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Practitioners have welcomed Intellectual Property Office of Singapore (IPOS) amendments to the patent regime to spur innovation and improve the quality of patents granted

Deciding whether to keep proprietary information secret or apply for a patent is a key commercial decision. Leythem Wall and Katherine Banks weigh up the options, focusing on inventions in the chemical industry

In a recent case relating to a product (a medical device) that treats coughs, some interesting issues were raised regarding parallel imports, repackaging and unfair competition.

April 21 2017, was a milestone in the settlement of IP infringement cases relating to .vn domain names in Vietnam. This was the day the domain name bmw.com.vn was withdrawn by the national domain name management agency, the Vietnam Internet Network Information Center (VNNIC), taking control of the domain away from the registrant by 'flicking a switch' at the registry. It marked the first time under recently passed legislation that VNNIC had withdrawn a domain name at the request of the IP infringement settlement agency, the Inspectorate of the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST).

Brazil’s new Civil Procedure Code came into force last year. Breno Akherman and André Oliveira of Daniel Legal & IP Strategy analyse its impact on IP litigation so far

Plain packaging has become a hot topic in Turkey as controlling the consumption of tobacco has been one of the top priorities of the Turkish government. The government has adopted the 2015-2018 National Programme and Action Plan for Tobacco Control, which stipulates the implementation of necessary provisions related to plain packaging into the relevant legislation.

H D Lee of the USA, owner of the famous brand Lee for jeans, suffered another setback in its trade mark battle with local company Emerald Garment Manufacturing Co. As far back as 1995, the Supreme Court issued decision in GR 100098 holding that Emerald's trade mark Stylistic Mr Lee is not confusingly similar to H D Lee's trademark Lee, applying the holistic test, despite the decisions of the then Bureau of Patents, Trademarks, Technology Transfer (now the Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines) and the Court of Appeals using the dominancy test. This 1995 decision also ruled that while H D Lee was the senior registrant, it failed to substantiate its claim of prior use of the mark dating as far back as 1946, while Emerald was able to provide sales invoices proving actual use since 1975.

To further improve examination quality, the Taiwan IP Office (TIPO) recently amended the examination guidelines regarding inventive step, among other changes. The new guidelines were implemented on July 1 2017.

Australian courts have recently taken a dim view of competitors claiming that the patentee has made unjustified threats of patent infringement. It is now clear that, in relation to the assessment of damages, it is necessary for the defendant to show any threats made by the patentee were directly the cause of loss or damage to the defendant.

Cambodia and Thailand have made modifications to the rules and regulations related to their trade mark application filing procedures as part of the ongoing south-east Asia region-wide trend towards electronic IP processes.