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In the past, end-users might use a remote control to store and manage relevant channel and TV programme information. The process, however, has become more burdensome due to the increasing number of TV channels and service providers. The information that end-users will have to manage by themselves has become voluminous and complicated.

In January, the US Supreme Court granted a petition for certiorari in Kirtsaeng v John Wiley & Sons, Inc to decide the standard for determining whether attorneys' fees should be granted to a prevailing party in a copyright case. The Supreme Court's decision on the issue will be closely monitored by prospective plaintiffs and defendants alike since the risk of fee-shifting may have a significant impact upon a party's decision-making with respect to both pursuing and defending a litigation.

Bad faith filings by registry pirates in China continue to pose enormous challenges to brand owners, large and small, foreign and domestic.

Back in April 2015 we reported that one of the China antimonopoly agencies (SAIC) published the IP Misuse Rules, which became effective then. What followed after that surprised everyone. The other anti-monopoly agency (National Development and Reform Commission, NDRC), which was at the centre of the attention of the global IP/antitrust community for last couple of years due to its investigation into Qualcomm and InterDigital in China, announced in the summer that it was asked by the State Council to draft guidelines on IP misuse. NDRC issued a preliminary draft in October 2015 and issued an updated version in January.

The Patent Office considered an appeal filed by Brouwerij L Huygne company, Belgium on the decision of the examiner to refuse recognition in Russia of International Registration number 1141648 for goods in class 32 and services in class 43. The trade mark according to the International Registration is a depiction of a decapitation device, the guillotine, brought into general use by Dr Guillotin. For those who do not immediately understand there is also the word element "La Guillotine" across the device.

On December 8 2015, the Supreme Court, in a decision in four consolidated cases (GR Nos 209271, 209276, 209301 and 209430) permanently enjoined the field testing for Bt talong (genetically modified eggplant), declared the Department of Agriculture Administrative Order No 08, series of 2002 (DAO 08) as null and void, and temporarily enjoined any application for contained use, field testing, propagation, commercialisation, and importation of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) until a new administrative order is promulgated in accordance with the law.

It is established practice at the European Patent Office to offer accelerated processing of patent applications simply on request by the applicant, without the need to pay additional fees. This is in contrast to other patent offices, such as the USPTO or the UKIPO, which will only allow accelerated processing in specific circumstances (for example, when potentially infringing activity has been identified) or for particular categories of applications (for example, inventions having an environmental benefit).

The Athens Single Member Court of First Instance recently granted a preliminary injunction based on a patent despite the fact that the Opposition Division of the EPO, a few days before the preliminary injunction hearing, had revoked the same patent.

Scott A McKeown discusses three important Patent Trial and Appeal Board cases that addressed the important issue of estoppel, and looks ahead to this year with the Federal Circuit continuing to work through appeals and the Supreme Court set to rule on Cuozzo

Following the Myriad decision in the United States, the High Court of Australia recently denied the patent eligibility of isolated genes of BRCA1 DNA. Along with the Alice decision from the United States, this is truly a new wave. What we patent reflects the most fundamental social decisions in our patent system. It is worth seeing how Korea is riding on this wave and balancing its system.