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The key legislation that governs intellectual property in Laos is Law No 01/NA of December 20 2011, on Intellectual Property, as amended. Under the IP Law, trade mark owners can bring an administrative action, through the Department of Intellectual Property Rights (DIPR), against a shop that sells counterfeit products. This is the most effective anti-counterfeiting measure in Laos.

Generally, the law prohibits registration of trade marks lacking distinctiveness. However sometimes this rule can be waived. There is an international trade mark registration number 1140887 (see picture).

Recently, the PRC Trademark Office (TMO) has refused to formally accept a number of oppositions on grounds that the initial arguments and evidence filed failed to satisfy new standing requirements under the recently revised Trademark Law. The non-acceptance of these oppositions (referred to below as rejections) has caused consternation among the filers and their agents, as the TMO failed to provide any prior notice of a change in policy with respect to the time for filing supporting evidence in this regard.

In the case of Dura-Mine Sdn Bhd v Elster Metering Ltd & Anor [2015] 1 CLJ 887, the Federal Court of Malaysia conclusively decided that the exact original copies of artistic works were not required for the purposes of establishing prima facie evidence of ownership of copyright under the "true copy" requirement within Section 42(1)(a)(iii) of the Copyright Act 1987, and applied the common law position that copyright is not limited to the first or earliest work.

In Solid 21 v Hublot of America, et al, the US District Court for the Central District of California issued a ruling holding that once a term has become generic, it is always generic and cannot be the subject of trade mark protection under any circumstances even if the purported owner can demonstrate secondary meaning in that term.

A group of Māori (New Zealand's indigenous people) representatives filed a claim before the Waitangi Tribunal, asking the Tribunal to examine the Crown negotiations towards the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA).

The Administrative Court of First Instance of Athens recently delivered a well-founded judgement on the infringement of a well-known trade mark.

The Dutch soccer team played two World Cup finals in 1974 and 1978. No need to elaborate on the scores. During that period, the German sports multinational Adidas was the sponsor of the Dutch team. Its competitor Puma was personal sponsor of Dutch star player Johan Cruyff. At that time, Adidas and Puma were in fierce competition. Puma forbid Cruyff to play in an Adidas jersey. The parties negotiated and it was agreed that Cruyff's jersey be adapted. Instead of the Adidas three-stripe pattern on the sleeves, worn by the team, Cruyff played with a two-stripe T-shirt.

In a recent decision, the Tribunal de Grande Instance de Paris has confirmed that the rules of professional secrecy applicable to the French IP counsel profession (Article L422-11 of the Intellectual Property Code) include absolute professional secrecy which extends to professional correspondence exchanged between the French patent counsel and a client, a third party, a colleague or a lawyer.

Two decisions in Europe and the United States have addressed the licensing of standard- essential patents. Andrew Moir, David Wilson, Nic Ruesink- Brown, Joseph Falcone and Allison Alcasabas ask: have the courts provided a helping FRAND?