#homage #IPDistinctions – Afred NOBEL and women’s awards at NOBEL 2018

/0 Comments/in /by

Today, there is no need to present the Nobel Prize, which is undoubtedly a reward of international significance. The prize was awarded for the first time in 1901, and aims to reward people who, through their inventions, discoveries and improvements, or their work for peace, have “brought the greatest benefit to humanity”.

Alfred NOBEL was born on October 21, 1833 in stockolm and died on December 10, 1896 in Italy. He was a chimistre and a weapons manufacturer by his armament company Bofors. Alfred NOBEL has filed more than 350 patents. The chemical element Nobelium has been named in his honor.

Alfred NOBEL was born to a family of engineers. His grandfather Olof RUDBECK (1630-1702) was one of the most famous Swedish scientists of the seventeenth century. His father Immanuel NOBEL was a Swedish engineer, architect and businessman who sold many inventions. He invented the plywood and made many inventions in the armament. These last inventions did not imply much success in Sweden, of peaceful tradition. As a result, the NOBEL family moved to Russia in 1838. Immanuel NOBEL founded a marine mining company, which will be taken over by Ludvig NOBEL, Alfred NOBEL’s brother.

At 18 years old Alfred NOBEL went to study Chemistry in the United States for 4 years and in Paris for 1 year. In a context where gunpowder remained the only powerful explosive for a long time, the discovery of nitrocellulose in 1846, followed by nitroglycerin in 1847 stimulated research. Back in Sweden, Alfred NOBEL devoted himself in 1862 to the study of a safe use of nitroglycerine. He founded the company KemaNobel (later AkzoNobel), and faced several failures resulting in several explosions some fesant deaths.

After several years Alfred NOBEL succeeded in making the use of nitroglycerine less dangerous and in controlling its power. He accidentally discovers that the mixture of nitroglycerin with an inert and absorbent solid, Kieselguhr (diatomaceous earth) gives good results. Transport is thus facilitated because the explosion requires the use of a detonator. The Nobel detonator and patented in 1865, dynamite is patented in 1867.

He also has a French laboratory where he invented, by chance, another explosive more practical than dynamite, ie: dynamite gum or “dynamite extra Nobel” or gelignite (blasting gelatin), composed of nitroglycerine (93%) and collodion ( 7%).

He acquired many properties including the old castle of Sevran in Seine-et-Oise (currently Seine-Saint-Denis) and the castle called “La Maison du Fayet”, a typical house of the eighteenth century.

Before the end of his life, he moved to Sanremo in Italy.

It was as a result of an erroneous publication of an anticipated obituary of a French newspaper mentioning “The merchant of death is dead.” Dr. Alfred Nobel, who made a fortune by finding a way to kill more people faster than ever before, died yesterday “, which pushed him to leave a better image to posterity.

In his will, Alfred NOBEL bequeaths almost all of his fortune for the creation of a fund whose interests will be redistributed “to those who over the past year have returned to humanity the greatest services” in five different areas: peace or diplomacy, literature, chemistry, physiology or medicine, and physics. This is how the Nobel Prize was born. The fortune left is 31.5 million Swedish krona of the time, which is estimated at 179 million euros.

The 2018 edition was held today.
The prize was given to illustrious scientists such as Wilhelm Röntgen (Physics 1901); Hendrik Lorentz (Physics 1902); Henri Becquerel, Pierre and Marie Curie (Physics 1903), Ivan Pavlov (Medicine 1904); Johannes Diderik van der Waals (Physics 1910); Albert Einstein (Physics 1921) Niels Bohr (Physics 1922) …
The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Martin Luther KING (1964) and Nelson MANDELA (1993)

The 2018 edition wants to honor women by giving them 3 prizes:

Donna Strickland for having revolutionized laser technology. Prize is shared with Arthur Ashkin and Gérard Mourou (former teacher of Donna Strickland).
Dona Strickland and Gérard Mourou have developed a “method of generating ultra-short and high intensity optical pulses”. According to the Academy, the three scientists have revolutionized the physics of lasers so that they can reaakize extremely small objects and incredibly fast processes. The possibilities are numerous in precision instruments in research and industrial and medical applications.

Frances Arnold is Laureate of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for her directed evolution methods for creating useful biological systems, including enzymes, metabolic pathways, genetic regulatory circuits, organisms, and directed evolution.

Nadia Murad who is an Iraqi human rights activist, goodwill ambassador of the United Nations for the dignity of victims of human trafficking.
She is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize with Denis Mukwege for their efforts to end the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war.

Inventing and discovering is bestowing substance to posterity.

SOTERYAH IP

#IPBday – The kevlar patent is over 50 years old!

/0 Comments/in /by

Stephanie KWOLEK, the inventor of the kevlar, symbolizes women in the post-war scientific community having to make considerable efforts in comparison with her (male) peers, having to leave the lot significantly to be kept in office.

Born in New Kensington, Pennsylvania, in 1923, from Polish parents in the United States, Stephanie KWOLEK early became much interested in science and medicine. She graduated in chemistry at Carnegie Mellon University near Pittsburgh in 1946.

She will take up a position in research at DuPont’s textile fiber laboratory in Buffalo, New York, orriginally to finance her studies. In such an environment, she provided considerable effort and determination to try not to lose her job as it was for women in men’s work environments in post-war America. She was then hired at DuPont Pioneering Research Laboratory in Wilmington, Delaware.

As is often the case, the invention of Kevlar was a happy coincidence. Stéphanie KWOLEK was working on tire reinforcing fibers, with tests on strands of carbon-based molecules to be polymerized. She got a thin, opaque liquid while she was expecting a limpid, syrupy liquid.

Her colleagues were convinced that it is unlikely that this polymer can be transformed into fibers, but Stéphanie KWOLEK maintains her determination and persuades another scientist to spin the liquid through a laboratory “spinneret”. This type of machine makes it possible to eliminate the liquid solvent to obtain fibers. It was a success.

Kevlar is essentially a super fiber that is 5 times stronger than steel and much lighter. It is still used today in the aeropace as well as construction of aircraft and bulletproof vests. This material has saved the lives of many people

This shows that determination in Research or R&D can lead to scientific breakthroughs.

SOTERYAH IP

#IPLaw #PatLaw – Disadvantages of the new mandatory online filing of patent applications before the French Patent Office (INPI)

/0 Comments/in , /by

Following the filing of the French trademarks and the filing of French designs, the General Director of the French Patent Office issued a decision on last November 8, concerning the filing of French patent applications and other national proceedings to be made exclusively online, with effect from November 19, 2018.

Previously, it was possible to file a patent application by hand, post, fax or filing software (epoline) common with several offices in Europe and with the European Patent Office. Since last November 19, these other means of filing are no longer allowed.

An INPI portal has been in operation for a very long time, and has been updated following objections. Indeed, schematically, the portal system looks for the term “description” in the text of the application to identify the description part, and does the same for the claims, the abstract, and the figures that should normally be integrated in the same file in docx format.

Following this, the system converts the deposited file into an “enrich” docx file with specific tags. The result is a change in the font, margins, character sizes and font, line numbers converted to paragraph numbers, and initial claim numbers (“1.”) are modified to (“[Claim 1] “). The system then generates a downloadable pdf file corresponding to the docx.

Thus, apart from the sequence of letters, the file of the pending application before the INPI no longer has any aspect in common with the file that the applicant has introduced on the system. It becomes difficult to refer to the application as filed, or to a co-pending application that should have been identical. Similarly in the context of a modification of the claims, for the practitioner, only the initial file in docx is available but it does not correspond, in the form, to the pending set of claims.

The removal of the other means of filing and the obbligaion to go through the portal INPI has, from the beginning, raised problems of form / cosmetic text, as well as practical problems from the point of view of the practitioner.

Most pratitians each have their uses in terms of fonts, formatting including paragraphs. The removal of the old filing means forces everyone to have a pending application to the INPI having exactly the same form and a relatively large font size delta between the title and the body.

Beyond the impersonalization of the texts of the French patent applications, come practical disadvantages when the practitioner wants to refer to the application as filed or the pending application, the relevant mentions are no longer in the same place. The same is true when one wishes to make modifications similar to those of a co-pending application, or to modify the claims during the procedure. Indeed, the pending application before the INPI is not available in editable format and the practitioner will use the initial file with the variations of positions.

What about documents filed in foreign languages? For example, can a French application under Chinese priority, for which instructions are given on the last day of the priority period, be recognized by the INPI portal system?

As for references numbers, it would be necessary to systematize the use of paragraph numbers, but it is possible that an empty paragraph could be considered by the portal system as a new paragraph where the practitioner would not have associated any number, which can generate specific shifts.

After objections the portal has been modified. The main novelties that were deemed sufficient to close the debate were the establishment of a fallback procedure and the possibility of paying the fees after the initial filing. Thus, a docx file that the system could not convert can be filed as is in its pdf form in the fallback procedure, the burden is for the applicant or the practitioner to file a compliant file within two months.

These changes are still not fully satisfactory. The impersonalization of the texts remains, as well as the practical disadvantages. Tests show that the filing of a Chinese docx makes it possible to do the fallback procedure. The regularization of the docx and the translation of the Chinese text of the application into French seems to have to be done within the same period of 2 months from the filing.

The main problem that remains to date concerns the case where the practitioner receives instructions of filing a French application under foreign priority with a document in pdf on the last day, without any docx document available for example due to jet lag. Indeed, in this case, the system hangs and does not accept the pdf because it is required to file first a docx could that not be converted, and then a pdf that exactly matches the docx … The risk of loss priority is therefore important with the subsequent consequences in terms of the validity of the patent application.

By way of comparison, online filing at the European Patent Office (EPO), the UK Office (UKIPO) and the German Office (DPMA) do not, to our knowledge, have this type of disadvantages.

The INPI portal therefore needs some additional developments to limit the aesthetic, practical and substantive disadvantages.

SOTERYAH IP

#PatLaw – The employer has disclosed an invention that would have worth millions

/0 Comments/in , /by

One more or less uniform paradigm in various jurisdictions, is that the invention of the employee belongs, because of the employment contract, to the employer. Some specificities may exist in certain jurisdictions but the principle is generally this one.

Under French law, schematically, when the inventor had an inventive mission, the employer must give him an “additional remuneration” which must be proportionate in the light of the commercial success of the invention. When the inventor did not have an inventive mission, but realized the invention in the field of the company, the situation is generally equivalent.

But what happens in a case where the ivention is published without having filed any application?
Indeed, the fruit of an invention is really substantial only in the case of the sale of an industrial property title implying a monopoly.

This is the situation in which Jean-Michel Lerussé, a former employee of the Kéolis group in charge of the subway of Rennes (FR), found himself.

Mr. Lerussé was hired by the Keolis group in 2002, when the first subway line for Rennes was commissioned. He spent long hours cleaning the subways by hand with water jets, a brush, a bucket of water and soap. This represented nearly 1,000 hours of work and 60% of their activity. Washing was used to limit accumulations of graphite that could cause serious short circuits.

Tired of these tedious operations, this former mechanic, after working nights, designed and built a water jet cleaning machine with washing bars and high-pressure nozzles on a maintenance train.

Mr Lerussé consideres today that the Keolis Group has never acknowledged his work and has removed any chance of being protected by making a public disclosure of the invention. As a consequence of this, a filing of a patent application is no longer possible, and Mr. Lerussé can not claim any additional remuneration on this basis.

In this type of situation, it is possible to pursue remedies on the basis of the general law on responsibility. It must be established that there was a fault, a damage and a causal link relating to them.

In the case in point, Mr Lerussé states that:

– in 2002, the agents could clean 3,643 m of lanes in 30 nights and that amounted to € 5.22 per meter;

– in 2016, thanks to his invention, they could clean 46,432 m in 53 nights and it came back to € 0.67 per meter.

This allowed Keolis to save 87% on maintenance.

This saving can be determined in terms of income for the patent holder for example on the basis of royalties from almost all metro maintenance companies in the world.

It is an income from which Mr. Lerussé can no longer benefit what constitutes a damaged, caused by the public disclosure of the Keolis group.

It is surely on the basis of a calculation of this type that Mr. Lerussé and his lawyer came to claim the group Keolis 25 million euros.

The lawsuit between Mr. Lerusé and Keolis takes place today (November 20, 2018), The judgment is eagerly awaited. As far as the French case law is concerned in this matter, it is not necessary that an application for the invention was filed to avail itself of the additional remuneration, yet will it establish with probity that the damage is actually 25 millions of euros …

Stay connected, we will let you know of the update …

SOTERYAH IP

#Hommage – Lise MEITNER – Radioactivity and Nuclear Physics

/0 Comments/in /by

Lise MEITNER (November 1878 AT – October 1968 UK) is renowned for her work on radioactivity and nuclear fission, as well as the discovery of protactinium.

She received 48 nominations and 21 scientific awards for her work, including:

-1925: Lieben price for the study of beta and gamma rays;
-1947: Award of honor of the city of Vienna for science;
-1949: Max-Planck Medal of the German Physics Society, with Otto Hahn;
-1955: Otto Hahn Prize for Chemistry and Physics;
-1957: elected honorary doctor at the Free University of Berlin, May 11, 1957;
-1966: Enrico Fermi Award, with Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann.

While studying in Vienna, she attended all courses taught by Ludwig Boltzmann and she studied articles published by Lord Rayleigh.

During her career in Germany, she oversaw the construction of a particle accelerator in the physics department, which she ran until 1938 in Germany.

As a jewish woman in the Hitler years, Lise MEITNER is first and foremost the symbol of unjustly ignored scientists, even though she was considered, secretly in her time, and publicly then until today as a pioneer in the discoveries of nuclear fission.

In 1938, Lise MEITNER was forced to flee from Germany, but continued her collaboration with her team, including Otto HAHN, by correspondence. For example, MEITNER and HAHN met illegally in Copenhagen in November 1938, and planned new experiments.
Otto HAHN conducted these experiments with Fritz Strassmann, and they showed that there is barium among the elements produced as a result of the bombardment of uranium with neutrons. Unfortunately, given the political situation, Lise MEITNER could not appear as co-author of the subsequent publication in Naturwissenschaften in december 1938, despite her major role in the conduct of this research.

The Nobel Prize for Chemistry was the awarded to Otto HAHN, much to the surprise of the scientific community, including Dirk Coster, a Dutch physicist who discovered Hafnium (Hf) (element 72) in 1923.

Lise MEITNER is said to have been the victim of what is known as the “Matilda effect”, namely the attribution of women’s scientific discoveries to their male counterparts.

Subsequently, Lise MEITNER received many honors, and was more recognized in the United States. She was a member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences and an honorary doctor of several universities.

SOPERYAH IP

#IPLaw – Rather seizure for counterfeiting or discovery procedure?

/0 Comments/in , /by

Let’s start with a story that can be that of your company.

After long efforts, the company may have products recognized by its clientele as qualitative, including its distinctive signs and its constant search to offer high-performance products.
Whenever the customer recognizes the color, the name, the form, he expects to renew a more than satisfactory experience that he has already had with the products of the same company, and may expect to have additional advanced technical innovations.

Given the success of the first company, a second competing company may consider investing in the same market and offering similar products. Therefore, there is a limit not to be crossed, the freedom of the second company ending at the frontier of the intellectual property rights of the first one when they are regularly established.

If the competing company uses an identical or similar distinctive sign, to be compared to a registered trademark, there is a dispute on grounds of trademark infringement. If it is a technological innovation protected by a patent, it is rather a patent infringement.

But how to provide admissible proof that my competitor has reproduced my mark or my innovation (French procedures)?
1 °) The holder can mandate a bailiff to make a purchase statement. In essence, the bailiff buys the product and places it under seal.

This evidence is limited because there are usually a lot of commercial intermediaries. In addition, it is inoperative in most cases of infringement of a process patent.

2 °) The “royal” way is the seizure for counterfeiting. As a historical procedure in France, and implemented in Europe by a so-called “enforcemment” directive (2004/48), the seizure for counterfeiting allows the holder of intellectual property rights regularly registered, to request from the competent judge of the Court of First Instance, on the basis of evidence and the industrial property title in its possession, to issue an order for seizure.

On the basis of this order, the Patent Attorney and a bailiff visit the premises of the competitor to make the seizure.

It can be a seizure of samples, industrial documents, accounting documents, descriptive seizure, photos of installations … as provided in particular Article L. 615-5 of the Intellectual Property Code.

The procedure is very framed. Form defects can cancel the seiure. The appelant must commence an action on the merits within 20 business days or 31 calendar days after the seizure. If not, the seizure will be canceled.
In addition, the seizure is made by agents who are bound by professional secrecy, so much so that the secrecy of the business is not violated.

An abusive seizure engages the responsibility of the appelant, who will have to pay damages.

The purpose of the seizure for counterfeiting is to be able to provide substantial evidence of infringement of the rights from within the defendant’s company. Revenue from counterfeiting can be deducted as well as the product distribution chain.

Even if the procedure seems invasive, it is very framed so that fundamental rights are not violated.

Other jurisdictions such as those in the United States are based on so-called discovery procedures, where parties must exchange as much information as needed without hiding anything. In general, the most wealthy parties flood the other parties with an infinity of documents to be reviewed by the advisors. The less wealthy parties should take of their time, which would have been used for production, to search for the documents and send them to the other parties.

In comparison, the seizure for counterfeiting would go to the heart of the issue and enable to quickly collect information that is needed, unlike the discovery procedure.

We remain at your disposal for any additional clarification you may need.

SOPERYAH IP

#IPLaw, #IPBasics – Detention under customs control and custom seizure of more than 8000 counterfeit automobile parts in Drôme and Indre (FR)

/0 Comments/in , /by

EU law allows a regime of keeping goods in detention under customs control, when they are suspected of infringing industrial property rights.

Needless to say, it is important that rights must first be registered to justify the use of this regime.

Under this scheme, the procedure in France allows custom agents to retain imported goods by refusing any release for 10 days. Detention under customs may be initiated by a written request from the IPR holder, or on the own initiative of the custom agents.

The filing of a request for intervention of the customs is free of charge. The request is valid for one year, and renewable by a written request. As provided by law, when the goods suspected to be infringing are immobilized during a detention, the IPR holder must justify, within 10 working days, either of provisional measures or of the introduction of a legal action.

Within this period, the customs contact the right holder in order to have the goods appraised by an expert, generally the IP atorney of the right holder, to recognize whether or not the detention is justified and whether an infringement of industrial property rights is characterized.
Subsequently, according to the procedure, the holder can request the destruction of the goods in the absence of express objection from the importer. This is generally called the simplified destruction procedure. Alternatively or cumulatively, the holder may bring an action for infringement against the importer.

Actually, even without action by the owner of the IP rights, in some cases the customs authorities usually use their customs powers to destroy counterfeit goods, in obvious cases.

Thus, at the beginning of September this year, according to the provisions of the procedure, the customs office of Valencia (FR) has selected among the import declarations received, one particular from Turkey.

After checking the goods, the customs officers discovered window lift systems, door openings, and door handle parts. The customs announcement states that “none of the plastic packaging containing the car parts contained the wording “adaptable to “”, which suggests that the packages in question mentioned the names of the car trademarks.

The expertise of the holders of IP rights has recognized 3 740 spare parts as counterfeits. These counterfeits have been subject to a simplified destruction procedure.

The information was transmitted to the service within the territory of the recipient company, so that an inspection could be made on its premises, which enabled the seizure of 4 300 additional parts considered as counterfeits, which subsequently underwent a simplified destruction procedure.

In 2017, the French customs seized more than 8.4 million counterfeits articles in France.

Of course, the importer in good faith may request the intervention of an IP Attorney to make legitimate disputes and avoid having to cease his activity because of significant unjustified losses.

SOPERYAH IP

#CopyRLaw #EULaw #DELaw – CJEU Decision on Peer-to-Peer Copyright Matters

/0 Comments/in /by

The case (C-149/17) pits the German publishing house Bastei Lübbe against a private individual, Mr Michael Strotzer, who has an internet connection which would have been used to share, and make downloadable, an audio book on a platform Peer-to-peer with an unlimited number of users.

For the record, French law established the entity HADOPI (High Authority for the Dissemination of Works and Protection of Rights on the Internet) and what is commonly referred to as the “graduated response”. Essentially, in such cases, the HADOPI, or more precisely the HADOPI Rights Protection Commission (CPD), sends successive warnings to the holder of the Internet subscription used.

After three unsuccessful warnings, the CPD may seize the judicial authority on the basis of the negligence breach for failing to prevent the use of its connection for infringement. The contravention can go up to 1,500 euros or 7,500 euros for legal persons.
The CPD can also invoke the basis of the offense of counterfeiting, likely to result in a sentence of up to 3 years imprisonment and 300,000 euros fine or 1,500,000 euros for a legal person.

German law provides a way out for Mr Strotzer. According to the case law of the Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof), it is possible to invoke the fundamental right to the protection of family life, and the fact that family members have had access to the internet connection, such that the holder of said connection may not assume responsibility. It was on this basis that Mr. Strotzer argued that his parents living at home had access to this connection, without further specification.

In this context, the Landgericht München I asks the Court of Justice to interpret the provisions of Union law on the protection of intellectual property rights.

The judgment of the CJEU is more in line with the French interpretation. The Court asks the Landgericht München I to find the right balance between the right to an effective remedy and the right to intellectual property, on the one hand, and the right to respect for private and family life, on the other.

The Court considers that such a balance is lacking when there is almost absolute protection for the family members of the holder of an Internet connection.

The court asks the Landgericht München I to verify the existence, in German law, of other means, procedures and possible remedies.

To be followed closely…

SOPERYAH IP

#IPLaw #FRLaw – Advantages and disadvantages of the provisions of the PACTE draft law (FR)

/0 Comments/in , /by

For the record, the French government has made draft law to boost the French economy through business development. This is the PACTE (Action Plan for Growth and Transformation of Enterprises) draft law. The law was adopted at first reading by the National Assembly on October 9, 2018. We will do another a post to inform of the effective entry into force of the law.

Part of the law includes significant changes in French patent law, with a view to promoting its attractiveness.

For this part, the provisions of the draft law have advantages in the sense of attractiveness sought, but also disadvantages that may have a counterproductive effect.

The biggest positive effect would be an announcement effect, namely that companies hearing government’s efforts are more inclined to invest, expand their businesses and expand their portfoliosof IP rights; combined with effective improvement related to the other provisions of the law.

We will review these patent provisions in a synthetic way, with for each one, the current situation, the advantages and disadvantages:

1 °) The provisional patent application

This is the point that is most commented by people not aware of the legal issues of patent law. The relevant provisions have been removed from the draft PACTE Law to be introduced by regulation.

The aim is to bring it closer to the American system where applicants have the opportunity to file an application that does not necessarily fulfill the formal requirements, at reduced cost, without the filing being analyzed by the Patent Office (in our case the INPI). The applicant then has the opportunity to re-file the subject-matter of the provisional application one year later at the most, in due form.

The advantage could be a first quick filing to have an application date at a lower costs.

In the current system, as already discussed in a previous post, it is already possible to file a patent application without paying the official fees, to have a filing date and benefit from the effects of a provisional application.

Unfortunately, substantive issues usually arise. The costs of preparation and filing by an expert are intended to cover several subject-matters functionning in the same way as the preferred embodiment of the applicant, allowing to have a wide scope of protection, more difficult to circumvent.
If an applicant files a provisional (or definitive) patent application without the assistance of an expert, the description will likely be limited in terms of coverage, and it will be difficult or impossible to increase the scope of the patent application, as well as having a first filing date.

Therefore, whether for a provisional definitive or final application, the assistance of an expert is highly recommended for the drafting of the patent application.

A provisional application will therefore set specific rules, but the “provisional” effect can already be used today.

The implementation by regulatory means would be provided in 6 months according to a statement of Mr. Bruno LEMAIRE in September 2018.

2 °) Strengthening the quality of patents (examination of inventive step)

One of the important measures of the draft PACTE law is the possibility for the INPI to reject patent applications for non-invention (in particular for lack of technical effects) or for lack of inventive step (Article 42bis).
In the current situation, the INPI can reject a patent application only for manifest lack of novelty, as regards the conditions of patentability. Inventive step and the non-invention aspect are examined before the courts in case of litigation.

The advantage of this provision would be the issuance of patents that further satisfy the requirements of patentability. It would result mechanically that fewer patents would be issued by the INPI which benefits third parties and not applicants. This measure will probably lead to a decrease in the number of French filings, and deflate patent portfolios.

A common practice of having patents or parts thereof serving for a business purpose will be greatly limited. These patents still make it possible to be viewed by the customers as a company in a constant search for innovation even if there is not a breakthrough innovation every time. This currently benefits all types of applicants (SMEs and large groups).

This provision will result in an increase in INPI’s staff, an increase of analysis time and an increase of the time to issue the French patent. An increase of the INPI official fees is therefore to be expected. Similarly, the experts will have to spend more time on the files taking into account these changes of law, which will result in an increase of the consulting costs (in the current state, the expert checks that certain elements are indeed new and preferably inventive and confirms this to the client, without necessarily having to demonstrate inventiveness in detail to the INPI).

The entry into force is planned within two years after the promulgation of the PACTE law.

3 °) Opposition proceedings before the INPI

The opposition procedure will allow any third party with an interest in acting to question the validity of the patents issued by the INPI. If the mechanism used at the EPO is used, there will be some exchange of written arguments and then some oral proceedings.

In the current state, third parties only have the opportunity to file observations with relevant documents without being party to the proceedings and without any obligation to identify themselves or to prove an interest in acting . The third-party observations are possible 2 months after the publication of the patent application. Beyond that, you have to go to court.

The advantage would therefore be greater legal certainty for third parties, and standardization with other countries (namely the EPO, Germany, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Austria, Sweden, Norway , Finland, the United Kingdom, Denmark, Japan and the United States).

This proposal seems to go in the right direction, but will necessarily, in the same way as above, impose associated procedural and advisory costs.

4 °) The promotion of the utility certificate

The utility certificate is a title similar to a patent but of reduced duration, and issued without examination of the INPI. The law aims at increasing its duration from 6 to 10 years (as in Germany), and to implement the possibility of converting an application for a utility certificate into a patent application.

Only in case of litigation, a search will be required. With the PACTE law, it can be envisaged that research will also be required with the said transformation.

The improved utility certificate will come closer to the current potentially non-inventive patent with a shorter lifetime, and without a search report by the EPO (making it possible to anticipate the outcome of a European filing on the same invention).

The measures are mainly administrative and should not lead to substantial increases in costs.

5 °) A great absentee of the proposals remains the designation FR-PCT

To date, the international applications to be validated in France are necessarily made through the EPO, and the European patent is then validated in France.

It would have been interesting for foreign applicants wishing to be protected only in some European countries to have the possibility of directly designating France. A direct designation is already possible in Germany and the United Kingdom namely, and this would be in preparation in Ireland, Italy and the Netherlands namely.

In conclusion, the government attempts through this means to stimulate the development of companies and the protection of their industrial property to reach the levels of other countries, including Germany. The most important lever would have been to change the minds of entrepreneurs namely by training the companies on the interests of the protection of intellectual property. Indeed, German entrepreneurs have quickly have the reflex to file a patent application while French entrepreneurs are more inclined to test the product on the market which is generally detrimental to the validity of a patent filed thereafter.

SOPERYAH IP

#IPLaw #USLaw – Judgment erasing damages due by APPE Inc. to the WARF (University of Wiscousing) (US)

/0 Comments/in /by

For the background of the case, the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (“WARF”) sued Apple in january 2014, before the Wiscounsin District Court.

The WARF argued that Apple was infringing U.S. Patent No. 5,781,752, essentially concerning instructions executions in a predictive way by processors. The WARF argued that the A7, A8 and A8X integrated circuit chips infringed the patent in issue by their processors comprising a “Load-Store Dependency Predictor” (LSD).

As usual in these procedures, Apple has made a counterclaim for non-infringement and invalidity judgments of the patent in suit. In particular, U.S. Patent No. 5,619,662 was raised as a prior art anticipating predictive technology.

The District Court ruled in favor of the WARF regarding the novelty and the jury found the non-invalidity (ie: the validity of the patent), and the infringement of the patent. In addition, the jury has awarded the WARF, damages of more than 234 million dollars. Apple’s requests were rejected.

Apple appealed to the Court of Appeal of the Federal Circuit.

The Court of Appeal redid an analysis of the wording of the claims, in particular the use of the terms “particular” and “prediction”, the opinions of the experts of the parties and the arguments of the parties.

The Court of Appeal upheld the validity of the patent (in favor of the WARF), but also ruled in favor of APPLE because it overturned the decision on counterfeiting, awarding damages of over $ 234 million to the WARF.

This is a victory for Apple concerning the alleged infringement.

NOTE:
The patents in question (that of the WARF and the prior art) are protected only in the US, which shows that particular attention is required when entering the American market.

SOPERYAH IP