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Intellectual Property UK
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April 26, 2024
Coca-Cola Chews Up Greek Rival's 'Tsakiris' Snack TM
A Coca-Cola subsidiary defeated a rival that wanted to register the trademark "Tsakiris" to sell cereal snacks, after a European court ruled that it would take unfair advantage of the soft drink giant's reputation in Greek potato chips.
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April 26, 2024
Billboard Biz Gets OK To Fight To Opt Back Into UPC System
Billboard advertising firm Aim Sport can have another chance to challenge a ruling by the Unified Patents Court, which held that its decision to opt out of Europe's umbrella patents court system is permanent and cannot be revoked, the UPC ruled Friday.
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April 26, 2024
UK Litigation Roundup: Here's What You Missed In London
This past week in London has seen budget airline Ryanair file a claim against NATS PLC after the air traffic controller's system collapsed, Mastercard and Visa Europe face group claims from Christian Dior and dozens of other beauty retailers, an intellectual property clash between the publisher of The Sun and ITV, and ISC Europe sue a former director for alleged money laundering. Here, Law360 looks at these and other new claims in the U.K.
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April 26, 2024
Luxury Streetwear Brand Off-White Can't Block 'On White' TM
Luxury streetwear brand Off White has failed to convince the U.K.'s intellectual property authority to block a toothpaste brand from registering its "On White" trademark, with the regulator finding that there was no likelihood that the public would confuse the two logos.
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April 25, 2024
Game Cheat Tools Don't Infringe Copyright, EU Advocate Says
Third-party video game cheating software should not infringe game creators' copyright in the European Union if it only manipulates a gamer's input rather than the game's code itself, a legal adviser to the bloc's top court said Thursday amid Sony's dispute with a British gaming business.
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April 25, 2024
TM Applicants Must Prove Lost Reputation, EU Court Rules
A European court said Wednesday that a trademark's reputation can be "progressively" lost over time, ruling that companies must prove another trademark's reputation has fully dwindled in order to register a similar mark in a dispute over an LVMH-owned perfume brand.
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April 25, 2024
Pharma R&D Biz Set To Exit London Market
Pharmaceutical development specialist C4X Discovery Holdings PLC is set to delist from the London Stock Exchange on Friday, as it looks to go private to raise more funds amid concerns about the regulatory "burden" linked to its junior market.
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April 25, 2024
Jim Beam Loses TM Dispute Over 'Pinnacle' Name
American distiller Jim Beam failed to block a trademark for "Pinnacle Gin" because a similarly branded vodka company it owns isn't on the market in the U.K.
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April 25, 2024
Wachtell Steers Perrigo In €275M Unit Sale To Pharma Biz
Healthcare company Perrigo said Thursday that it has agreed to sell its pharmaceutical division for rare diseases to pharmaceutical company Esteve Healthcare SL for €275 million ($295 million) in a deal guided by Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz and Clifford Chance LLP.
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April 25, 2024
Zara's Reputation Not Enough To Block 'Zarzar' TM
Zara's owner has lost its bid to stop a U.K. trademark for "Zarzar" after the U.K. Intellectual Property Office found that any link between the high-street fashion giant and a company offering modeling services would be "fleeting and tenuous."
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April 25, 2024
German Pharma Biz Blocks Italian Cosmetics TM
A European court has overturned a decision that allowed Italian cosmetic dermatology brand Pherla Medical to register a trademark for its name, ruling that the logo was too similar to that of German pharmaceuticals company Verla-Pharm Arzneimittel.
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April 25, 2024
Hipgnosis Ditches Blackstone Bid For Concord's $1.5B Offer
Hipgnosis Songs has accepted a revised offer from its U.S. competitor Concord Chorus to buy the music rights investor for $1.5 billion, ditching Blackstone's $1.2 billion offer just days after accepting the private equity giant's deal.
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April 24, 2024
Ex-Yukos Oil Shareholders To Auction Russian Vodka Brands
The Benelux rights to trademarks for 18 Russian vodka brands, including Stolichnaya and Moskovskaya, will go to auction in June in the Netherlands, the former shareholders of Yukos Oil Co. said Wednesday as they sought to enforce arbitral awards now valued at $60 billion.
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April 24, 2024
Klarna Trims Down Basque Bank's European Logo TM
Buy-now, pay-later giant Klarna has won its fight to restrict trademark registration for a Spanish bank's logo, blocking protection in a myriad of categories ranging from laundry detergent to musical instruments.
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April 24, 2024
EU Geographic IP Rules Promoting Sustainability To Launch In May
New rules for geographical indications covering agricultural products, wines and spirit drinks in the European Union will kick in on May 13, part of the bloc's plan to boost uptake of the niche intellectual property right.
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April 24, 2024
Labcorp Prevails Over Software Biz TM Challenge In EU
Labcorp has cleared its path to a trademark over its name in the European Union after a court ruled Wednesday that a German software business can't halt the application based on its earlier "labcore" signs that it has not sufficiently used in recent years.
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April 24, 2024
Panasonic Denies 'Illegitimate Pressure' In 4G Patent Fight
Panasonic told a London court Wednesday that a bid by rival Xiaomi to have the Japanese giant's litigation accusing it of infringing standard essential wireless patents in other European courts thrown out is "dead in the water," saying its overseas claims against the company are legitimate.
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April 24, 2024
Monster Energy Can't Get Descriptive 'Flavor Unleashed' TM
Monster Energy's "Flavor Unleashed" logo is not distinctive enough for a European Union trademark because it simply describes the characteristics of the drinks it appears on, an intellectual property appeals panel in the bloc said Wednesday.
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April 24, 2024
Marine Tech Co. Fights MoD Unit's 'Inflated' $90M Claim
A South Korean marine navigation business that misused a Ministry of Defence agency's data to make its own products has hit back at the agency's claim for as much as $90 million, alleging it includes jacked-up figures and miscalculations.
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April 24, 2024
IP Firm Can't Take Bid To Block Clients' Case To Top Court
Britain's highest court has rejected a final attempt by Marks & Clerk LLP to block thousands of former clients from bringing a bribery class action over alleged secret commission payments, ruling that the law firm did not put forward any arguable legal challenges that justified an appeal.
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April 23, 2024
Advertising Biz Can't Avoid Liability For Billboard Tech IP
A London appeals court ruled Tuesday that a sports advertising company's digital billboard displays did not analyze pixels in a different enough way to overturn a finding that it infringed a rival's patent for the moving displays.
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April 23, 2024
Biotech Gets Rival's DNA-Detection Patents Invalidated
A London court nixed two DNA sequence detection patents Tuesday, ruling that information available before they were protected would have prompted skilled scientists to make the invention eventually.
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April 23, 2024
Novartis Wins TM Fight After Trade Services Linked To Retail
Altamedics has lost a bid to register a trademark for its name after European officials ruled that buyers would think its products came from Novartis, which had already registered the "Alta" brand for similar pharmaceutical goods.
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April 23, 2024
Panasonic Accused Of 'Illegitimate Pressure' In Patent Fight
Chinese electronics giant Xiaomi asked a London court on Tuesday to prevent Panasonic from suing it in overseas jurisdictions amid a patent dispute, arguing that its Japanese rival is using the threat of injunctions to put pressure on it to accept a licensing deal.
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April 23, 2024
Pfizer Says Moderna MRNA Patent Offers Nothing New
Pfizer urged a London court on Tuesday to revoke one of Moderna's patents for the mRNA vaccine, kicking off the U.K. arm of the global litigation campaign over the central intellectual property behind the COVID-19 jabs.
Expert Analysis
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A Look Ahead At Key UK Intellectual Property Cases
Anticipated 2023 U.K. intellectual property decisions include robotics, artificial intelligence, and clean energy matters that have also been heard in the U.S., while other areas to watch include global fair, reasonable and nondiscriminatory issues, as well as COVID-19 patent litigation, say Tom Oliver and Claire Robinson at Powell Gilbert.
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Lessons That May Be Learned From The Demise Of Made.com
With Made.com going into administration, companies that may face similar challenges should take on board that the earlier adequate preemptive planning is considered, the more financial and legal options there will be to avoid last minute firefighting and to focus instead on strengthening the business, says Eleni Michaela at Faegre Drinker.
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Teva Case Aims Europe's Pharma Crackdown At IP Loophole
The European Commission's recent allegations against Teva signal not only the EU competition watchdog's continued focus on intellectual property violations in the pharmaceutical sector but also its new enforcement interest in exclusionary disparagement, say Robert Bell and Malgorzata Janiec at Armstrong Teasdale.
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Determining Whether To Opt Out Of New Unified Patent Court
The new United Patent Court, made up of judges from all European Union member states, will cover the new unitary patent and European patents unless the owner chooses to opt out during the transition period, so patent proprietors must consider whether to opt out for each patent family, say Steffen Steininger and Anna-Katharina Friese-Okoro at Hogan Lovells.
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10 Things To Know About The Coming EU Unified Patent Court
When the Unified Patent Court opens next year, it will represent a paradigm shift for adversarial patent proceedings in Europe, and practitioners should familiarize themselves now with this new, centralized litigation system, say Fabian Koenigbauer at Ice Miller and Thomas Kronberger at Grünecker.
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7 Key Takeaways For Litigating Willful Patent Infringement
Brian Nolan and Manuel Velez at Mayer Brown explore the impact of the Federal Circuit's 2021 SRI International v. Cisco Systems decision, and six other areas recent parties have focused on when litigating willful infringement in the latest case law.
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Trademark Ruling Brings Clarity To Product Defect Liability
The recent Court of Justice of the EU ruling in Fennia v. Philips, its first concerning the trademark aspect of producer liability in Article 3(1) of Directive 85/374, brings greater clarity to the question of compensation in the event of a claim for defective products, say Radboud Ribbert and Thomas van Weeren at Greenberg Traurig.
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Appointments Shape EU Unified Patent Court Before Launch
A series of judiciary appointments at the EU Unified Patent Court help put the court on track for its April opening, while also reflecting a patent-friendly enforcement system, say attorneys at Baker McKenzie.
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5 Considerations In Preparing For EU's New Patent System
With the upcoming implementation of the unitary patent and Unified Patent Court, Europe gets closer to its long-term goal of one EU patent that can be enforced in one court, and non-EU patent owners and applicants will have strategic decisions to make, say Fabian Koenigbauer at Ice Miller and Thomas Kronberger at Grünecker.
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Reexamining Negative Limitations After Novartis Patent Ruling
The Federal Circuit's decision and denial of rehearing in Novartis v. Accord has created exacting standards that must be met in order for negative limitations in patent claims to satisfy the written description requirement, but whether the dissent is correct that the majority opinion heightened the standard is an arguable point, say Jonathan Fitzgerald and Jaime Choi at Snell & Wilmer.
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UK Courts' 3rd-Party Disclosure Rule Sets Global Precedent
The quiet change about to take place in the English Civil Procedure Rules, enabling U.K. courts to require pre-action disclosure of information from overseas third parties, is uncharted territory and will have profound implications for any organization that handles assets on behalf of a party, says Simon Bushell at Seladore Legal.
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Zara TM Ruling Shows Prefiling Clearance Is Always Advisable
The recent Trade Mark Tribunal decision regarding Zara and House of Zana demonstrates the importance of conducting prefiling clearance investigations, so that where opposition may be anticipated, a strategy can be put in place, says Melanie Harvey at Birketts.
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Dutch Merger May Promote Behavioral Remedies Across EU
A Dutch tribunal's recent clearing of the Sanoma-Iddink deal might further encourage merging parties in the EU to offer — and government agencies to accept — behavioral remedies, which was rarer when more emphasis was put on divestments, says Robert Hardy at Greenberg Traurig.
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How Will UK Address AI Patent Infringement?
As artificial intelligence-related patent litigation activity inevitably approaches, a review of U.K. principles of direct and indirect liability offers insight into how courts may address questions involving cloud-based technology and arguments related to training AI models, say Alexander Korenberg at Kilburn & Strode and Toby Bond at Bird & Bird.
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Law Commission's 'Data Objects' Proposal Is Far-Reaching
The Law Commission’s proposals to recognize data objects as a new category of personal property would bring fundamental changes were they to be implemented, and would have significant ramifications for finance litigation, say attorneys at Norton Rose.