WIPO Committee Narrows Definition Of Development Expenditure 18/09/2015 by William New, Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment After four years of talks, committee members at the World Intellectual Property Organization have agreed on a definition for what constitutes an expenditure on development in the UN agency.
Health Advocates Press United States On WTO LDC IP Waiver 18/09/2015 by Catherine Saez, Intellectual Property Watch 1 Comment Several leading public health groups have sent a letter to United States Trade Representative and US Patent and Trademark Office director asking for more transparency on the US position on a request by least-developed countries to indefinitely extend their World Trade Organization intellectual property waiver on pharmaceutical products.
Cutting-Edge Energy Tech Presented At Swiss Energy And Climate Summit 18/09/2015 by Catherine Saez, Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment BERN – Everybody knows how annoying it is to run out of battery power for mobile devices. In the same way, storing energy is a continuing issue for renewable energy due to its non-continuous nature. A number of innovations presented at this week’s Swiss Energy and Climate Summit in Bern sought to address that problem. The yearly event invites Swiss and international speakers to put forward the latest in technology. And according to some participants from start-ups, intellectual property is key, but their IP strategy relies more and more on both patents and trade secrets.
The Lexmark Litigation: Why Does Big Pharma Care So Much About Ink Cartridges? 17/09/2015 by Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment The Federal Circuit will soon hear Lexmark v. Impression Products, a case about ink cartridges. Impression, a foreign buyer, refills spent Lexmark cartridges and resells them in the United States. Impression claims that Lexmark, having sold the cartridges, has exhausted its patent rights, and cannot hold Impression liable for patent infringement. The Federal Circuit will address whether the US patent is exhausted with the sale of the patented product outside the US, write Burcu Kilic and Peter Maybarduk.
Did WIPO Get Cool? UN IPR Agency Joins Creative Commons Initiative 17/09/2015 by William New, Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment The World Intellectual Property Organization exists to protect and promote intellectual property rights, including copyright. As a large international organisation, it is also a producer of a great amount of data and information that users around the world want to access.
New Opinion Of The European Copyright Society On “Reprobel”- Case (C-572/13) 16/09/2015 by Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment From the Centre for International Intellectual Property Studies (CEIPI), University of Strasbourg: On 5 September 2015, the European Copyright Society issued an Opinion on the conclusions presented on June 11, 2015 by the Advocate-General Pedro Cruz Villalón in the HP Belgium v. Reprobel-case pending before the Court of Justice of the EU (case C-572/13), following a request for preliminary ruling from the Brussels Court of Appeal (Belgium) lodged on 8 November 2013.
WIPO HR Report Shows Effort At Geographical Diversity, Gender Balance 16/09/2015 by Catherine Saez, Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment The World Intellectual Property Organization has fewer staff overall but more senior staff, according to an annual report on human resources at the United Nations agency. In addition, while efforts at WIPO are continuing to expand geographical diversity among staff, the number of countries represented fell last year. Western Europe provides half of all staff. Meanwhile, women make up about a quarter of senior posts.
WIPO Continues Honing Its Audit And Oversight Functions 15/09/2015 by William New, Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment The UN World Intellectual Property Organization has been working in recent years to improve its audit and oversight functions under the watchful eye of its member states. On the opening day of its meeting this week, the influential Program and Budget Committee (PBC) took several actions to advance the process, with some key positions in flux.
Switzerland Backs Renovation Of UN Offices In Geneva 14/09/2015 by Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment The government of Switzerland has decided to give a CHF 400 million interest-free loan toward renovation of the Palais des Nations, the United Nations headquarters in Europe. The CHF 837 million project is expected to begin in 2017 and be completed in 2023, the UN said.
Polish Parliament Moves Toward Amending IP Law, Patent Registration Procedures 14/09/2015 by Jaroslaw Adamowski for Intellectual Property Watch Leave a Comment WARSAW — The Polish Parliament has drafted an amended industrial property law which is expected to facilitate the procedure for registering trademarks and reduce related costs, as well as introduce a number of other modifications to the existing regulations.