EU bids for European patent court

The European Commission has set down plans for the creation of an EU patent court in Luxembourg.

The two formal proposals filed by the EU executive would establish a new judicial body, under the auspices of Europe’s highest court, the European Court of Justice, to help out with intellectual property disputes on points of EU law.

But the proposals need a green light by EU governments before the project can begin - a process that could take several months.

The plans include giving the ECJ judicial protection over EU patents, and in particular, infringements of patents and challenges to their validity.

And the proposal would secondly establish the EU patent court as a second sister body of the ECJ in the field of trade mark disputes - so sitting alongside the Court of First Instance in this regard.

Under the present system, trademark disputes fall under the chief responsibility of the ECJ’s sister court, the CFI.

“The new system would mean that judgements over [..] patent rights would be effective throughout the EU, avoiding the expense, inconvenience and confusion that can occur when judgments in several different national courts are required,” said the commission on Monday.

But the move is currently held in check by the inability of European member states to adopt EU-wide laws on patent control under the so-called ‘EU Patent Regulation’.

The regulation sets general measures to harmonise the protection of trade marks and patents across the union.

“Setting up the jurisdictional arrangements without finalising adoption of the [..] Patent Regulation itself is about as useful as a new pair of skis in the desert,” said EU internal market commissioner Frits Bolkestein.

“Europe's companies have been crying out for too long for access to pan-European patent protection at reasonable cost with minimum red-tape and maximum legal certainty," he added.

The Council of European ministers, representing EU governments, reached formal agreement on the EU Patent Regulation in March 2003.

But the ministers stopped short of fully adopting the laws when they reconvened in November later that year – so have new set a target date for conclusion by the end of Ireland’s EU presidency in five months time.

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