1. CJEU in C-395/16, Doceram vs. CeramTec, interprets the concept of technically required features of appearance excluded from protection under Community designs Regulation. For more information here.
2. Colour it mine: protecting colour trademarks. For more information here.
3. Euro-PCT Guide: PCT procedure at the EPO. For more information here.
Source: Intellectual Property Center at the UNWE. More information can be found here
The European Patent Office published valuable instructions how you can work with Chinese database for patents, without any knowledge of Chinese. The instructions cover:
The European Patent Office has put forward a proposal to reduce the fees for registration of European patents. The new proposals will reduce both the PCT search fee and the examination fee by EUR 100 each. For applicants using the EPO as ISA for search and examination and entering the European phase, the PCT fee proposals would result in a considerable fee reduction: a decrease of EUR 656.
In addition, there are proposals for fees reduction for SME’s and universities.
More information here.
The European Patent Office announced its decision to elect António Campinos as President of EPO. His five-year term will start on 1 July 2018.
Mr. Campinos is currently Executive Director of the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO). He is also a former President of the Portuguese Institute of Industrial Property (INPI).
The new President will have to deal with complex issues such as the ongoing conflict between the EPO staff and the Office leaders and the uncertainty regarding the future of the Unified EU Patent Court in the light of Brexit.
More information here.
The European Patent Office reports about a good news regarding the use of searching engine offered by the Office. According to the news:
You can now conduct a patent search in the EPO’s databases – the world’s largest free collection of technical information – on the move, using your smartphone, as the EPO has added mobile beta versions of Espacenet and the European Patent Register to its small-screen optimised website, m.epo.org. Launched in 2014, the mobile website concentrates on the services and information that users told us they would need on the move.
The inclusion of patent search fulfils a key user requirement. In a recent online survey almost 70% of users said they would like a mobile version of Espacenet and nearly 60% said they would like the European Patent Register added to the mobile website. We’ve made the search experience as similar as possible to the desktop versions, but the mobile version is leaner and more streamlined. We provide basic searches, which work like “Smart search”, and advanced searches, where you can combine criteria. There are some limits. Currently, we can display no more than 100 search results, but we do let you know that there are more so that you can refine your query to find those that are most relevant.
In terms of data, since we use Open Patent Services (OPS) in the background, the collection is large, but not quite as large as in Espacenet. However, all the data available in the desktop European Patent Register is also available via the mobile search. The amount of data you can download daily is subject to the same limits as in the desktop versions.
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY PLANET 