A unitary European patent and a unified European patent litigation system – political agreement by the end of 2011?
Following on from our report in October and our article in BSLR*, Poland which currently holds the rotating presidency of the EU's Council of Ministers, is eager to reach a deal on the unitary patent, the language regime and the unified patent court, having made it a priority of their six-month term that finishes at the end of the year. They have in past weeks held numerous meetings with MEPs and officials from the European Commission, and a compromise deal was reached between the three sides on 1 December. The compromise was broadly accepted in substance by the EU member states at the Competitiveness Council meeting on 5th December, but the debate showed that further work is still needed on a number of issues. The Polish Presidency has committed to taking the work forward with a view to reaching political agreement on the package of proposals by the 22 December.
At least one notable sticking-point remains – the location of the court to deal with litigation issues arising from the patent regime, with Munich, London and Paris all vying for the seat. Reports from EU officials state that Paris is currently the front-runner, over Munich and London. However, the Competitiveness Council did agree on the location of the Court of Appeal, which will be in Luxembourg, as well as the offices of the patent mediation and arbitration centre, which will have seats in Lisbon and Ljubljana.
What’s ahead in 2012?
If the last remaining obstacles can be overcome and the so-called Warsaw Convention is initialled on 22 December, the package is expected adopted by the plenary session of the European Parliament in February 2012. The international agreement creating the court would be scheduled for signature in the first half of next year and, depending on speed of ratification, the new regime would come into force at the beginning of 2014. It is also now reported that the new governments in Spain and Italy could drop their challenges to the unitary patent.
Lawyers Helen Cline, David Sant, Christoph de Coster
* 'The Unitary Patent and the European Patent Court: A reality check' was first published in BSLR and is reproduced here with the kind permission of the editors, Lawtext Publishing Limited.
