MSD recently announced it will close down the Organon research & development facilities in Oss, near the Netherlands university of Nijmegen. This came as a shock to many in the Netherlands. The departure of Organon is ‘a totally missed chance,’ said Michel Dutrée, head of the Dutch pharmaceutical organization Nefarma. ‘Now you see what happens if the government does not have a proper strategy for innovation.’ Dutrée told the Volkskrant, a major Dutch newspaper, he was concerned other pharmaceutical...

Today the European Patent Office’s Large Board of Appeal will hear a highly contested and much anticipated case on on the patentability of biotechnological enhanced breeding methods (in this case for broccoli and tomatoes). The patentability of biotechnological inventions is equally controversial as whether software patents are eligible for patent protection. Critics argue that patenting biotechnological inventions is nothing less than patenting life itself, despicable as that would be. As with many other inventions that...

In 1999 Alan Greenspan, the former head of the US Federal Reserve, delivered a speech at Harvard University entitled “Transcending all else is being principled”. In it he said of reputation “In today’s world, where ideas are increasingly displacing the physical in the production of economic value, competition for reputation becomes a significant driving force, propelling our economy forward. Manufactured goods often can be evaluated before the completion of a transaction. Service providers, on the other hand, usually...

One of the largest and most closely-watched intellectual property disputes in the United States right now is the lawsuit that Viacom, a major media company, filed in 2007 against Google. This is a copyright case, not a patent case, but it has major implications for the types of technologies that will be valuable in curbing copyright infringement in the digital age. Many such technologies had their core patents granted ten or more years ago, and many of the patentees went through periods of trying to sell their technologies but...

the IPEG blog started in 2005 as a hobby project, as part of a consultancy of 19 intellectual property subject matter experts. IPEG now reaches over 39,000 unique visitors a month, all intellectual property professionals and those interested in IP. Below is an infographic showing where the IPEG readers orginate from. we thank all of you for your continuous support and interest and hope we can keep up the work. we invite IP professionals to send in their blog entries which, after a review by the IPEG blog board, will be published...

When Bernard Bilski sought to patent a method for hedging against weather-driven changes in energy prices, he undoubtedly never anticipated the storm of legal controversy that would ensue.  Bilski’s 1997 patent application took center stage in a struggle to establish guidelines for assessing whether certain types of subject matter—and in particular, so-called “business methods”—no matter how novel or useful, are eligible for patenting at all. Our Founders, like Bilski himself, probably never imagined the scrutiny that...

During the Intellectual Property Business Congress (IPBC) in Munich one of the more interesting presentations was from Margot Fröhlinger, Director knowledge based economy of the EU Commission (DG Internal Market and Services) who handles the unpopular file on the creation of the EU patent and the creation of  a unified patent litigation system in Europe. Who thinks that US Patent Reform is cumbersome, it pales next to the patent reform process in Europe. The issue at hand is the creation of a unified EU patent litigation system,...

I never met an inventor who didn’t want to know the value of his inventions. Accounting rules allow intangible assets to be recorded on balance sheets at their ‘highest and best uses’. The highest and best use of inventions is typically to license the invention to a company capable of delivering products that incorporate the invention to the market. Licensing typically yields a higher value than using related patents to ensure freedom of operation, blocking competitors, or removing a technology from the market in order...

Intellectual Property (IP) valuation is easily one of the most misunderstood topics surrounding the management of intangible assets. Over the last 20 years we have seen the migration of IP valuation from being a tool for estimating IP damages into more “main stream” applications, and with the explosive growth in IP transactions, the need for assigning a monetary value to IP assets is higher than ever.  Having said that, inside the IP community there is a high degree of frustration expressed by all constituents when it relates...

Thomas L. Friedman reminded us that “Invent, Invent, Invent” is the mantra to get us out of economic downturn. A surprising number of great companies, like General Electric, IBM, Kraft, McDonald’s, Walt Disney and Electronic Arts were formed in years that featured a recession, as did Motorola, HP,  Xerox, Unisys, Texas Instruments and Revlon.  The recession of the early 1990s hit much of the world. The rapid recovery from the recession and the growth of industrial output in Finland has been very much explained by...

The creation of a new European Patent System meets some firm opposition and obstacles from various sides. Debates have been going on for decades now whether we should have a EU – or in older terms “Community” – Patent.  Presently, the only “European” patents[1] that exists next to “national” patents are those granted by the European Patent Office (EPO) in Munich according to the Convention on the Grant of European Patents of  5 October 1973, commonly known as the European Patent...

The German Supreme Court (BGH) in its recent Siemens application decision[1]will give software patent critics new ammunition to oppose IPRs for software patents. The decision regarding computer-implemented inventions seems to tear down all common (German) barriers for software patents. From the critics point of view it further monopolizes software and computer products. However the decision just settles the long-lasting dispute between the European Patent Office (EPO) and the German Supreme Court about the specific conditions...

On 12 may 2010, the Enlarged Board of Appeal  of the European Patent Office (EPO) issued its opinion G3/08 on the referral of 22 October 2008 by the President of the EPO on the patentability of Computer Implemented Inventions (CIIs). The Enlarged Board received around a hundred of letters of organizations/individuals expressing their opinion. The Enlarged Board comes to the conclusion that all questions of the president are inadmissible, because the decisions of the Boards of Appeal identified by the President as being different...

The Nokia vs. Apple patent dispute entered a new stage. Nokia recently brought up a fresh patent infringement action against Apple, alleging that Apple’s new iPad product infringes five Nokia patents. At a first glance, the recent lawsuit before the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin could be seen as nothing special. A patent holder just asserts his patents  against an alleged technology “theft”. But it looks as if there is more behind all this. We remember the first act of the dispute...

Roche, the Swiss drug maker, lost its antiviral drug patent for Valcyte in India patent widely used by AIDS patients. The assistant controller of patents and designs, said that the patent covering Valcyte (valganciclovir hydrochloride) lacks inventive step and does not demonstrate significantly improved efficacy over previous compounds. Section 3(d) of India’s Patent Act[1], which sets out the limitations of patentable subject matter, says “the mere discovery of a new form of a known substance which does not result...

Patent valuation, as a subject, is still “hot”. When in LinkedIn a question was posted on how to value IP[1] a large number of comments,  suggestions and ideas appeared. The overall conclusion – it is fair to say – is that valuation is all about context. This might not be very helpful for those that seek a clear and universally applied method, but unfortunately in the absence of a functioning  IP market, this is proven to be right many times over. We blogged earlier about accounting initiatives to come...

When we hear about China and intellectual property we like to think China is predominantly a source of counterfeit. China is still among the 5 countries where most seized counterfeited goods originate from[1]. More than 80 per cent of seizures originated from only ten countries: China 32 per cent, Thailand 13 per cent, Korea 9 per cent, Hong Kong (China) 8 per cent, Chinese Taipei 4 per cent, then Turkey, Malaysia, Vietnam, Philippines and Pakistan.  China continues to have some of the highest piracy rates in the world, while...

Tomorrow, Monday April 26, is World Intellectual Property Day. Initiated by WIPO in 2000, the 10th anniversary of this day coincides with the 40th anniversary of the entry into force of the Convention establishing WIPO (the WIPO Convention).  There are currently 184 Member States, i.e. over 90 percent of the countries of the world. Many countries and WIPO members organize special events for this day, countries with an active IPR policy but also countries one would not imagine to pay much attention to IP, like Moldova or Saudi...

As research has shown, owners have an incentive to exaggerate the valuation of their property. This is true for all kind of property but is it also true for intellectual property? People are reluctant to part with their property, and the amount that they are willing to accept to sell it generally far exceeds the amount that others are willing to pay for it. This gap has been termed the “endowment effect”[1] and it has been detected for a number variety of forms of property. In investing this effect leads to an inherent tendency...

Netherlands’  The Hague District Court Orange-Book decision brings up again the discussion about the compulsory licensing defense and the role of antitrust in patent infringement proceedings. Opposing’s Germany highest court the Dutch Court denies the possibility of responding with a compulsory licensing defense in a patent infringement proceeding. How damaging is it that two major patent courts in Europe differ on such important issues? After all, we are supposed to have a harmonized European legal order in patent...