When the Kingdom of Spain joined what were then called the European Communities (the "EC") in 1986, it had to approve a new Patents Act which sought to adapt Spain's patent law to the standards…
During the past decade, Spanish courts have debated the impact of the TRIPS Agreement ("TRIPS") on patents the applications of which were filed before 7 October 1992, that is, before Spain's…
On 24 November 2016, the Court of Appeal of Barcelona (Section 15) handed down a judgment in which it confirmed that "the interpretation of the scope of protection of a patent for the purposes of…
For the first time, the Spanish Supreme Court made far-reaching observations on key issues of the assessment of inventive step and, in particular, on a) the reformulation of the "objective technical…
For many years, Spanish Courts have considered the "problem & solution approach" developed by the European Patent Office ("EPO") to be a very useful tool for the purpose of trying to make an…
A judgment of 13 July 2017 from the Spanish Supreme Court (Civil Chamber) has highlighted the importance of taking the fine pencil when examining novelty.
The decision stemmed from a judgment of 12…
For the first time, the Spanish Supreme Court made far-reaching observations on key issues of the assessment of inventive step and, in particular, on a) the reformulation of the "objective technical…
When analysing inventive activity, one risk that appears to be here to stay is that of hindsight. As Richard Ebbink very aptly put it in a workshop held at the INGRES Institute in Zurich on 8 and 9…
In paragraph 54 of its judgment of 12 July 2017, the UK Supreme Court wrote that "[…] notwithstanding what Lord Diplock said in Catnic [1982] RPC 183, 242, a problem of infringement is best…
