The European Patent Office (EPO) is an organ of the European Patent Organisation, an intergovernmental organisation that was set up on 7 October 1977 on the basis of the European Patent Convention (EPC) signed in Munich in 1973. The EPO is responsible for the uniform procedure to grant European patents. Once the EPO has granted a European patent, the patent holder can validate it in every single contracting state. In the future, the EPO will also be in charge of deciding on requests for unitary effect of European patents under the Unitary Patent system.
The Dutch Government has warned the social situation at the EPO will have to improve soon. The International Labour Organisation (ILO) has complained it is not acceptable that over half of the…
The Board of Appeal decided that the invention was not sufficiently disclosed, as no seeds had been deposited and a skilled person could not obtain the claimed plants on the basis of the information…
The European Patent Office can invoke its immunity from jurisdiction of Dutch courts in its conflict with the EPO trade unions SUEPO and VEOB. The highest court in The Netherlands, the Hoge Raad, has…
Although it did not admit a broader claim 1, an EPO board of appeal allowed an auxiliary request wherein claim 1 as granted was replaced by a combination of independent claims from different first…
Will 2017 be the year that the Unitary Patent system sees the light of day? A year ago the general expectation was for the system to fully launch this spring, with a provisional period starting late…
Not surprisingly the Brexit and its consequences for the Unitary Patent system, but also the continuing social unrest at the European Patent Office were among the most popular topics on the Kluwer…
The Board of Appeal found that the examining division had committed a substantial procedural violation by raising tentative patentability objections rather than completing an improperly justified…
The parliament in the Netherlands will hold a debate on the ‘deteriorating social situation’ at the European Patent Office. The recent dismissal of a SUEPO trade union leader in The Hague was one of…
An EPO board of appeal decided that it had the discretion to admit a late filed document, even though the opposition division had exercised its discretion not to admit the document. In this respect…
