organization names

Exhaustion is the hot Brexit topic du jour. Regardless of the industry, changes to the exhaustion regime are set to affect everyone in ways both predictable and unpredictable. This Kat has had lots of messages from friends in very different sectors wondering what on earth exhaustion of rights could mean and why everyone is so worried about it. The note goes some way toward answering both questions. What is exhaustion? The guidance note has this helpful explanation: The exhaustion of IP rights refers to the loss of the right to control distribution and resale of that product after it has been placed on the market within a specified territory by, or with the permission of, the right holder. A parallel import is a non-counterfeit product which is imported into a country where the intellectual property rights in that product have already been exhausted. The UK is currently part of a regional European Economic Area (EEA) exhaustion scheme, meaning that IP rights are considered exhausted onc...

The UK government guidance on a no deal scenario also considers the situation for trade marks and designs . To save readers' paws the trouble of clicking through, the abbreviated text for each section is below together with some gratuitous use of bold and initial thoughts on what this could mean. As they are unitary rights, the EU trade mark and registered Community designs are the most harmonised areas of IP law but in some respects, they offer the simplest solutions. EU trade mark and registered Community designs existing registered EU trade marks or registered Community designs held will continue to be valid in the remaining EU member states protection of existing registered EU trade marks or registered Community designs in the UK will be through a new, equivalent UK right which will be granted with minimal administrative burden right holders will be notified that a new UK right has been granted. Any business, organisation or individual that may not want to receive a new compara...

There was a time when national IP offices were cozy little operations, dealing with the registration of patents, trademarks and designs. Various national offices did a better or worse job at this, but all agreed- the task of the IP office was �.well, mostly technical and administrative. No one came looking for guidance on how the fruits of protected IP was meant to filter through the greater world of business and industry. No more. While not the stuff of racy headlines, one of the most important dynamics running through the IP world is how national IP offices are coming to terms with this expanded role, easily defined in the abstract, but surprisingly challenging to implement. Against this backdrop, this Kat felt the undercurrents of uncertainty that characterized the First Plenary Session (��Anchoring Innovation: The Future of IP Organisations�) of the 2018 edition of Singapore�s nonpareil IPWeek @ SG . This Kat was not able to attend this year, but the Intellectual Property Office...

2018 has been a very eventful copyright year, with key developments � inter alia � at the EU level, also  due to substantial progress in the process towards adoption of the draft directive on copyright in the Digital Single Market. If you would like to discuss the present and future of copyright, our friends at KNect365 would like to let you know that the annual International Copyright Law conference is returning to London on 27 and 28 November 2018. Looking at the agenda , and having personally attended last year�s proceedings, the event looks very interesting, with topics ranging from EU copyright and WIPO developments to Brexit and everything in-between. The other good news is that IPKat readers enjoy a 15% discount in the registration fee. Just click here to register and use the VIP code FKW82865IPKE .

A few months ago, this blog reported that the EU Commission had issued a Notice to stakeholders on the impact that a no-deal Brexit would have on UK copyright .  At that time, UK's withdrawal from the EU without any agreement in place must have seen impossible: if one looks at the comments to the relevant post, a reader who called themselves a 'Broptimist' stated that the EU Commission's document did  relate "to a worst-case scenario, and one that is highly unlikely to come to pass". As things stand now, however, the level of likelihood of such a scenario has increased ... Today UK Government has issued a number of technical notices relating to: Exhaustion of intellectual property rights if there�s no Brexit deal Patents if there�s no Brexit deal Trade marks and designs if there�s no Brexit deal Copyright if there�s no Brexit deal The IPKat will analyze these documents and revert, but this evening my attention could not but go to the copyright notice. Unsurpr...

The Swedish Patent and Market Court of Appeal has provided for an interesting ruling (PMFT 2585-17, 2018-01-24) concerning the protection of copyright-protected works when these are used as evidence as a court proceeding. The   case at hand concerned a text written by J.I., filed as evidence during an appeal concerning custody. M.B. (the mother)   filed a copy of the text as evidence of J.I.:s (the father) inappropriate behavior. The text had not been previously published. The objective was of course to harm the credibility of J.I. by means of the content of the text in question and thereby to succeed in acquiring the custody of their son. The custody proceedings took place behind closed doors. J.I. sued for copyright infringement on three grounds, the distribution of the text, its reproduction and its communication to the public. Is the work copyright-protected? The ruling of the Court starts with considering whether the text is   copyright protected work,   conclud...

Readers might recall last month�s post concerning the US Copyright Office Review Board�s refusal to register UEFA�s Starball logo. This work was denied registration because it was not sufficiently original to sustain a claim for copyright]. On similar grounds, the Review Board has now delivered yet another blow � this time against Vodafone. Background Vodafone applied for registration of the Speechmark logo as a copyrighted work with the US Copyright Office back in 2016. The work is a two-dimensional artwork consisting of a red quotation mark with light shading, placed within a circle in various shades of grey and white. The quotation mark is placed in the centre within a red square: The Speechmark logo was initially denied registration in 2017. The Office found that the work did not contain a sufficient amount of original and creative graphic or artistic authorship to support a copyright registration. Furthermore, the circle and the apostrophe (the Office took the view that ...