Dec 12, 2022
Our Christmas donation 2022 was given to "Haus der Barmherzigkeit" and “Leukämiehilfe Österreich”. The "Haus der Barmherzigkeit" offers long-term care with quality of life to people in need of care. Geriatric residents…
Read more →Dec 6, 2022
The roadmap published by the Unified Patent Court (UPC) for the entry into force of the Agreement on a Unified Patent Court (UPCA) has been delayed. According to a new announcement, the start date will be postponed from…
Read more →Nov 29, 2022
A request for non-admission of a particular document, which was first made at the oral proceedings before the Board of Appeal, may constitute an amendment of the submission, the admissibility of which must in turn be…
Read more →Nov 19, 2022
Art 12 Par 2 of the Rules of Procedure of the Boards of Appeal (RPBA) does not contain any restriction according to which each party may only refer in the appeal to those matters of the preliminary proceedings which it…
Read more →Nov 18, 2022
We are pleased to announce that Matthias Scheiner successfully passed the Austrian Patent Attorney Examination. He is registered in the list of Austrian patent attorneys since November 2022 and is employed as patent…
Read more →Nov 9, 2022
In order to substantiate an objection in the appeal proceedings which the Opposition Division did not consider convincing, it is necessary to provide specific reasons why the finding and the reasoning in the decision…
Read more →Nov 2, 2022
Can the provision of services under a certain trademark outside the European Union constitute genuine use of that trademark within the EU? At first glance, one might think this is an easy question to answer. Outside…
Read more →Oct 30, 2022
Improved patient compliance to a pharmaceutical formulation cannot be used to establish an overall technical effect if it is the result of a "broken technical chain", namely an alleged chain of technical effects…
Read more →Only natural persons can be named as inventors in an application. (EPO Board of Appeal 21 December, 2021, J 8/20, Designation of inventor/DABUS).
Read more →Oct 14, 2022
With the Unified Patent Court (UPC), a common patent court for currently 17 EU member states (including Austria, Germany, Italy and France) has been created. A roadmap published by the UPC now gives for the first time a…
Read more →Oct 10, 2022
Under the Rules of Procedure of the Boards of Appeal (RPBA), which have been in force since January 1, 2020, it is the duty of the parties to present their submissions in the proceedings in such a timely manner that the…
Read more →Sep 30, 2022
The principle of the prohibition of reformatio in peius is not applicable where a case is to be remitted to a division in a new composition because of a suspicion of partiality (EPO Board of Appeal 1 April, 2022, T…
Read more →Sep 20, 2022
Statements in the description contradicting the plain claim wording may cast doubts as to the intended meaning of this. (Only) under such circumstances, an objection under Article 84 EPC has to be raised (EPO Board of…
Read more →Aug 12, 2022
Does the EPC confer jurisdiction on the EPO to determine whether a party validly claims to be a successor in title as referred to in Art 87 (1) (b) EPC?If the above question is answered in the affirmative: Can a party B…
Read more →Aug 3, 2022
A change of representative cannot regularly be recognized as a reasoning for amendments to the party's appeal case being filed after notification of the summons to oral proceedings. To accept such an reasoning would…
Read more →Jul 25, 2022
If a patent proprietor chooses not to file any submissions during the opposition proceedings but to present them only with its statement of grounds of appeal, this amounts to bringing an entirely fresh case in appeal…
Read more →Jul 15, 2022
We are pleased to announce that Rudolf Griss has successfully passed the European qualifying examination (EQE) and has been registered in the list of professional representatives before the European Patent Office.…
Read more →Jul 14, 2022
Neither Article 13 (2) RPBA 2020 nor the explanatory remarks contain an explanation of how to generally determine whether circumstances are "exceptional". However, the explanatory remarks of RPBA 2020 cite as an example…
Read more →Jul 4, 2022
A disclosure within a prior art document can only be considered to represent a suitable starting point for assessing inventive step if the skilled person would have realistically started from it. An important…
Read more →Jun 23, 2022
For the purpose of examining whether the requirement of Art 123 (3) EPC that the European patent shall not be amended in such a way that its scope of protection is extended are complied with, national infringement laws,…
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