News: Uncategorized

Nordic/Baltic divisions in the Unified Patent Court

By AWA Editor | Posted on March 5, 2014

Yesterday the governments in Sweden and the three Baltic countries signed an agreement on a common regional division within the UPC system. The court will be placed in Stockholm and the language used will be English. In Denmark, the government has decided to establish a local Danish division of the Unified Patent Court, provided that...

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Number of new top-level domains now exceed 100

By AWA Editor | Posted on February 10, 2014

It may soon be possible to register domain names ending in .today, .shoes, .social, and .berlin. More than 100 new generic top-level domains have been given the green light by ICANN and may soon be open for domain registrations. The new top-level domains also include Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, and Russian names. Another 200 top-level domains...

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Google and Samsung partner on patents

By AWA Editor | Posted on February 10, 2014

Samsung and Google have signed a global partnership agreement on cross-licensing of patents. Under the terms of the agreement, both companies will have access to the other’s patent portfolios in an effort to enable joint research and development. The agreement covers a wide range of technology and business areas and includes existing patents as well...

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All-time-high for European patent applications

By AWA Editor | Posted on January 24, 2014

More patent applications than ever – 265,000 – were filed with the European Patent Office (EPO) last year. This is a 2.8 per cent increase on 2012, according to preliminary statistics from the EPO. The number of patent applications has now been rising for four consecutive years. The EPO granted 66,700 patents in 2013, which...

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New Global Patent Prosecution Highway launched to simplify use

By AWA Editor | Posted on January 17, 2014

Using the Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) for obtaining accelerated examination has become considerably simpler as 17 IP offices around the world has agreed on a Global Patent Prosecution Highway (GPPH) arrangement which took effect recently.Most notably, this means that applicants may request accelerated examination of a patent application filed with any of the offices participating...

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Increase in patent filings picks up speed

By AWA Editor | Posted on December 18, 2013

The number of patents filed around the world rose by 9.2 percent in 2012 compared with figures for 2011. This is the fastest spurt in growth that has been recorded over the past 18 years according to data compiled for the latest World Intellectual Property Indicators report, published by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).China...

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EPC celebrates 40th anniversary

By AWA Editor | Posted on November 27, 2013

This autumn marks 40 years since the signing of the European Patent Convention (EPC). This paved the way for the European patent that enables individuals and organisations to protect their innovations in a large number of European countries by filing just one single European patent application. Compared to the previous national system requiring a separate...

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Tunisia new member in international trademark cooperation

By AWA Editor | Posted on November 14, 2013

On 16 October 2013 Tunisia acceded to the international cooperation agreement on trademark registration that is commonly known as the Madrid System and is administered by the World Intellectual Property Organisation, WIPO. The Madrid System offers a cost-effective solution to the challenge of protecting brands and trademarks in the international arena. By filing just one...

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Prison for trading in counterfeit clothes brands

By AWA Editor | Posted on October 17, 2013

Stockholm District Court has sentenced a man to ten months behind bars for importing and selling counterfeit clothes brands. The relatively strict punishment was imposed even though the man has no previous convictions. The court motivates its decision by emphasising that this was an extensive criminal operation that has been going on for a long...

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