European Union
Parliament, on 11th of December, adopted two draft Regulations, for
the creation of a unitary patent, clearing the way for the completion of an
exclusive European Patent System with a unitary patent and a unified Patent
Court.
The European patent with unitary effect in the 25 participating States is
based on two Regulations, one creating the instrument, and the other on
applicable language regime for the new patent. The European Patent Office (EPO) has been entrusted by 25
EU member states to deliver and administer unitary patents. The third element
of the package is the creation of a unified patent litigation system set up
under an international convention establishing the Unified Patent Court (UPC),
a specialised court with a first and an appeal instance with exclusive
jurisdiction concerning infringement and validity questions related to unitary
patents.
The unitary patent - or "European patent with unitary effect" -
is a European patent, granted by the EPO under the rules and procedures of the
European Patent Convention, to which, upon request of the patent proprietor,
unitary effect is given for the territory of the 25 Member States participating
in the unitary patent scheme. The unitary patent will co-exist with national
patents and with classical European patents. Patent proprietors will in future
be able to choose between various combinations of classical European patents
and unitary patents.
The Regulation on the unitary patent provides that the
participating Member States will entrust the following tasks to the EPO:
- Receiving and examining
requests for unitary effect
- Registering unitary
effect
- Publishing translations
during the transitional period
- Setting up and
maintaining a new "Register for unitary patent protection"
- containing entries on
assignment, transfer, lapse, licensing, limitation or revocation of unitary patents
- Collecting annual fees
for unitary patents
- Distributing part of the
annual fees to the participating Member States
- Administering a
compensation scheme
- reimbursement of
translation costs (up to a ceiling) for certain applicants filing applications in an official
language of the European Union other than English,
French or German
These new tasks consist in straightforward ex parte registration
tasks carried out by the EPO on the basis of the internal rules of the EPO.
Decisions of the EPO regarding unitary patent protection may be appealed to the
Unified Patent Court. After grant of the European patent, there will in future
be no translation requirement for unitary patents - once the transitional
period (of up to 12 years) has expired.
EPO has also envisaged Patent translate, the
EPO's machine translation programme developed together with Google, which
offers free online access, for information purposes, to automatic machine
translations of any European patent application and patent. By the end of 2014,
machine translation of patents will be available for the languages of the 38
Member States of the European Patent Organisation, including the European
Union's 27 Member States. Fourteen European languages are already covered. Only
in case of dispute, at the request of a court or an alleged infringer, will the
patent proprietor have to provide a full human translation into the relevant
language.
Transitional measures are provided for during a
period of up to 12 years, as follows:
- where the language of proceedings at the
European Patent Office is French or German, the patent proprietor will
have to provide a translation of the European patent into English;
- where the language of proceedings at the EPO
is English, the patent proprietor will have to provide a translation of
the European patent into any official language of the European Union.
Finally, a compensation scheme is provided for to
reduce the costs for SMEs, natural persons, non-profit organisations,
universities and public research organisations having their residence or
principle place of business within a Member State of the European Union: where
such applicants file applications in an official language of the European Union
other than English, French or German, the costs of translating the application
will be reimbursed (up to a ceiling).
The two Regulations will enter into force on the 20th
day following publication in the Official Journal of the European Union. They
shall apply from 1 January 2014, or from the date of the entry into force of
the Agreement on a Unified Patent Court, whichever is later.
Draft agreement on a Unified Patent Court
and Draft Statute are available here
