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Unified Patent Court

The Unified Patent Court (UPC) is a Court, comprising judges from all participating Member States of the European Union. It is set up to decide in particular on the infringement and validity of both Unitary Patents and classic European Patents.

Consilium – European Council website: ratification of UPC Agreement

The European Patent Office

The European Patent Office (EPO) is one of the largest intergovernmental organizations in Europe. Its main responsibility is to grant patents for inventions in Europe through a centralized and streamlined process.

Espacenet: Patent Search Facility

With its worldwide coverage and search features, Espacenet offers free access to information about inventions and technical developments from 1782 to today.

Court of Justice of The European Union

The role of the Court of Justice of The European Union is to ensure EU law is interpreted and applied the same in every EU country; ensuring countries and EU institutions abide by EU law.

Curia – Case law of the CJEU

Since the establishment of the Court of Justice of the European Union in 1952, its mission has been to ensure that “the law is observed” “in the interpretation and application” of the Treaties.

Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market (OHIM)

The European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) is the European Union (EU) agency responsible for managing EU trade marks (EUTMs) and registered designs at EU level (RCDs).

World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO)

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is the global forum for intellectual property policy, services, information and cooperation.

WIPO Lex

WIPO Lex provides free of charge access to legal information on intellectual property (IP) from around the world.

The IPKat Blog

Passionate about IP! Since June 2003 the IPKat has covered copyright, patent, trade mark, designs, info-tech, privacy and confidentiality issues from a mainly UK and European perspective. Read, post comments and participate!

The SPC blog

A niche blog dedicated to the issues that arise when supplementary protection certificates (SPCs) extend patents beyond their normal life — and to the respective positions of patent owners, investors, competitors and consumers.

International patent offices

German Patent Office
French Patent Office
US Patent and Trademark Office
UK Intellectual Property Office

Links to National Court Decisions

This table contains links to various resources for a number of European Courts

CountryCommentsLinks
ATOfficial database of Austrian case law, including Austrian Supreme Court and Higher Regional Court of Vienna on patent law (no focus on patent law, no first instance decisions)https://www.ris.bka.gv.at/Jus/
BESelection of decisions (no focus on patent law)https://ie-forum.be/
DESelection of German patent decisions with English translationDecisions of the Federal Court of Justice (in German)Selection of lower instances decisions (in German)https://www.german-patent-caselaw.com/https://juris.bundesgerichtshof.de/cgi-bin/rechtsprechung/list.py?Gericht=bgh&Art=en&Datum=Aktuell&Sort=12288https://d-prax.de/https://www.gesetze-bayern.de/Search/Hitlisthttps://www.justiz.nrw/BS/nrwe2/index.php
DKDK 1st instance patent decisions (and TM, Designs and Competition)DK – patent some appeal court decisions (Eastern High Court)https://domstol.fe1.tangora.com/page13990.aspxhttps://domstol.dk/oestrelandsret/aktuelt/
ESCase Law database of Spanish Judiciary (not limited to IP)https://www.poderjudicial.es/search/indexAN.jsp
FIJudgments of the Finnish Market Court (all IP matters not only patent cases)https://www.markkinaoikeus.fi
FRSelection by the French patent office of IP casesSupreme court and some lower court civil and commercial decisions (including French Supreme Court cases on patent law)https://www.inpi.fr/en/base-jurisprudencehttps://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/search/juri?tab_selection=juri&searchField=ALL&query=&page=1&init=true
HUPublished judgments of Supreme Court (Curia), Appeal Courts, and some decisions of the Metropolitan Court (exclusive 1st instance court for IP infringement and validity) – only in Hungarian, party names cannot be searched as the decisions are anonimizedhttps://eakta.birosag.hu/anonimizalt-hatarozatok
HUDecisions are anonimized, therefore one cannot search party names, patent numbers, product names, etc.
IEIrish decisionshttps://www.bailii.org/recent-decisions-ie.html
NLDutch patent decisionshttps://uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl/https://www.ie-forum.nl/https://www.boek9.nl/
PLSelection of Polish 1st instance patent infringement decisions (preliminary measures and judgments)Selection of Polish patent validity administrative court judgmentshttps://bip.warszawa.so.gov.pl/orzeczeniahttps://orzeczenia.nsa.gov.pl/cbo/query 
CHSwiss patent decisionshttps://www.bundespatentgericht.ch/en/case-law/case-law
SEhttps://www.domstol.se/patent–och-marknadsoverdomstolen/patent–och-marknadsoverdomstolens-avgoranden/?f=CaseType_list:patentrattsligamalhttps://www.domstol.se/hogsta-domstolen/avgoranden/
UKUK patent decisionshttps://www.bailii.org/databases.html#ew

EPLAW Patent Blog

Get the latest European patent law developments