NIPC News

Manchester Civil Justice Centre Author Skip88 Licence Public Domain   Source Wikimedia Commons Jane Lambert Yesterday afternoon, I attended the Intellectual Property Crime Group  Knowledge Share, Introducing the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court Small Claims Track.  That was an online presentation given by Deputy District Judges Nicola Solomion and Richard Vary.  It consisted of 18 slides and lasted just over an hour.  Well over 140 people attended the call at one point.   I noted some familiar names in the Participants' list, including Barbara Cookson , Dids Macdonald  and Michael Edenborough . The presentation began with the observation that the court was now working well with good feedback.  The move to Manchester had been successful.   It had received additional resources which had enabled Deputy District Judge Vary to "rattle through his list."  Waiting times were now quite short.  Many cases were settled through...

Manchester Civil Justice Centre, Home of  the Small Claims Track Author Skip88   Public Domain   Source  Wikimedia Commons   Jane Lambert Yesterday, HM Courts and Tribunal Service published a Guide to the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court Small Claims Track  and a glossary of  Common legal terms used in the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court .   It aims to help users and potential users of the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court ("IPEC") small claims track by giving practical tips.  Although it is primarily intended for litigants in person, intellectual property practitioners will also find it useful.  The guide is divided into the following sections: Introduction About the IPEC and the Small Claims Track How to decide if a claim is suitable for the IPEC Small Claims Trac k What to expect in your dealings with the court     What to do before issuing a claim     The procedure for claims in the IPEC Sma...

Standard youtube Licence Jane Lambert Cities have been motors of innovation and creativity throughout history,  Think of Periclean Athens, renaissance Florence, enlightenment Edinburgh and Silicon Valley.  Every year, the WIPO (the UN specialist agency for intellectual property) publishes a ranking of science and technology hotspots.   The list is compiled using the following methodology: "Inventors listed in patent applications under WIPO’s Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT), spanning the years 2014 to 2018.  Authors listed in scientific publications in the Web of Science’s Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE) and covering the same period.  The geocoding of inventor and author addresses and the use of density-based spatial clustering of applications with noise (DBSCAN) algorithm to the geocoded inventor and author points." The above film shows the top 10 clusters for 2020.  From a British perspective, it is disappointing that there are no British clusters i...

Business and Property Courts The Business and Property Courts in Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Leeds, Manchester and London went live yesterday. I discussed them in Launch of a Judicial Superhighway   on 12 July 2014 in IP North West and  The Leeds Business and Property Courts   on 12 July 2017 in IP Yorkshire. On 27 Sept 2017, the Judiciary issued a new 14-page advisory note  which I mentioned in   Better than the M4 - "The Judicial Superhighway"  2 Oct 2017. Relevance  This topic affects IP practitioners and owners as well as litigation lawyers throughout the UK, particularly those in Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Leeds and Manchester. Commonwealth Games Birmingham has been chosen as the UK's candidate city to host the Commonwealth Grounds. Like all other major sporting events, the Games will rely on sponsorship, broadcasting and licensing revenues but, unlike the Olympics, there is nothing like the Nairobi Treaty or Olympic asso...

Photo Adrian Pingstone Reproduction kindly licensed by the author Source Wikipedia Jane Lambert The IPO  has published details of the  China IP Roadshow 2017  when our IP attaché, Tom Duke,  will tour Scotland and the North of England between 18 and 20 Sept. My chambers are assisting with the Yorkshire leg of his tour and I can tell you that there have been a lot of enquiries and we are already into double figures with the bookings. If you want to attend the Leeds event call my clerk Steve on 020 7404 5252 or send him an email  without delay. Most British businesses do very well in China but things can go wrong sometimes. When they do, they can have repercussions here. That is where I come in.  Here are some of the problems that occasionally arise: The British trade mark of a company that applies to register that mark in China is opposed, invalidated or revoked; A company that imports goods from China for distribution in the UK fi...

Author Ssolbergj Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International Licence Source Wikipedia Jane Lambert Some homework for those who are coming to hear our IP attaché, Tom Duke , speak about Succeeding in China - How to mitigate IP risk in Barnsley, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, London or Manchester this September. The Intellectual Property Office has produced a very helpful guide entitled  Intellectual property rights in China .   A quick read of this guide before he speaks will enable you to make the most of Mr Duke's talk, especially if you are new to the subject. Although our law differs from China's in detail the basic concepts are the same because China is a member of many of the same international agreements to which we belong. Thus patents protect new inventions. trade marks brands, copyrights literary and artistic works and so on. But there are some rights in Chima that do not exist in our law such...

Manchester Civil Justice Centre, Wikpedia Commons Jane Lambert In "Success Fees and ATE Premiums in the Patents County Court: Henderson v All Around the World Recordings Ltd " 4 May 2013 NIPC Law, I blogged about Judge Birss QC's decision in  Henderson v All Around the World Recordings Ltd and Another [2013] EWPCC 19 (27 March 2013) where an impecunious singer song writer who had successfully brought proceedings in the Patents County Court for infringement of her performer's rights against a major record label was allowed  £52,484.25 in costs. Had she brought her claim in the Chancery Division she might well have been awarded £232,676.20. One of the reasons why Judge Birss QC would not allow her more was that "a litigant who wishes to recover a reasonable proportion of the totality of his of her legal costs has a clear option available, to litigate in the High Court. In that system none of the problems now faced by the claimant would...