This is my response to the public consultation on the rules of procedure (the 15th draft) for the European Unified Patent Court (UPC) that the UPC Committee conducted between June and September 2013. The focus is put on constitutional implications and conflicts of interests.The key points are:...

The US case Akamai Technologies Inc v Limelight Networks Inc brought the patent world's attention to the issue of if and how a patentee may enforce a method claim against a party who performs some of the steps in a patented method but leaves other steps to be performed by a third party. The case...

Forward citations are arguably the most widely used empirical metric for patents, including as indicators of patent information content, cumulative innovation, value, and knowledge flows. However, forward citations have major shortcomings. Citations require long time horizons to accrue, and...

The aim of this study is to elucidate whether arbitration offers advantages compared to the patent litigation system which is currently existing in Germany. To answer this question three essential characteristics of the current German patent litigation system are presented, i.e. the economic...

Patents define an inventor’s exclusive rights by reciting essential aspects of the invention in sentences called claims. The claims are drafted in varying degrees of technical specificity, such that each claim is legally distinct — some may be valid or infringed while others are not. Most...

Patent protection for genetic enhancements would tend to spur genetic innovation, but would tend to limit access to those genetic enhancements through discriminatory mechanisms such as price and favoritism. The patent system would likely ensure high rates of genetic enhancement innovation,...

The Federal Trade Commission's 2003 innovation report revealed an interesting fact: the pharmaceutical industry is largely satisfied with today's patent system while the electronics, software and Internet industries are not. This article suggests that a difference in governing law accounts for...

The doctrines of patent exhaustion, or first sale, and patent misuse are generally only considered affirmative defenses to patent infringement claims. However, under MedImmune, where patent misuse caused or threatened injury to an entity, that entity may assert misuse as an independent claim....

Courts are rarely asked to judge beauty. Such a subjective practice would normally be anathema to the ideal of objective legal standards. However, one area of federal law has a long tradition of explicitly requiring courts to make aesthetic decisions: the law of design. New designs may be...