Commercial strategies for attaining value from your patent portfolio and the latest case law from the UK courts and EPO.

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12 October 2017, London
Patent law update 2017

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3. Patent Update – Autumn 2017
Commercial strategies for attaining value from
your patent portfolio and the latest case law from
the UK courts and EPO

4. • Welcome and introduction
• The year in patents (so far)…

5. header 2
Unwired Planet v Huawei [2017] EWHC 711
(Pat)
• Clarity on FRAND
– Worldwide licence
– Only one rate is FRAND
– No variance for the size of the licensee
• Patent valuation
– “In assessing a FRAND rate counting
patents is inevitable”
– Note the cross check
• Injunction:
– “bringing a claim for infringement of a
SEP which includes a claim for an
injunction without prior notice of any kind
will necessarily be an abuse of dominant
position”
– A defendant that fails to take a worldwide
licence can be hit with a UK injunction
© Pedro Fernandes - https://flic.kr/p/oWTpki
Giles Parsons, Browne Jacobson LLP

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Fujifilm v AbbVie
[2017] EWHC 395 (Pat)
• The problem
– Cascading divisionals
– Threat of legal
proceedings
• The power
– Declarations can be
granted if they serve a
useful purpose
• The solution
– Declaration that a product
was obvious at a given
date

7. header 2 IPEC Costs Cap
• PPL v Hagan [2016] EWHC 3076
(IPEC)
– If a Claimant beats a Part 36
offer, it gets costs on the
indemnity basis which are not
subject to the costs cap
• Proposals
– An uplift on recovery, but still
subject to a cap
– Additional damages

8. key contacts
Giles Parsons
Associate
Browne Jacobson LLP
e: giles.parsons@brownejacobson.com
t: +44 (0)207 337 1505
m: +44 (0)7887 754830

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John Lawrence, Barker Brettell

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20. key contacts
John Lawrence
Partner
Barker Brettell
e: john.lawrence@barkerbrettell.co.uk
t: +44 (0)121 456 0006

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Carrie Johnson, Barker Brettell

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32. Any questions

33. Patent Strategy
• Filing strategy
• Internal structure: R&D to
protection
• IP audit
• Commercial considerations
• Filings/acquisitions
• Offensive/defensive
• Insurance
• Licensing
Kathleen Fox Murphy, Browne Jacobson LLP

34. Commercial considerations
• Patents cost money.
• Board, shareholders investors all want return on
investment from patents
• Starting point is the commercial strategy of the
business
• How can patents be used to fulfil that strategy?

35. Filing vs acquisitions, or a mixture
• File patents on all R&D, or on core business of
the company and/or core business of
competitors
• Keep an eye on patent filings which read on to
business and/or those of competitors and
acquire patents as and when required
– may not be possible to acquire & risks infringement of
third party patents

36.  Offensive or defensive strategy
• Allow budget for funding assertion and defence
of patents
– How much is proportionate to fulfil business strategy
– Insurance? Policy price + excess
• Sales and licensing
– Value from patents which are not core to business

37. key contacts
Kathleen Fox Murphy
Partner
Browne Jacobson LLP
e: kathleen.foxmurphy@brownejacobson.com
t: +44 (0)207 337 1013
m: +44 (0)7342 056238

38. Developments and trends in patent
licensing
Selina Hinchcliffe – Browne Jacobson LLP

39. Contents
• Patent licensing
• Trends
• Consequences
• Questions

40. Patent licensing
• Licensing patents can be lucrative
• are you utilising the invention yourself?
• if not, can 3rd parties utilise?
• Licenses can be as simple or complex as
required based on what you are trying to achieve
• The “Tea Bag”
• IBM

41. Trends
• more and more patents are being granted
worldwide
• but only 50% of all UK patented inventions are
used by their applicant
• almost 20% of UK patents are licensed
• opportunities to tap in to patent licensing

42. Trends
• The landscape is secretive and opaque – very
rarely publicised – let’s piece together some of
the trends
• It is a more competitive and difficult licensing
environment than historically the case

43. Trends
• R & D
• Rise of “Mega Licensing”
• Board room interest in IP Strategy
• Increase in Patents filed
• Companies more willing to check validity of
individual patents
• Licensee’s productive capacity and expertise in
local markets

44. Consequences
• Do your homework in advance.
• Look at collaboration models.
• Enforce actively.

45. key contacts
Selina Hinchliffe
Partner
Browne Jacobson LLP
e: selina.hinchliffe@brownejacobson.com
t: +44 (0)330 045 2199
m: +44 (0)7585 884321

46. Actavis v Eli Lilly
Freedom to Operate and Related
Issues
Mark Daniels – Browne Jacobson LLP

47. • Freedom to Operate (FTO)
– Identify your product/process
– Search of patent literature
– FTO review
– Purchasing / licensing
– Designing around
– Clearing the path
– Securing patent protection (defensive publication)

48. • How do I know if my product/process would
infringe in the UK?
– Three landmark cases:
– Catnic [1982] RPC 183
– Improver [1990] FSR 181
– Kirin Amgen [2005] RPC 9

49. • Actavis v Eli Lilly [2017]UKSC 48
• Two questions:
– Notional addressee of the patent (person skilled in
the art)
• (1) does the variant infringe the claim as a
matter of normal interpretation?
– Art 69 EPC (claims – using description and drawings)
– Protocol (protection vs legal certainty)
– “Normal” = contextual (purposive) literal
construction?

50. • (2) Does the variant nonetheless infringe
because it varies from the invention in
immaterial way(s)?
– Reformulation of the Improver/Protocol Questions:
– Does the variant achieve substantially the same result in substantially
the same way as the invention (ie the inventive concept)?
– Would it be obvious to the person skilled in the art, reading the patent
at the priority date, but knowing that the variant achieves substantially
the same result as the invention, that it does so in substantially the
same way as the invention?
– would such a reader of the patent have concluded that the patentee
nonetheless intended that strict compliance with the literal meaning of
the claim(s) of the patent was an essential requirement of the
invention?

51. • A UK doctrine of equivalents
– Closer into line with French and German position
– Indication of UPC approach?
• Significant impact on your FTO analysis
– Variants achieving substantially the same results, in
substantially the same way
• Expert evidence
– A more complex minefield to traverse

52. key contacts
Mark Daniels
Partner
Browne Jacobson LLP
e: mark.daniels@brownejacobson.com
t: +44 (0)121 237 3993
m: +44 (0)7733 306501

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59. Freedom to operate
BL O/388/17 – UKIPO decision….
Carrie Johnson, Barker Brettell

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63. key contacts
Carrie Johnson
Partner
Barker Brettell
e: carrie.johnson@barkerbrettell.co.uk
t: +44 (0)121 456 0079

64. Thank you