November 3, 2009
The Israel Patent Office has published a questionnaire offering users of the PCT Receiving Office in Israel the opportunity to express their satisfaction or dissatisfaction with the service provided and to comment on tentative plans to go paper-less.
I, for one, have always found Head of Receiving Office, Dr. Michael Bart and his staff forever courteous and helpful, and, apart from filing in Geneva on Mondays where the Paris deadline was Saturday or Sunday, or for saving clients excess page fees for gene sequences, prefer filing in Israel.
I can’t link to the questionnaire, but Liat King liatki@justice.gov.il at the Israel Patent Office will send one to interested parties. The deadline for responding is the end of November.
Leave a Comment » | 
Israel IP, Israel Patent, Israel Patent Office, PCT, Patents, WIPO | 
Permalink
Posted by Dr Michael Factor
November 3, 2009
U.S. Federal Judge Robert Sweet (Manhattan) has agreed to hear a lawsuit challenging patents on two human genes associated with hereditary breast and ovarian cancer.
The lawsuit has been brought by the American Civil Liberties Union challenged patents held by Myriad Genetics and the University of Utah Research Foundation on grounds that genes are “products of nature” and cannot be patented.”
The lawsuit was filed in federal court in May on behalf of women’s health groups, geneticists and scientific associations representing approximately 150,000 researchers, pathologists and laboratory professionals, and concerns patents for the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes. The wider issues are patents for genes in general. Note, the issue is not genetic engineering, but rather patenting scientific discoveries.
The same issue is being considered in Australia, see Gene Patents Under Attack and the European Court of Justice has also been asked to clarify through interpretation of Directive 98/44 whether a DNA sequence is entitled to patent protection as a compound as such, or only under circumstances where the DNA performs its function.
Back in October 2008, the Israel Commissioner of Patents in Circular M.N. 64 – ruled that gene sequences can be patented in Israel. See Gene Sequences are now patentable in Israel, but that ruling ignored the fundamental issue of whether such things are fairly described as being inventions. If challenged in Court, I would not be surprised if a judge finds the ruling of the Patent Commissioner as being ultra vires, since the Israel law does relate to patentable material and excludes scientific discoveries and natural products.
We note that in the interim to the US Supreme Court hearing re Bilski, the USPTO has issued guidelines on patentable subject matter. See http://blog.ipfactor.co.il/2009/08/27/uspto-issues-guidelines-about-patentable-subject-matter/ which themselves seem to indicate that genes are no longer patentable.
Leave a Comment » | Intellectual Property, Israel Patent Office, Israel Related, Patents, pharmaceuticals and Biotechnology | Permalink
Posted by Dr Michael Factor
November 3, 2009
Apparently, PepsiCo. were revealed the trade secret of vending bottled water, and went ahead and marketed this revolutionary product as Aquafina without coming to a business arrangement with the entrepeneurs who gave them the idea. Anyway, PepsiCo. forgot to defend the charges and a Wisconsin judge awarded damages of 1.26 billion dollars against the rinks company. The alleged infringement happened in 1981, so one wonders about Statute of Limitations issues.
For the full story, see: http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE59R58N20091028
Apparently the charges were ignored due to a misplaced letter and a conflicting board meeting, and PepsiCo. have requested that the case is heard and tried on its merits. Bottling water wasn’t new back in 1981, so we find the whole issue a little weird.
This is somewhat reminiscent of Peckham Spring Water. See the BBC hit series “Only Fools and Horses” 1992 Xmas Special – Mother Nature’s Son.
2 Comments | Business Method, Intellectual Property, News, famous marks | Permalink
Posted by Dr Michael Factor
