Intellectual Property

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Augmented Reality (AR) uses technology to overlay real world, physical environments with virtual components like light, sound, video, images or GPS data.  Once seen as a futuristic and ‘gimmicky’ area, AR is growing at a rapid pace and will soon form part of our everyday technology. Microsoft recently unveiled its AR wearable technology, ‘Hololens’ which is geared towards gaming and design and comes in the form of a headset. Continue Reading Augmented Reality Poses New Legal Challenges

The EU General Court has refused to register the ‘Skype’ word and logo marks (the Skype marks) as Community Trade Marks (CTMs) in relation to a range of telecommunications and computer-related goods and services. The General Court’s decision is based upon a likelihood of confusion with Sky’s earlier word CTM SKY (the Sky mark).Continue Reading EU General Court finds risk of confusion between ‘Sky’ and ‘Skype’ marks

The Commercial Court has delivered a ruling which will have significant implications for music companies and ISPs, in regard to illegal downloading. The Court has granted three music companies, Sony Music, Warner Music and Universal Music, an injunction requiring UPC Communications to take measures to stop illegal downloading of music.  

The parties are due to return to court on 29 April with submissions on how the order can be implemented. Continue Reading High Court orders UPC to take action against illegal downloaders

Last month, the Court of Appeal of England and Wales handed down its judgment in the highly publicised legal battle between pop star Rihanna, and fashion giant Topshop and its parent company Arcadia Group Brand Ltd (Topshop).  The Court of Appeal upheld the High Court’s July 2013 decision that Topshop’s sale of t-shirts showing a photograph of Rihanna – without her consent – constituted passing off.Continue Reading Rihanna v Topshop – UK Court of Appeal upholds decision in landmark passing off judgment

In December 2014 the European Commission published its 5th Report on the monitoring of patent settlement agreements in the EEA in respect of the period January to December 2013. The focus of the report was to gather some insight into the types of agreements being entered into between originator and generic companies and to identify the types of agreements that were resulting in a delay to generic entry to the market. While these types of agreements can potentially give rise to competition law issues the Report does clarify that there is no presumption of any legislative breach and that each case would require analysis of the merits and specific circumstances.Continue Reading Commission Report on the Monitoring of Patent Settlement Agreements

In the wake of its recent win against "screenscraper" website eDreams, Ryanair has claimed another victory following a referral from the Dutch Supreme Court to the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) on the Database Directive (96/9/EC).

In brief, the CJEU held that owners of publically available databases, which do not fall under the protection of the Database Directive, are free to restrict the use of the data through contractual terms on their website. The decision in Case C – 30/14 Ryanair v PR Aviation BV marks the CJEU’s first copyright judgment of the year.Continue Reading Ryanair in another victory against the screenscrapers

The Intellectual Property (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2014 has been enacted. It introduces a small number of amendments to Patents and Trade Marks legislation. 

It expands the research exemption in our patents legislation to benefit companies engaged in the pharmaceutical sector in Ireland. This will be done by providing legal certainty on the aspect of immunity from patent infringement where clinical tests and trials are carried out in order to develop new or generic versions of medical and veterinary products, while the derivative products continue to enjoy legitimate patent protection. The new provisions will apply to tests and trials carried out in Ireland for the purposes of getting regulatory approval of the new products anywhere in the world.Continue Reading Intellectual Property (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2014 enacted

New Balance has kicked off a trademark action against Nike-owned Converse concerning its PF Flyers brand and the Converse trademark on Chuck Taylors. New Balance is requesting that the Federal Court in NY cancel the Converse trademark registration, which was obtained in 2013, so that they may continue selling their version of the shoe. New Balance has set out in court filed papers that the products are different enough and that consumers are unlikely to confuse the two. 

Last October saw Converse file a trademark action against 31 companies, notably not including New Balance, who they accused of infringing their trademark by producing knock-offs of their famous Chuck Taylor designed shoe. Should Converse be successful in this action New Balance has indicated their concern as to how such a ruling would be enforced.Continue Reading New Balance trademark action against Converse

Ireland has been ranked in 18th position globally and 11th in western Europe for the level of protection which it affords to property rights followng the publication of the International Property Rights Index 2014. The Index ranks 97 countries in respect of their legal and political environments, physical property rights and intellectual property rights.

Ireland is ranked one place higher at 17th globally in respect of its intellectual property rights protection. Most notably, it has been placed third globally and first in western Europe for its patent protection – a position which it shares with overall top ranked country Finland. This result should be further cemented by the proposed introduction of a local Irish division of the…

Continue Reading Ireland scores highly on International Property Rights Index