Unitary patent launched: one single European patent

On June 1, 2023, the Unitary Patent will be launched. Protection will then finally be obtained with one (granted) patent in all 17 EU countries that have joined the Unitary Patent system. These countries so far are: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia and Sweden.

This Unitary Patent is different from the already familiar European Patent, which, once granted through the European Patent Office, breaks down into a bundle of national rights and is thus enforced on a state by state basis. This new Unitary Patent is invoked only before the Unified Patent Court (UPC): an international court that focuses solely on patent disputes. The idea is that in this way there will be uniform and harmonized jurisdiction for patent disputes in the participating European countries.

The UPC has exclusive jurisdiction in disputes concerning Unitary and European Patents. In addition to a central department, there are several local and regional departments in the participating countries. These departments will adjudicate infringement and nullity proceedings, the national courts will no longer have jurisdiction.

For already pending European patent applications and European patents that do not yet have unitary effect, there is a 7-year transition period, which can be extended to 14 years. During that period, for those patents, an ‘opt-out’ declaration can be made, causing that the UPC's jurisdiction is not exclusive and the national courts retain jurisdiction.

I will write about the pros and cons of the choices to be made in the next newsletter!

Moïra Truijens