Bonum Certa Men Certa

Member States Are Turning Against “Tyrannical” Chief of European Patent Office (Benoît Battistelli)

De Morgen



Summary: Another new article translation from this week's Dutch newspapers

Having just published a translation of this article about Dutch EPO protests, we also got another translation from Petra Kramer. It's this Dutch article (just republished in the Belgian media).



Here is the full text:

Member states are turning against "tyrannical" chief of European Patent Office



The days of the controversial president of the European Patent Office, Benoît Battistelli, appear to be numbered. Employees have been complaining for some time that Battistelli behaves like a tyrant and a Sun King. But now for the first the Member States are against the Frenchman.

The European Patent Office (EPO) gives patents to all kinds of conceivable inventions, ranging from thermos bottle to computer chip. Rijswijk is one of the five offices, where 2,700 people work. The 38 participating countries act as principals and supervisors of the EPO.

Thus far they still supported the rule of President Battistelli who took office in 2010. He is very controversial among the staff because he deteriorated all kinds of working conditions and he took harsh reprisals against trade union representatives who express criticism. Meanwhile two union directors have been laid off at its headquarters in Munich. Two union representatives at the Rijswijk office are on sick leave after they were subjected to what they call intimidating integrity investigations. Colleagues set up a 'bread' fund last month to provide one of them of income, because management has suspended his salary.

According to the top of the EPO, it's pure coincidence that the punished staff are all trade unionists. Member States up until now have let Battistelli plot his course. This is the straw that broke the camel's back, according to a letter from Jesper Kongstad, the Danish president of the Administrative Council, a sort of supervisory board in which the 38 countries participating in EPO are represented.

Kongstad asks Battistelli to examine all disciplinary measures taken against members of the union by an independent external committee. The layoffs and other sanctions should be suspended until the results of this examination are made public.

"Unfortunately we can not hold any significant conversation with the president," Kongstad writes in his letter. Battistelli has immediately rejected the proposal and questioned the legal basis of it. "There is no legal obstacle for the council to make requests to the EPO president," Kongstad writes however. "It is up to the president to respond positively to such requests."

Kongstad's flip-flopping is remarkable, because he was regarded as one of the 'friends' of Battistelli. Their personal connection, according to trade union Suepo, caused the festering of the conflicts within the organization.

Healthy organization

At the next meeting of the Administrative Council on March 16, delegates from the 38 participating countries will officially cast their votes on the proposal of Kongstad. Battistelli now lobbies with Member States to move them to shoot down the independent investigation. According to a letter from Battistelli, his organization "healthier than ever".

It is not very likely that the supervisory countries will vote against the proposals of their own president Kongstad. That will leave Battistelli with two options: resign or accept to have his controversial actions examined by an independent commission. "It's not so much the question whether Battistelli will have to resign, but how many millions he will receive as a severage package, claims lawyer Liesbeth Zegveld representing the trade union Suepo.

She booked last year's success at the Hague Court of Appeal, which concluded that the EPO violates human rights because it hinders the work of the union. A remarkable verdict, because the EPO as an international organization enjoys legal immunity. The court ruled that human rights in this case outweigh those legal immunity. EPO nevertheless rejected the verdict and got support from the Dutch government in doing so. At present, the case is in the Supreme Court.


Endless gratitude goes out to Petra Kramer for her work on this translation.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Matthew J. Garrett Behaved in a Similar Fashion to 4Chan and Kiwi Farms
Opposites attract? Are they opposites at all?
Drew DeVault Suggests "CoC Enhancement", Starts Trolling Projects in Microsoft GitHub
And it backfires immediately
What 'Hulk Hogan of UEFI' Could Learn From Jimmy Kimmel About the 'Streisand Effect'
Lawyering up is risky and is usually doesn't work
 
Do Your Job and Demand Your Compensation - But in That Order.
We'll do our best to convince the Judge to award all costs to us (lawyers, barrister, LIP bills etc.) plus judgements against them, for abusive litigation and needless suffering associated with that abuse
Like Nazi Germany and Volkswagen
Tell us all about "freedom" when your government runs a Ponzi scheme
Microsoft Sponsored This Man, Microsoft Sponsored His Behaviour (and He Controls Microsoft)
They get what they paid for
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, September 26, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, September 26, 2025
He Talks Too Much, He Says Dumb Things
only British when that suits him
Slopwatch: FUD and Plagiarism (Working Against Linux) Promoted and Rewarded by Google News
Shame on Google News
Reminder: We're Unloading Some Publications to Tux Machines
About 15 years ago I was struggling to keep up with TechDirt
The E-mail Protocol is for Text
bad netiquette
Gemini Links 26/09/2025: Slop in OpenStreetMap and MOPML (My Own Private Markup Language)
Links for the day
Links 26/09/2025: More Provocations Against NATO by Russia (Near Alaska, USA), Microsoft Booster Accenture Has Mass Layoffs
Links for the day
Links 26/09/2025: Hardware, Security, Health, and Nuclear Armament
Links for the day
Links 26/09/2025: "Digital Fatigue" and Slop Frenzy (Hype) Ruining Work Productivity, Culture, Languages
Links for the day
Brett Wilson LLP Unwilling to Disclose or Explain How 'Hulk Hogan of UEFI' Pays for His SLAPPs Against Us (He Cannot Afford These), So We Are Escalating
Escalated in the British authorities
Linux is Replacing Apple
Apple is money down the drain. Not only are the gadgets overpriced; they cost a lot to maintain and keep going over time
"We don't have that kind of relationship with Microsoft. The only public key that every UEFI firmware is guaranteed to have is Microsoft's, and only Microsoft owns the private key."
This is how to sabotage GNU/Linux distros that Microsoft does not control
Slopwatch: linuxconfig.org, linuxsecurity.com, and Google's Promotion of the Worst and Most Prolific Slopfarms
Over in Google News it has been quite chaotic this past day
Gemini Links 26/09/2025: Reading RSS Feeds, ROOPHLOCH 202
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, September 25, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, September 25, 2025
Links 25/09/2025: More European Airports Shut Down Due to What Seems Like Russian Drones
Links for the day
Gemini Links 25/09/2025: Amiga Revived and Hackers (UTF-8)
Links for the day
Purchasing Concert Tickets in 2025 in Manchester: The "Modern" Experience
I recently spent a couple of days here testing the "terrain" in order to better understand how large public venues, for concerts rather than sporting events like football, currently "work"
Links 25/09/2025: French Unions Want Another Strike, Super Typhoon Ragasa Kills Many
Links for the day
Microsoft 'Secure Boot' and Shim as Barrier or Obstacle to New GNU/Linux Users Trying to Escape Microsoft
Just as intended all along
Lovers and Haters
Always beware hate preachers and demagogues (or how they frame issues or whose fault they distract from)
Focusing on What People Have in Common Instead of Killing and Cancelling One Another
Men and women of both "wings" stand to gain a lot by working together on common interests
'Cancel Culture' Isn't About Enforcing Ethics (and It's Done by People on the Right, Not "The Leftists")
Smarter folks would leave social control media
Russia's Attack on Europe (and NATO) Will Worsen Censorship and Corruption in Europe
Can we still debate issues that predate the invasion of Crimea?
Lawyers Should Permanently Lose Their Licence (and Worse) for Using Chatbots in Legal Work
They not only waste people's money and time. They pollute the literature with falsehoods. They commit perjury. [...] Brett Wilson LLP sent the Judge nearly 1,000 pages of material (mostly mine, copied without proper permission) shortly before a short Hearing, which lasted less than an hour
GAFAM and MATA (Mythical, Metaphor) as Explained by analognowhere.com
They're instruments of suppression that sponsor the oppressor
We've Already Mentioned Who Nowadays Funds Garrett's SLAPP Against Us (Not Garrett), Let's Examine Who Sponsored His Litigation Partner (Other Than Microsoft Salaries There's a Buddy of Bill Gates)
it's alleged that the Serial Strangler from Microsoft got money from him
Florian Müller: Using Software Patents to Attack Software Developers, Agitate Against Patent Reform
He also promotes attacks on the German Constitution and laws
Reliance on Typepad Seems to Have Doomed the Voice of Software Patents and Patent Maximalists in PatentDocs
Follow the money
UEFI 'Secure Boot' is Potential Mayhem to the Environment (Older and Leaner Distros Stop Working)
creating new problems, disguised as "solutions" to problems that do not exist
Sometimes 'Cancel Culture' Backfires Badly
There's no such thing as "too much" coverage
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, September 24, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, September 24, 2025
Links 25/09/2025: Jimmy Kimmel Returns to Air (With Limitations) and London Stansted Airport Latest to Have Incident (Fire)
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Fake Articles, SPAM With Slop, and Google News Directs People to Read Slopfarms
why does Google News insist on still linking to prolific slopfarms?
Gemini Links 25/09/2025: New Game for Gemini Protocol, Eleven, and Network Solutions Woes
Links for the day