Bonum Certa Men Certa

Grünecker, Hoffmann Eitle, Maiwald and Vossius & Partner Find the Courage to Express Concerns About Battistelli's Ugly Legacy and Low Patent Quality

A brown envelope



Summary: The astounding levels of abuse at the EPO have caused some of the EPO's biggest stakeholders to speak out and lash out, condemning the Office for mismanagement amongst other things

THE EUROPEAN Patent Office, EPO, is in a very bad state because many talented examiners are no longer there and the Office struggles to recruit talent. Money can buy some reputation, but it cannot bury a legacy of pure evil from Battistelli. Applicants (for patents and jobs) understand, more or less at least, what's going on.



There's only half a month for the crook to still 'lead' (i.e. destroy) the Office before his 'child' António Campinos takes over. Insiders say that Campinos intends to change pretty much nothing. Team Battistelli will remain in tact, protected by Herrnst (Ernst) and the rest of the Administrative Council.

Thankfully, some stakeholders have -- dare we say! -- "unionised" against the Office and have put forth a letter. António Campinos too has received the relatively strongly-worded letter, warning about the damage Battistelli caused (without specifically mentioning Battistelli). A copy of the letter was also sent to Battistelli and Herrnst (Ernst), his 'boss' who did pretty much nothing over the past year, at times even openly denying the decline in patent quality. Remember that EPO staff (about a thousand of them) already admitted a massive decline in patent quality -- a monumental effort to speak about it without risk of retribution.

Leading German patent law firms grew tired of the abusive and corrupt administration; we appreciate that, but why did they wait until a fortnight before Battistelli leaves? Is Campinos the main target audience of this letter? He's indebted to Battistelli who gave him the job (or cemented the candidacy), so we very much doubt it'll have an effect on him. "Each year our law firms file more than 9500 patent applications with the EPO," said the authors of the letter. Will they consider reducing that as deterrence against the EPO's bad policies? They make some solid points; for example, the fifth point: "If the users of the European system gain the impression that granted EP patents cannot be relied upon anymore due to insufficient search and examination, the users may increasingly be discouraged from filing European patents. This might unhinge the entire patent system."

They also say "in contrast to an industrial company, we cannot see why the profit of the EPO needs to be increased beyond the level of self-funding."

Don't worry, Battistelli pockets the spare cash.

Here's Kluwer Patent Blog's introduction to the letter, which it posted this morning:

Four leading patent law firms in Germany – Grünecker, Hoffmann Eitle, Maiwald and Vossius & Partner – have published an open letter expressing ‘great concern’ about the developments at the European Patent Office, particularly ‘the modifications to the incentive systems for the examination of patent applications’.

The ‘overreaching desire for high productivity’ has led to a series of problems, according to the letter, which is directed to outgoing EPO president Benoit Battistelli, the chairman of the Administrative Council Christoph Ernst, principal director user support & quality management Niclas Morey and future EPO president Antonio Campinos (who will start in office on 1 July 2018).

Among others, the firms write that when ‘the aim is to terminate proceedings as quickly as possible (…), the quality of the search and examination of applications must suffer’. The rather high fees, moreover, ‘can only be justified by giving the examiners sufficient time for an indepth assessment of each single application’. Patents with an erroneous scope of protection distort and hinder economic competition and might unhinge the patent system, they write.

More broadly, the law firms question the enormous financial reserves of the European Patent Office, amounting to 2.300.000.000 euros, 650 million euros to fund the pension scheme not included: ‘in contrast to an industrial company, we cannot see why the profit of the EPO needs to be increased beyond the level of self-funding. From our perspective, the high surplus is rather an indication that the fees are too high and that a further, problematic increase of productivity is not appropriate.’

The full text of the letter is published below.


SUEPO has already taken note of this letter and the first comment says: "I can only applaud the companies involved in writing this letter. I could not agree more with the concerns that it expresses. I can only hope that the incoming president realises that the concerns expressed cannot be easily dismissed… not least because the unprecedented nature of the letter indicates that the authors must be very concerned indeed."

SUEPO then gets mentioned by "Save the EPO from destruction," whose message says:

MANY THANKS for this brilliant initiative.

By the way the content of the letter could be taken up by SUEPO as-is!

Indeed SUEPO (which represents half of EPO staff) denounced since years (so far to no avail) the dangers of Battistelli’s policies (for both the quality of the patents delivered as well as on health of staff)…

and the Administrative Council remain passive.

It is 5 to 12.

In a few weeks, Mr Campinos will arrive in an exhausted office which cannot continue on this path much longer before collapsing.

Let’s hope that Mr Campinos will understand the poisonous legacy he inherits from his predecessor and in particular, that he has to be very cautious with the teams in place who are directly responsible for this debacle (in particular in HR, and DG1) since something must be done asap to restore both the social atmosphere, the reputation of the EPO AND the quality of the work performed.


Where were these law firms 4 years ago when SUEPO sounded the alarm? Or when the EPO banned (blocked) our site, in effect attempting to muzzle its own whistleblowers? This corrupt EPO management has killed the goose for a few remaining golden eggs; work is (pretty soon) running out, which means that the Office is imploding (with layoffs still expected). We have thus far found only one article about it. IPPro Patents wrote:

Four German law firms have penned an open letter to the European Patent Office (EPO), expressing “great concern” over recent developments at the EPO, specifically the ever-increasing work targets at the office.

The law firms Grünecker, Hoffmann Eitle, Maiwald, and Vossius & Partner wrote that “the incentive systems and internal directives appear to be increasingly directed towards rewarding or even requesting rapid ‘termination’ of proceedings and a correspondingly higher productivity”.

The letter said that this has resulted in penalisation of detailed and thorough assessment of cases.

It said that while the law firms do appreciate the increased speed, such “overreaching desire” for high productivity has led to a range of problems, including issues of quality, scope of protection and inadequately assessed patents.


Now is the time to carefully check which so-called 'IP' site covers the matter (letter) and which ones deliberately ignore it like IP Kat (controlled by Team UPC elements and patent maximalists nowadays).

Recent Techrights' Posts

Our Case is a Very Easy Win, the SLAPPs From Microsofters Were a Grave Error, and Censoring Information Won't Work (It'll Only Ever Backfire)
Censoring is what people do when they lose the argument
 
Slopwatch: Mindless Slop Pieces, Fake Images and Text, Linux FUD on the Cheap
spewed out by Microsoft-controlled LLMs
Links 04/06/2025: Workers' Strikes, Sudan Exodus
Links for the day
Links 04/06/2025: Linux Foundation PR Spam and Lee Jae-myung Wins Election
Links for the day
Gemini Links 04/06/2025: Future Leaders of the World and Platforming Jordan Peterson
Links for the day
Links 04/06/2025: WSL Backfiring on Microsoft and "Disney, Microsoft Announce Massive Layoffs"
Links for the day
Say the Truth, the Rest Will Follow
There's no guarantee that writing the truth will result in an audience (or readership), but over time - in the long run - people generally gravitate towards what they know or feel to be crude truth, not just what's comforting (albeit false or self-deluding, usually groupthink dictated from above)
How to Expose High-Level Corruption Without Getting in (Too Much) Trouble
Democracy depends on free press and freedom of the press depends on being able to safely publish (and keep available) material that bad people don't want to be known to anybody
In-Depth EPO Coverage at Techrights Turns Eleven
11 years is a very long time
Windows Measured Below 10% in Afghanistan, GNU/Linux Gaining a Lot
about 80% are Android (Linux) users, compared to only about 10% for Windows
Poland's Political Predicament and Social Control Media
Democracy and fake "tech" don't mix well; the latter tends to interfere with the former and that's why we get more "Putins" out there
EPO: Taking Away From the Staff to Give More to the Rich
The Central Staff Committee (CSC) wrote to EPO staff earlier this week
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, June 03, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, June 03, 2025
Abuse Inside the Polish Patent Office (UPRP) - Part I: It's a Lot Like the EPO
we can commence a series soon
Gemini Links 04/06/2025: Inescapable Questions and Quitting All "Oligarch Tech"
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Linux FUD From Slopfarms, Blaming Linux for Microsoft Issues; Even WebProNews Has Become a Slopfarm (Googlebombing "Linux" With Slop Images and Fake/Plagiarised Text)
The Web is really getting bad; it's also overwhelmed by fake material or plagiarised material, wherein the plagiarism gets disguised/hidden by LLM sausage factories
Links 03/06/2025: Tiananmen Square Massacre Censorship and Growing Military Activities Around Taiwan
Links for the day
Linux is Already Dominant (Android), Let's Make GNU/Linux Dominant in Desktops/Laptops as Well
"Dr. Stallman recently warned everybody about Microsoft."
The Loyalty to Microsoft and the Salaries From Microsoft (Funding SLAPPs Against Techrights and Tux Machines)
Garrett always knows better. He knows everything best.
Windows Falls in Italy as GNU/Linux Jumps to 5%
Italy knows a thing or two about digital autonomy
Nigeria is All Android and Google
Windows down to almost nothing in Africa's largest population
Mass Layoffs at Microsoft (Second Wave) Not Limited to Redmond
"More layoffs at Microsoft as axe falls in Washington and California"
Gemini Links 03/06/2025: Forth System and "Common Lisp is a Dumpster"
Links for the day
The Leaks Were Right: Mass Layoffs at Microsoft in May, Then Another Wave in June
Just as we've been saying for over a month
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, June 02, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, June 02, 2025
Last Article From Australia's Sam Varghese Was a Year Ago and It Covered the Release of Julian Assange, Who Will Apparently Come Back as 'Politician'
It'll soon be exactly 12 months
Hungary Seems Hungry for Linux
Windows down by a lot
Like in Europe, Bad News for Microsoft in US and Canada
If it loses those "regions", then what's left?
About 8 Waves of Mass Layoffs at Microsoft in 2025 (in Less Than 5 Months), Now Vista 11 "Market Share" Decreases
Really bad news for shareholders of Microsoft
statCounter Sees Bing "Share" Falling Over 0.5% in One Month, Now Lower Than Before the ChatGPT/Bing Chat Hype
Bing has been part of the mass layoffs for quite some time
After Microsoft's Bankruptcy in Russia Android (Linux) Will Dominate Asia Completely
Windows probably peaked in "XP" or "2000"
Microsoft's Demise is a Global Phenomenon
mass layoffs justified using mindless buzzwords
All-Time Highs for GNU/Linux in EU and the UK, All-Time Lows for Microsoft
Combining ChromeOS and GNU/Linux, it adds up to and almost reaches 6%
India: Windows Falls to 50% in Desktops/Laptops and 8% Overall
laptops/desktops fell to 16% of the whole
statCounter: GNU/Linux Up to 4.7% "Market Share" This Month
30,000 Microsoft jobs may be eliminated by year's end
Microsoft is in Trouble and Microsofters Know It
"I've been happy on Win 3.11 for years."
[Video] New Introduction to Richard Stallman's Contributions Including GNU Emacs, GNU/Linux, and Software Freedom
from the channel previously bullied for supporting RMS
Links 02/06/2025: South Korea to Vote, Russia Blitzed From Within
Links for the day
Links 02/06/2025: Political Leftovers, DRM, and Patents
Links for the day
Links 02/06/2025: Microsoft Spins Layoffs as "Slop", Frontier Settles Lawsuit
Links for the day
When You Publicly Boast About Wanting to Violently Attack People (Even Colleagues) Finding a Job Will Prove Difficult
there's a lesson to be learned here
The Web We Lost, the Information Lost Due to Microsoft's Attacks on Companies Like Yahoo! (Before the LLM Slop Frenzy)
When it comes to news sites, what can we say?
Covering Corruption in Poland, Including a War on Science (Due to Bad Politicians)
What we're about to show is that skilled and experienced scientists in Poland are besieged by bureaucrats
Gemini Links 02/06/2025: "Star Wars Day" and "Security Day"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, June 01, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, June 01, 2025