09.14.19
Gemini version available ♊︎Unitary Patent (UPC) Promotion by Team Battistelli ‘Metastasising’ in Private Law Firms
EPO revolving doors totally acceptable when you serve Team Battistelli
Summary: The EPO’s Albert Keyack (Team Battistelli) is now in Team UPC as Vice President of Kilburn & Strode LLP; he already fills the media with lies about the UPC, as one can expect
“REAL SOON NOW!”
That’s what Team UPC wants us to think of the Unified Patent Court (UPC). They keep telling me stuff like this in Twitter, but evidence suggests otherwise. I choose not to reply; they try to provoke for a response they can somehow take out of context. It’s an entrapment and opponents of the UPC call it that. They try to put UPC critics in a position wherein they seem ‘clueless’ about what they oppose.
“They try to put UPC critics in a position wherein they seem ‘clueless’ about what they oppose.”Unitary Patent (UP) rebuttals are necessary; there’s lots of propaganda to come shortly from Team UPC, i.e. from people whose entire career for about a decade was advocacy of UPC (for personal gain in the monetary sense). Lots of new FUD is afoot, no doubt about it, and it’s connected to corrupt EPO officials like António Campinos or like Benoît Battistelli. They stand to gain from the UPC, even if the people of Europe stand to lose. The European Patent Office is just some empty vessel for them — something with which to propel and boost interests of the litigation ‘industry’. If the Office dies in the process, so be it; they don’t really care. If European firms suffer? They couldn’t care any less. The only firms they care about is their own, i.e. law firms, unproductive firms.
“If European firms suffer? They couldn’t care any less. The only firms they care about is their own, i.e. law firms, unproductive firms.”As we shall explain in a later post, Lexology was recently bombarded with lots of shameless self-promotion by a firm with special EPO connections. Lexology is connected to IAM, the EPO’s prime propaganda machine.
Kilburn & Strode LLP’s Carrollanne Lindley wrote some days ago (to be boosted by Lexology) that UPC “would allow central revocation, enforcement and litigation throughout the EU [and] becomes more uncertain in the light of Brexit.”
“Uncertain” as in dead? Here is the whole paragraph which is relevant:
Patents. Clients should be reassured that the implication of Brexit for patents is less substantial as there is little post grant pan-European patent law (in fact the only post grant pan-European law is relatively rare and is at the level of the Court of Justice of the European Union). The European Patent Convention (EPC) is not an EU body. The future of an EU Unitary Patent (UP) and an EU Unitary Patent Court (UPC) that would allow central revocation, enforcement and litigation throughout the EU becomes more uncertain in the light of Brexit.
“Clients”…
This is news? This is what now counts as ‘news’ (in Google News, owing to Lexology as a gateway)?
Private firms’ promotional messages to “Clients” are not news. They’re sales pitch. It’s marketing.
But pressing on, around the same time we saw Kilburn & Strode LLP’s Albert Keyack with his own puff piece (apparently they’ve paid Lexology to promote their stuff, as it shows up everywhere lately).
“As we explained some months ago (after readers too had alerted us), this is a classic case of revolving doors with the EPO (something ordinary EPO staff, such as examiners, isn’t permitted to do; strictly).”Wait, did we say “Kilburn & Strode LLP’s Albert Keyack”?
Yes, that’s the EPO’s Albert Keyack.
As we explained some months ago (after readers too had alerted us), this is a classic case of revolving doors with the EPO (something ordinary EPO staff, such as examiners, isn’t permitted to do; strictly). Now comes UPC advocacy (i.e. lies) from what became the Vice President of Kilburn & Strode LLP. He wrote:
The UK is set to leave the European Union on 31 October 2019 (‘Exit Day’).
[...]
What about the Unitary Patent and the Unified Patent Court (the UPC Agreement)?
As of mid-2019, 16 EU member states (including the UK) have ratified the convention related to the new pan-European patent (Unitary Patent) and pan-European patent court (Unified Patent Court). The EPO, which is not an EU institution, would administer both the granting of these patents and the courts. All that remains for the new system to take effect is the required ratification by Germany (although ratification is currently under consideration by the German Constitutional Court). IP owners would not be able to use the Unitary Patent system to protect their inventions within the UK, and it is unclear whether post-Brexit rulings by the new court would or would not be enforceable within the UK. The UPC Agreement, once enacted, will be available to protect inventions within the 25 (of 28) EU member states that have joined, but rights holders will still be able to obtain equivalent UK patents (enforced in UK courts) to protect their inventions in the UK from either European patent applications designating the UK filed at the EPO, or UK national patent applications filed at the UK IPO – exactly the system in place today.
Notice that optimism. So he has basically already decided that UPC will come “real soon now” (not a direct quote) and somehow the UK leaving the EU would not be an issue at all. This is great propaganda from one of Battistelli’s own ‘chefs’…
“Our Prime Minister’s (not even elected!) own brother was recently “re-appointed as UK IP Minister” as well.”If the Vice President of Kilburn & Strode LLP is such a liar, how much better can their lawyers be? Probably the same ‘gene pool’ as Alan Johnson and Edward Nodder of Bristows LLP. They’ve been doing ‘damage control’ after the UK’s ‘IP Minister’ resigned again (that's four times in 3 years!) — revealing the extent of the chaos UPC hopefuls are facing. Just before the weekend Nodder wrote: “Chris Skidmore re-appointed as UK IP Minister [..]. Mr Skidmore was previously IP Minister between 5 December 2018 and 25 July 2019.”
Our Prime Minister’s (not even elected!) own brother was recently "re-appointed as UK IP Minister" as well. What a mess; it’s all nepotism and corruption. Over and over again. No consequences; no investigation, let alone punishment.
“Nothing “community” or “unitary” or “unified” to see here, except in name. United in greed — the law firms’!”As the FFII’s President has just put it (in reply to an EU chief): “The “rule of law”, but the EPO cannot be sued in court for maladministration. Can you explain how the Unitary Patent is compatible with the treaty then?”
It’s incompatible and unconstitutional. I also responded by saying: “At the same time the corrupt EPO threats to sue me, several times, for exposing its corruption…”
If this is what the EU boils down to under the EPO regime (remember that UPC — unlike the EPO — is an ‘EU thing’), then Team UPC liars and nepotists are becoming a credibility threat to the EU. They’re in effect fracturing Europe, not uniting it. Nothing “community” or “unitary” or “unified” to see here, except in name. United in greed — the law firms’! █
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