OUR MANY ARTICLES about misconduct and misbehavior at the EPO go several years back. The EPO is not only emulating the USPTO's corporate patriarchy (things get better in the US these days) but is also borrowing a page from totalitarian regimes by appointing crooks to top positions while assaulting oversight. It's like a state within a (super)state, the European Union. There is no accountability, definitely not to European citizens, let alone their elected officials.

Back in 2010, when Benoît Battistelli was first appointed as President of the European Patent Office (EPO), there was a certain lack of transparency in the election process. As a blog post by IAM Magazine reported at the time, mischievous rumours quickly emerged from the EPO staff union newsletter (PDF link) to fill the vacuum of information regarding the circumstances of Mr Battistelli’s appointment.

Battistelli’s original contract was negotiated in secret with Mr Jesper Kongstad, the then Acting (and now actual) Chairman of the Administrative Council. It was rumoured, intriguingly, that the contract specified that Mr B’s place of employment was the Parisian suburb of Saint Germain-en-Laye (the town of which he was deputy major, the spiritual home of football team Paris Saint-Germain and the birthplace of Louis XIV, the Sun-King), and that it contained an annex granting him full pension rights at the end of his five-year contract. While Merpel, whose nine lives invariably make any sort of pension annuity unaffordable since the pension must last so much longer than expected, can see the attraction of having full pension rights after a relatively short employment stint, she wonders what advantage or reason could lie behind deeming Mr Battistelli's place of employment to be 700 km west of where his office is actually located, if there is any substance behind that improbable rumour. The union newsletter, SUEPO Informs, also reported that Mr Kongstad refused to show the final contract negotiated with Mr Battistelli to the Administrative Council ('AC'), despite repeated requests by its apparently quite powerless members

"Google, for instance, has been stuffed using some puff piece of both Battistell and Kongstad."Florian Müller, who insists that it has been a while since Microsoft last paid him, recently wrote that the Administrative Council of Kongstad is a sham. "Instead of exercising oversight," he wrote, "that body is largely responsible for the banana republic that the EPO has become."

He also told us that "on [SUEPO] they've announced a new demo, this time in front of Kongstad's country's embassy" (Denmark).

"I just checked," he added, "it's the Munich consulate to be precise (embassy would be in Berlin). I may go there, take pictures and report."

Here is the original announcement.

Searching the Web for information about the Battistelli-Kongstad connection isn't too helpful. Google, for instance, has been stuffed using some puff piece of both Battistell and Kongstad. "Managing IP," says one activist site, "is the magazine which published the controversial interview of Mr Battistelli and Mr Kongstad on 19 December 2014."

They have a lot to cover up or lie about. We have already refuted many of their claims (responses to softball questions). The relationship between Battistelli and Kongstad, as evidenced by the joint interview, helped reaffirm if not expose a complete conflict. Merpel at IP Kat recently said: "Even the renominations in the December AC meeting, announced in the 12 December Communique, were, Merpel understands, only those for members whose term would expire before the next AC meeting. According to Article 11(3) EPC, second sentence **, these re-appointments require only the consultation, not a proposal, from the President. Previously, these re-appointments have been confirmed well in advance of the 5-year deadline. What is the cause, or intended effect of this brinkmanship? A worrying but plausible conclusion is that it is to make the Members concerned more biddable as their term comes up. Any such pressure, whether subtle or overt, would of course completely conflict with accepted principles of judicial independence."

This speaks not only about the AC but also the Boards of Appeal. Basically, the EPO now has merely an illusion of separation of powers.

The EPO is something that acts a bit like the Kremlin. It hides behind European flag, symbolism, etc. and has among its staff people from different nations; in practical terms, it's like a country (or cult) within a country and it is run by crooks who work hard to eliminate anyone not belonging to the cult. We urge our readers in Germany and EPO staff to attend protests until the issues are rectified and the EPO regains some sense of legitimacy. ⬆