Bonum Certa Men Certa

UPC Roundup: War on the Appeal Boards, British Motion Against the UPC, Fröhlinger Recalled, and Fake News About Spain

Team UPC still distorts the facts, as if the end justifies the means

UPC Dead



Summary: Taking stock of some of the latest attempts to shove the Unitary Patent (UPC) down Europe's throat, courtesy of Team Battistelli and Team UPC

THE EPO's management is eager to ram the UPC through, having decided to replace the Boards' location, keep them understaffed and perpetually scared, etc. The management calls it "reform" but it's actually an overhaul which serves the patent microcosm and large foreign corporations; it would be an enormous, historic disaster. It needs to be stopped, both by EPO insiders (not Team Battistelli) and outsiders.



Decision T 2561/11



An EPO-friendly legal firm wrote the other day (earlier this week) about decision T 2561/11 from the Boards, noting that "the EPO Board of Appeal found an Appeal to be admissible despite certain omissions in the Notice of Appeal. In particular, the Notice of Appeal failed to mention the Appellant’s name and address, and was alleged not to contain a request defining the subject of the Appeal, both requirements of Rule 99 EPC."

"In the above case, it would be so convenient for the Office to just blame the Boards and punish them for it, as is so common/habitual nowadays."Since then, as was covered here before, the EPO got even stricter, not when it comes to patent scope but when it comes to signatures etc. It further complicates the process not of patent-granting but merely the bureaucracy. In the above case, it would be so convenient for the Office to just blame the Boards and punish them for it, as is so common/habitual nowadays.

Douglas Carswell in Motion to Bury the UPC in the United Kingdom



Putting aside the war on the Boards -- a war long fought by Battistelli -- how about the war on British law, or the pretense that Brexit is magically compatible with UPC (it's not)? Dr. Luke McDonagh, who had repeatedly explained why the UPC is untenable here, said it is "interesting that Carswell seems all on his lonesome in putting this UPC motion forward - what is the Tory position?"

"Remember that Carswell is a longtime Tory (Conservative) politician.""Be interesting to keep an eye out on this UPC EDM by UKIP's Douglas Carswell this week," Max Walters from the Law Society Gazette wrote.

Remember that Carswell is a longtime Tory (Conservative) politician. He is hence pretty mainstream and he comes from a high-profile family of famous doctors of medicine. His defection to UKIP is pretty recent and wasn't motivated by nationalism, racism and so on (the stereotypes).

"Her Master's Voice," Margot Fröhlinger



"Founded doubts regarding a legal UPC with UK after brexit," wrote another person the other day, "IP system need certainty..."

"Is this the first time that [the EPO's] Mrs. Fröhlinger is not 100% certain in public about UK participating in UPC after Brexit?"

That's what Christopher Weber wrote before noting that "it's just an old article preceding the UK's intent to ratify that I mistook for a later statement. My bad."

But nothing has technically changed since then. In fact, the person who expressed intent to ratify has since then been sacked or resigned. We also did a long series explaining why ratification makes no sense and even if it ever happened, it would not be sustainable, in particular after Brexit. Here is that series again:



What's noteworthy about Fröhlinger's remark is that she has always been "her master's voice" (Battistelli's echo chamber) and rejected simple facts when it suited Battistelli's agenda [1, 2, 3, 4, 5], as pointed out here before. Fröhlinger is in many ways an extension of if not part of Team Battistelli, wherein lying has become banal and routine.

The Rain in Spain...



Meanwhile, fake news about Spain is being spread again (we have seen a lot of fake news about the UPC recently, e.g. [1, 2]) and Team UPC is trying to connect it to Brexit (there is no connection). This one tweet, linking to Manuel Rey-Alvite Villar from Bristows LLP (some of the worst liars out there), says: "Will the Spain joins the UPC System and the Unitary Patent? Brexit can make Spain changes his mind..."

“Spain's ruling party and authorities still reject the UPC and have stated the reasons as recently as a year ago.”Nonsense. First of all, none of this is news; Francisco Moreno has already demonstrated that it goes a couple of years back. And what does the self-serving Bristows base its ridiculous headline on? "The motion [which] will be debated in the Committee on Economy, Industry and Competitiveness of the Congress of Deputies (the lower house of the Spanish parliament)."

But the party behind this motion has already spoken about it and attempted it before. Spain's ruling party and authorities still reject the UPC and have stated the reasons as recently as a year ago.

Recent Techrights' Posts

SLAPP Censorship - Part 136 Out of 200: Lawyers That Get Paid to Mess About
They were already outnumbered and understaffed
 
Newer Not Better: Treadmill Updates Cause Problems
after 2 years the un-updated machines still fine
The Cyber Show on the Slop Bubble
new article about the implosion of the slop bubble
Links 01/08/2026: New York Times Trying to Inflate the Slop Pyramid Scheme (at Cost to Its Own Reputation) and "Iran Appears to Be Blasting Amazon Data Centers Off the Map"
Links for the day
Positive Political Momentum
Daniel Pocock is taken seriously by many people who contact us privately
Google "AI" is Plagiarism, the Case of Richard Stallman (RMS)
Why would anyone choose LLM slop over the originals, curated and fact-checked by domain experts?
Explaining That Software Patents Are Neither Legal Nor Desirable
Many of our readers work in the legal sector
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, July 31, 2026
IRC logs for Friday, July 31, 2026
Gemini Links 01/08/2026: Retirement, Bike Trips, Quake Stuff, Usenet Reborn
Links for the day
Links 31/07/2026: Microsoft Now Says Slop is Bad (LinkedIn Cracks Down on It), LinkedIn Narrows Down Size (No Expansion)
Links for the day
European Patent Office (EPO) Series: From Alicante to Munich: Another Smooth Ride
Campinos is intent on transforming what was originally envisaged as a temporary public office into his own permanent personal feather-bed
Daniel Pocock and the Important Observation About Threats of Cult-Like Behaviours (No Rationality, No Reason, Just "Mob Rule")
It's a threat to Europe's sovereignty
The "PIP Parade" of IBM's Lousy Management, Which Said "Blockchain" Was the Future
In a healthy company such a CEO would be punished for utterly wrong visions and predictions. Not at IBM...
SLAPP Censorship - Part 135 Out of 200: Limited Liability Partnership (LLP) That Does Not Disclose Financial Activities Before August
It certainly looks like they keep losing the remaining women that still exist in the firm
Links 31/07/2026: "Climate Cover-Up Continues" and Pesticides "Cook the Planet"
Links for the day
Datacentre 'Boom' Sceptics Aren't Luddites, They Recognise a Threat to Human Survival (Not Limited to Climate Change)
Archaeologists very well know that no species will survive forever
Microsoft's Claims Are Based on a Big Lie
the bubble is coming to its hard limits
Don't Lose Sight of the Impact of "End of 10" (Vista 10)
GNU/Linux has taken off fast
Microsoft's Debt Continues to Steadily Increase, Not Counting Hundreds of Billions in Secret/Hidden Debt
The mass layoffs will carry on, maybe labelled LITE
IBM is Circling Down the Drain, the 'Growth' Comes From Beancounting Tricks and Salary Cuts
IBM was down 2.17% yesterday
Microsoft's "Headcount" Distracts From How Big a Cull It Had This Month
It also speaks of numbers "[a]s of June 30" though the "buyouts" were effective July 1 and since then well over 10,000 workers have vanished
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, July 30, 2026
IRC logs for Thursday, July 30, 2026
Gemini Links 31/07/2026: Music, Journaling, and Longing
Links for the day
More Fake News From (and for) IBM, Nobody Ever Held Accountable for Fraud
Companies that turn a blind eye to their own corruption end up recruiting more corrupt people and sacking those who object to the corruption
Links 30/07/2026: Smol Document Server and More PalmOS-ing
Links for the day
Links 30/07/2026: Microsoft Refuting Its Own Slop Hype and "Amazon Is Gutting Its Hey Hi (AI) Division" (GAFAM Bubble)
Links for the day
Today The Register MS Published "AI" Spam and Fake Article by "Senior Technical Marketing Engineer"
unethical practices
Cult inquiry parliament leak fallout
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Techrights Will Always Protect Sources
Our #1 priority is sources
European Patent Office (EPO) Series: Legal Concerns and Suspicions of Irregularities
complaints submitted to OLAF
The Era of Silence
So stay silent, remain hidden
GAFAM and IBM Dying in Massive Debt, Hence the Mass Layoffs (Increasingly Silent Layoffs That the Media Fails to Mention)
the integrity of this economy is only as good as its leaders or those who govern the market
TheLayoff.com Deletes Comment That Called IBM's Previous CEO, Ginni Rometty, "Gin 'n Tonic"
It is hard to believe the comment was deleted for being a duplicate (in another thread)
The Mainstream Media Continues to Overlook or Intentionally Ignore Hundreds of Billions in Hidden/Secret Microsoft Debt
the issue is that Microsoft's crisis is a lot greater and broader than this
SLAPP Censorship - Part 134 Out of 200: What "Majority Rules" Tell Us About the Litigant
we press on with this series
Overshoot Day Sites That Contribute to the Problem
Some of these are not even accessible (at all) without JavaScript
Microsoft May Have Gotten Rid of 8% of Its Workforce This Month
It's hard to know what's really going on because there's no transparency due to NDAs
Links 30/07/2026: "Age of Irrationality", Google Losing Money, and "House of Ellison is on the Brink"
Links for the day
Gemini Links 30/07/2026: Homeworlds Notes and Manuscript Submitted
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, July 29, 2026
IRC logs for Wednesday, July 29, 2026