The Unified Patent Court (UPC) should become a reality in 2022 or in the first few months of 2023.
The Protocol on Provisional Application (PPA) of the Agreement on a Unified Patent Court (AUPC) entered into force on January 19 after Austria became the thirteenth signatory to ratify it.
As a reminder, progress was slowed for the umpteenth time in 2020, when two appeals to the German Constitutional Court were filed against the German law ratifying the UPC agreement. After the Court denied the appeals (on June 23, 2021), Germany signed and promulgated the law (on August 7 and 12, 2021, respectively) and ratified the PPA (on September 27, 2021). Slovenia then ratified the PPA on October 15, 2021.
Technical preparations for setting up the UPC, including the hiring and training of roughly 90 judges, should be completed during the provisional application period which, according to Alexander Ramsay, Chair of the UPC Preparatory Committee, should last about eight months.
A decision should also be made during that period as to the attribution of the jurisdiction originally attributed to the London section, in particular in life sciences and health. At least initially, jurisdiction over those areas may be split between the Central Division headquarters in Paris and the Munich section.
Once enough progress has been made on the preparations, Germany should file its AUPC ratification instrument and the agreement will enter into...
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