Last week, the federal government introduced significant changes to the Trade-marks Act by tabling the omnibus budget bill, Bill C-31, the Economic Action Plan 2014 Act, No. 1 on March 28, 2014. The “monster” Bill makes changes to nearly forty different pieces of legislation, and is designed to enact measures in last month’s federal budget. The trademark amendments will allow Canada to meet its international treaty obligations (including the Nice Agreement, Singapore Treaty, and the Madrid Protocol). According to the government summary, the proposed changes make the Trade-marks Act consistent with the Singapore Treaty, add authority to carry the Madrid Protocol into effect, and simplify the trademark application filing requirements.
The Federal Court has published a Notice to the Profession on experimental testing in patent infringement and validity actions. It requires that notice be provided at least two months prior to the service of expert reports and unless notice is provided, the party shall not lead evidence at trial as to the experiments except with leave of the Court.
In a decision issued today, Justice Hughes considered the breadth of the claims in the first [see update below] biologic patent infringement trial decision of the Federal Court. The patent at issue was found valid and infringed.
On Friday, the United States Supreme Court granted cert in four IP related proceedings: POM Wonderful v. Coca-Cola – standing under the Lanham Act to challenge labelling; Limelight Networks v. Akamai Technologies – does inducing patent infringement require direct infringement; Nautilus v. Biosig Instruments – standard for indefiniteness in patent claims; and ABC, Inc., v. Aereo, Inc. – copyright infringement and public transmissions over the Internet.
Earlier today, the Supreme Court of Canada released its decision in Cinar Corporation v. Robinson, 2013 SCC 73. The Court upheld the findings of liability and modified the award of damages, including punitive damages. Some of the issues considered by the Court included determining “substantial part”, the admissibility of expert evidence, disgorgement of profits under the Copyright Act and punitive damages.
A series of IP related regulations were published in today’s Canada Gazette (Part II): a) changes to the Patent Rules and Trade-mark Regulations relating to the agent examinations; b) changes to the Patent Rules relating to final actions and c) regulations associated with Canada’s anti-spam legislation. Check the specific regulations for the coming into force dates of each amendment.
Changes have been made to the Patent Rules and Trade-marks Regulations governing the Patent Agent and Trade-mark Agent exams. The changes include more flexibility for scheduling the exams and requiring all new Trade-Mark Agents to have written the Trade-Mark Agent exam.
Amendment to the Patent Rules were registered last week directed primarily to final action practice. These amendments follow from the consultations that took place 2012 and relate to amendments and practice after a final action and the Patent Appeal Board.
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