sutton044

The US and UK patent offices have granted a number of patents relating to the therapeutic use of cannabis derived products. Paradoxically, both the US and UK governments currently define cannabis and cannabis-derived products as having no medicinal benefit. Recent developments suggest that both governments may soon soften the legal definition of cannabis. This Kat takes the opportunity to ask, in view of the US and UK governments current position that cannabis has no medicinal use, how strong are the patents claiming the very same? The legality of cannabis derived products is complicated by the broad spectrum of potential substances to which this term may refer. The cannabis plant contains at least 85 cannabinoids. The most prominent of these, cannabidiol (CBD), is non-psychoactive and has been associated with a number therapeutic effects. THC is the second most prevalent cannabidiol in cannabis, and is the primary psychoactive substance. Cannabis derived products contain varying amoun...

The AmeriKat has been noticeably whiskers down in her day job over the past few months .  But now, with the frenzy of a new Court term still several weeks away, she has taken the relatively quiet opportunity to review the much awaited publication of the EU IPO's report entitled " The Baseline of Trade Secrets Litigation in the EU ".  This report was commissioned by the EU IPO in order to prepare the future report that will assess what impact the EU Trade Secrets Directive has had (see previous Kat posts here ).  That report is to be published before 9 June 2021 (just think, 2021...what might be in store for us   then?). The AmeriKat's whiskers now alert to the EUIPO's Baseline Trade Secrets Study The 436-page report covers all 28 Member States and addresses how each jurisdiction deals with definitional issues, scope of protection, sources of law, enforcement (contractual, tortious, criminal, equitable, etc) and cross border issues relating to trade secrets (confid...

Kat on the beach Right before the summer break, on 7 August last, when most people had already turned their out-of-office auto-reply on or were getting ready to move to the beach, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) issued quite an interesting ruling -  SNB-REACT , C-521/17  - concerning enforcement of IP rights under Article 4(c) of the  Enforcement Directive  and the availability and scope of the safe harbours under the  E-Commerce Directive . Background This referral from Estonia was made in the context of proceedings that a collecting society, SNB-REACT, had initiated against an individual, Deepak Mehta, concerning the latter's alleged liability for infringement of the IP rights of 10 trade mark owners.  According to SNB-REACT, Mehta had allegedly registered a number of IP addresses and internet domain names, which  unlawfully used signs identical to the trade marks owned by SNB-REACT members, together with websites unlawfully offerin...

This is part 3 of a series of posts containing Andrew Waugh QC's review of US Patents since 1790. Parts 1 and 2 can be found by clicking here and here . Patent no. 6,000,000 - December 7, 1999 1,000,000 in 8 years – 125,000 a year  Patent No. 6,000,000 - 1999 Jeffrey C. Hawkins and Michael Albanese developed a means that with the press of a single button, a person could synchronise files found on one computer with those found on another. The patent was assigned to 3Com. Per the Abstract:   Many users of handheld computer systems maintain databases on the handheld computer systems. To share the information, it is desirable to have a simple method of sharing the information with personal computer systems. An easy to use extendible file synchronization system is introduced for sharing information between a handheld computer system and a personal computer system. The synchronization system is activated by a single button press. The synchronization system proceeds to synchronize ...

by Graham & Brown The end of each summer brings its traditional review of teaching curricula and reading lists before the start of a new academic semester. With ‘Copyright – What Everyone Needs to Know’ , US scholar Neil Weinstock Netanel , Professor of Law at UCLA, offers a new title to add to your library.  In this relatively short book, Weinstock Netanel describes the workings of US copyright law in accessible language. The author achieves an excellent balance between coverage and simplicity in the description of the law. Any copyright expert will agree that this is no small feat! It should be stressed that this book is not aimed at a legal or academic readership, as clearly indicated by its title. Rather, the book ‘speaks’ to a wider audience with no, or little, legal background and no specific knowledge in copyright. Whilst much of what is described in the book will also hold true for many other countries, the book centres on US copyright law. Having said that, references ...

This is part 2 of a series of 3 posts containing Andrew Waugh QC's review of US patents since 1790 - part 1 can be found by clicking here . Patent No. 2,000,000 - 1935 Patent No. 2,000,000 (2,009,957th) - April 30, 1935 1,000,000 in 24 years (41,667 a year) Patent number 2,000,000 was also related to tires and was granted to Joseph Ledwinka of Philadelphia for the Edward G. Budd Manufacturing Company. The focus for Ledwinka's patent was for rail cars and consisted of a pneumatic tire, used in combination with a rail wheel provided with a retaining flange. Light in weight, Ledwinka claimed that a rail car provided with wheels and tires of this type could attain exceptional high rates of speed, be braked as severely as desired, and do so safely. Patent no. 3,000,000 - September 12, 1961 1,000,000 in 26 years – 38,462 a year Kenneth Eldredge's Automatic Reading System allowed conversion of human language into machine language. The invention, which was assigned to General El...

Kat friends Adar Bengom (Ortal) and Jenia Melkhior , from Herzog Fox & Ne'eman in Tel-Aviv, report on how obscenity may render copyright in a work unenforceable in certain circumstances, at least according to one court in Israel . Can concerns over obscenity cut back on copyright protection? Given a recent ruling given by the Israeli Magistrate Court in Herzliya, the potential answer may be “yes”. In the case of Sex Style v. Abutbu l, the plaintiff, a producer of pornographic movies, sued the defendant, an individual who operates an adult website, for copyright infringement. It was alleged that the defendant’s website provided links without authorization to 15 pornographic movies. While the court ruled that the movies are entitled to copyright protection, it declined awarding statutory damages for infringement on the ground of such content, being obscene, was therefore illegal. At the beginning of its analysis, the court determined that the movies are pornographic (rather t...