The English Court of Appeal has thrown out an attempt to appeal a decision in favour of Dyson about spare parts for Dyson vacuum cleaners. Dyson sued spare parts supplier Qualtex for infringement of Dyson's unregistered design rights (UDR) in 14 spare parts manufactured by Qualtex. The spare parts were deliberately designed to look like the originals, known as "pattern parts" in the trade ...
There have been fresh developments in the continuing battle between pharmaceutical manufacturers and parallel importers. National and European courts have been attempting to strike a balance between the principle of the free movement of goods within the EU and the legitimate protection of intellectual property rights. The most recent contribution has come from Advocate General Sharpston (AG) in her opinion in the ongoing case of Boehringer and others v Swingward and Dowelhurst (C-348/04) ...
The Police and Justice Bill was put before the House of Commons on 25 January 2006. The main aim of the Bill is to improve the powers and scope of the police force but there are a number of sections which look to update the Computer Misuse Act 1990 (CMA) and in particular to make Denial of Service (DOS) Attacks illegal. DOS attacks can take many forms but are essentially an attempt to disrupt the use of a computer, server or website ...
A distribution franchise agreement allows a producer of goods or services (the “Franchisor”) to transfer to another entity (the “Franchisee”), in return of a fee, the commercialisation of such products under the Franchisor’s trade mark(s) and distinctive signs, in conformity with its uniform business method and upon the provision, by the Franchisor to the Franchisee, of technical know how and regular assistance ...
The commercial distribution of goods and services developed with the dynamics between sophisticated global markets, where the European Internal Market is integrated, with traditional markets of a local character or national dimension. The type of contract adopted by the producers or importer companies in order for their products or services to reach, through the commercial intermediaries, the final users – consumers or not – i. e ...
Dominant companies have special responsibility to ensure that the way they do business doesn’t prevent competition on the merits and does not harm consumers and innovation», said European Competition Commissioner Mário Monti, regarding the Commission’s Microsoft decision dated March 24th, 2004 ...
The interoperability information on Microsoft’s decision deserves special attention by the undertakings that have a dominant position in the market. Intellectual property rights, granted as an incentive for the creation of innovation and as a tool to recoup the investments made by companies, used to be understood as providing several rights to its owners ...
There are three possible courses of action in this situation. These are: Derivative action A derivative action is brought under common law by a member on behalf of a company in respect of a wrong done to that company. Remedies awarded are for the benefit of the company. Derivative actions are an option where the company itself could sue and there has been a fraud on the minority, illegality or a failure to approve a matter by the members passing an appropriate resolution ...
On March 31, 2006, the Treasury Department published in the Federal Official Gazette the "General Foreign Trade Rules for 2006" (GFTR), intended to help taxpayers in the application of the law. While the GFTR may give taxpayers rights, they may not establish obligations different from those contained in the Mexican Constitution or in laws and regulations ...
On March 6, 2006, the Ministry of the Economy published the Explanatory Notes for the Tariff Classification of Goods in the Federal Official Gazette, after a delay of over four years from the date of publication of the Federal Law on Import and Export Duties (“FLIED”) on January 18, 2002. These Explanatory Rules should have been published at the same time ...
Complaints by foreign businesses regarding protection of intellectual property rights in China have been a consistent feature in media reports since large scale foreign investment commenced some 20 years ago. However, China's economic revolution over the same period means that opinions based on negative experiences in the past must be constantly reassessed ...
Internet telephones are set to take the global communications industry by storm. Big names like Microsoft, AOL, Yahoo! and eBay are piling into the market and former state-run telecoms providers like BT are also investing. The technology was first developed by the US Defense Department as part of a research project on interconnection in the 1970s. But until recently only techno-geeks have had the interest and ability to make any use of it. But times have changed ...
The State Council promulgated the Regulations for the Administration of Direct Sales (the “Direct Sales Regulations”) and the Regulations for the Prohibition of Pyramid Sales (the “Pyramid Regulations”) on 23 August 2005. The Direct Sales Regulations, which entered into effect on 1 December 2005, allow the reintroduction into China of the direct sales business model that was banned in 1998 ...
The Central Government of the People’s Republic of China (“the Mainland”) and the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (“Hong Kong”) reached a further understanding regarding the Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement between the Mainland and Hong Kong (“CEPA”) (as discussed in the July 2003 and November 2003 issues of China Legal Update) on 27 August 2004 ...
The Ministry of Finance promulgated the Measures for the Examination and Approval of the Advanced Recovery of Their Investment by Foreign Partners in Chinese-foreign Cooperative Joint Venture Enterprises on 9 June 2005. The Measures, which entered into effect on 1 September 2005, specify the conditions that foreign investors must satisfy to obtain advanced recovery of their investment in a Chinese-foreign cooperative joint venture (“CJV”) ...
The National Development and Reform Commission promulgated the Provisional Measures for the Administration of Venture Capital Enterprises on 15 November 2005. When they enter into effect on 1 March 2006, the Measures will be the first national statute governing venture capital investment in China ...
On 1 May 2004 a new and revised Technology Transfer Block Exemption Regulation (the TTBER) entered into force - Regulation No. 772/2004. The TTBER will provide block exemptions for IP licensing agreements, ensuring that certain technology transfer agreements are automatically exempt from the application of Article 81(1) of the EC Treaty, which prohibits anti-competitive agreements ...
The European Union has recently launched a new ccTLD (country code top level domain). Instead of using the various national European ccTLD's, such as .fr for French companies, .de for German companies, and .co.uk for U.K. companies, the EU has made available the .eu suffix as a Community-wide ccTLD. The new domain extension has already proved widely popular, with more than 100,000 applications for domain names filed thus far ...
The Wider Economic Environment In 1978, the Government of the People’s Republic of China embarked on a comprehensive program to reform China’s state-planned economy and introduce a free market economy. The new capitalist structures were initially intended to co-exist with the state-planned economy, but a massive surge in foreign investment has since stimulated the free market economy to eclipse the public sector in the industrialised south and eastern seaboard of the country ...
Germany. November 9, 1938. Kristallnacht. “The Night of Broken Glass.” Nazi secret police and the Hitler youth swarm over Jewish businesses and homes, terrorizing and victimizing helpless individuals all over the country.1 SS leadership orchestrates attacks on every vestige of Jewish culture as “punishment” for fictitious crimes that will never be recognized by the rest of the world ...
This Order . which came into effect on 1 December 2005, facilitates the expansion of the electronic filing system in the Companies Registration Office. Companies may now appoint Electronic Filing Agents to sign and file documents with the CRO in electronic form. The Minister of State at the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Mr Michael Ahern, stated, “The introduction of a statutory Electronic Filing Agent will greatly simplify the process for companies and their agents ...
In February of the present year, the Law No. 511 on the Creation of the Superintendence of Public Services (SISEP) was enacted. This Law substituted on its functions the Institutions rendering Public Services of Telecommunications, Energy and Drinking Water, (INAA, TELCOR; INE), and revoked their Organic Laws leaving them without any effect. From this legal event it existed in Nicaragua uncertainty for all the private parties who had established legal relationships with these institutions ...
