Clients with European Union (“EU”) trade marks, registered designs and EP patents may be wondering what will happen to their IP protection in the United Kingdom (“UK”) now that the nation has voted to leave the EU.The good news is that EU IP rights extending to the UK will not be affected in the short-term. The European Patent Office is not an EU institution, so the leave vote will have no effect on EP patents ...
A whistleblower is a person who raises the alarm or reports wrongdoing within their organisation. The Swedish Government is now proposing new legislation with the purpose of enhancing the protection of whistleblowers, to come into effect on January 1, 2017. Rebecka Thörn and Josefine Wir summarise the main points of the proposed legislation and give some advice on how your company can handle alarms raised by employees ...
“The degree of consumer care is becoming more heightened as the novelty of the Internet evaporates and online commerce becomes commonplace.” This quote, which comes from a United States (“US”) decision, is quoted in the South African Supreme Court of Appeal’s (“SCA’s”) judgment in the so-called “Clearvu case” – Cochrane Steel Products (Pty) Ltd v M-Systems Group (Pty) Ltd and Another (unreported case no. 227/2015, 27 May 2016) ...
A South African court has found that, for the purposes of fair dealing in copyright law, hyperlinks are a sufficient way of acknowledging source and ownership. The recent decision in the case of Moneyweb (Pty) Limited v Media 24 Limited and Another (unreported case no. 31575/2013, 5 May 2016) attracted a great deal of publicity. This is possibly because the two main parties are media companies ...
A court has ruled that the South African Advertising Standards Authority (“ASA”) does not have the authority to consider and rule on adverts placed by entities that aren’t members of the organisation. Regular readers will know that the ASA is frequently used as a forum for dealing with what are essentially trade mark or passing-off disputes. This is because the ASA Code contains provisions that prohibit advertising that causes consumer confusion or involves slavish copying ...
Egypt’s Ministry of Trade and Industry has issued Decree No. 43 of 2016, which amends the rules organising the registration of factories and companies that are eligible to export their products to Egypt. The decree took effect on 15 March 2016, and replaces all previous decrees or stipulations that contradict it ...
Brexit, the United Kingdom’s vote to leave the European Union, raises many questions and some are related to intellectual property issues. There are a few anticipated changes to IP rights due to Brexit. Here is a summary of some key issues, and what could happen next. Trademarks and Designs Proceduresfor treatment of EU trademarks will need to be an element of the negotiations for the UK in leaving the EU ...
An encouraging news update comes from Croatia, as some of the recent reports claim that the Croatian IT market reached a value of EUR 950 million in 2015. According to IDC Adriatic – a regional branch of the global market intelligence provider – this shows an increase of 10.8% when compared to the previous year.IDC Adriatic added that a continuation of the IT market's recovery is expected in 2016 as well. More precisely, further strengthening of the market at an average annual rate of 6 ...
Turnaround Management Association (TMA) Europe held its ninth annual conference in Rome on 9 and 10 June. Partner at Karanović & Nikolić,Maja Jovančević Šetka, attended the conference as a board member of TMA Serbia ...
At the recently heldSummit 100Business Forum in Sarajevo, many topics of contemporary relevance for the region of Southeast Europe were expectedly touched upon. Be it the supply of sustainable energy, the position of women in business, or the issues related to infrastructure & transport conditions, it was an opportunity for a number of prominent experts and government officials to weigh in with their opinions on how to improve the overall business situation in our region ...
Federal Law No.2 of 2015 on Commercial Companies (the “New Law”) came into force on 1 July 2015, replacing Federal Law No.8 of 1984. The New Law, similar to its predecessor, contains sections relating to various forms of companies, including public and private joint stock companies (“PJSCs”) and limited liability companies (“LLCs”) ...
On 12 March 2015, the Slovenian Competition Protection Agency ("Agency") initiated proceedings against Hyundai Avto Trade d.o.o. ("HAT"), the national distributor of Hyundai vehicles, together with a network of authorised repair shops for Hyundai motor vehicles ...
According to recent media reports, the Bosnian Central Bank (BCC) has presented information regarding the scope of investments made by the country's diaspora. More precisely, it has been reported that more than EUR 1.5 billion of investments are being made by the Bosnian diaspora each year through remittances and formal channels – meaning that the exact figure is even larger when accounting for other, informally made investments which have been proven to exist ...
The Hamburg data protection authority has imposed fines against the companies Adobe, Punica and Unilever, stating that they have continued to transfer personal data to the USA contrary to the stipulations of the Safe Harbor judgment. 1. The Safe Harbor judgment of the ECJ dated October 6, 2015 (legal matter C-362/14) makes it clear that European companies can no longer simply transfer personal data to the USA as a "non-secure third country" ...
The Act Amending the Business Freedom Act and Certain Other Acts enteredinto force on 19 May 2016. The changes mainly affect Poland's small businessregister - the Central Register and Information on Economic Activity (CEIDG). The amended Business Freedom Act clarifies certain terminology used in the regulations but also introduces entirely new solutions governing small businesses ...
The government recently announced that a bill will be submitted to Congress to modify the Chilean Data Privacy Law N° 19,628 (“DPL”). In connection with the future bill (yet to be presented before Congress), the Ministry of Finance sent to several members of Congress a set of informal minutes outlining the structure and core aspects of the bill.The following is a summary of the minutes, and an initial legal analysis prepared by Carey ...
Various media outlets have recently been reporting on the economic relationship between Turkey and the Balkan countries, as well as the growing interest of Turkish companies to do business in this region through acquiring or cooperating with local companies – many of which are state-owned and in the process of being put up for sale by their respective governments. If we look closer into specific examples, the numbers are supportive of this positive trend, i.e ...
We have more real estate news from Montenegro, as there are media reports on 4.9 million square meters of beach properties being put up for sale in the municipalities of Buljarica, Budva, and Bar by the Montenegrin Council for Privatisation and Capital Projects ...
In the Executive Decree N° 1040 was enacted on May 23rd 2016, and contain the Regulation for the PPP Incentives Law. This Executive Decree is still pending to publishing in the Official Gazette, however is in force.This regulation establishes the following provisions that will regulate a PPP contract:Creates a fast track process for PPP projects, based in the studies of the public entity ...
Six years after Oracle first accused Google’s popular Android platform of infringing Oracle’s copyrights in Java application programming interfaces (“APIs”), a Northern District of California jury has found that Google’s copying constituted fair use. Oracle was seeking $8.8 billion in damages for the alleged infringement ...
Dear All, ALRUD Law Firm hereby informs that the amendments introduced to Arbitrazh procedural code in accordance with Federal law as of 02 March 2016 No. 47-FZ “On the amendments to APK RF” (hereinafter referred to as – “Law”) will come into effect on 01 July 2016. The Law remains in line with the general trend on reduction of arbitrazh (state commercial) courts workload and speeding up arbitrazh proceedings ...
By a judgment of 24 May 2016 in the MT Højgaard/Züblin case (Case C-369/14), the Court of Justice of the European Union has pronounced on the possibilities of changing the identity or the composition of a preselected entity during an award procedure. The case was a result of E ...
In an opinion that will make vacating arbitration awards even more challenging, the Texas Supreme Court unanimously held that the Texas Arbitration Act (“TAA”) sets out the exclusive grounds for vacating arbitration awards arising from agreements governed by that statute, and that common law vacatur grounds are no longer viable. Hoskins v. Hoskins, No. 15-0046, --- S.W.3d --- (Tex. May 20, 2016). Read the full alert ...
Plaintiffs frequently bring class action claims for alleged statutory violations for which Congress has provided private rights of action and statutory damages. In many of these instances, plaintiffs do not allege any specific, tangible harm (such as monetary loss), but claim that the violation of these so-called “statutory rights” by itself constitutes injury-in-fact sufficient to satisfy standing requirements. This week, the Supreme Court held in Spokeo v ...
