Tag Archives: Trademark

Foreign Updates

A couple of non-Canadian developments that may be of interest:

  • a majority of the US Supreme Court allowed the registration for the trademark “Booking.com” in the face of arguments that it was generic: “According to the PTO, adding “.com” to a generic term—like adding “Company”—can convey no source-identifying meaning. That premise is faulty, for only one entity can occupy a particular Internet domain name at a time, so a “generic.com” term could convey to consumers an association with a particular website.”
  • the UK Supreme Court in Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc v Kymab Ltd considered patent sufficiency: “The disclosure required of the patentee is such as will, coupled with the common general knowledge existing as at the priority date, be sufficient to enable the skilled person to make substantially all the types or embodiments of products within the scope of the claim.”

NAFTA 2.0

Bill C-4 was introduced today to implement the Canada-US-Mexico trade agreement. The IP related changes are substantially the same as those included in Bill C-100 introduced last May. Bill C-4 include a new criminal provisions on trade secrets, trademark changes on importation and in-transit goods, and some changes on copyright term (although not a general extension to life+70).

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Happy World IP Day

A number of interesting announcements on World IP Day. The focus of the international focus on IP was on Powering change: Women in innovation and creativity. In Canada, the government announced a National IP Strategy having a number of components including $85.3 million over five years to help Canadian businesses, creators, entrepreneurs and innovators understand, protect and access IP. Announced for IP tools, was more efficient dispute resolution and tariff setting at the Federal Court (more judges) and Copyright Board through more funding, formation of a patent collective, improvements to IP used in standards-setting processes, and an IP-specific marketplace. Announced legislative changes include:

  • establishing minimum requirements for patent demand letters;
  • excluding settlement demands from the copyright Notice and Notice regime;
  • Requiring ‘use’ of a trademark to enforce it within the first three years;
  • affirming the patent research exemption;
  • clarifying the role of standard essential patents;
  • allowing continued use of IP by licensees in liquidation proceedings; and
  • creating a College of Patent and Trademark Agents to regulate agents.

In Europe, the UK announced today that it had ratified the Unified Patent Court (UPC) Agreement.

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Updates

Here are several news items that may be of interest:

  • An Order in Council has indefinitely suspended implementation of the private right of action under CASL, Canada’s anti-spam legislation. The private right of action was scheduled to come into force on July 1, 2017.
  • CIPO has advised that it will beginning a series of consultations over the summer on proposed regulatory amendments for Industrial Design Regulations, Trade-marks Regulations, Patent Rules relating to implementation of the Hague Agreement, Madrid Protocol, Singapore Treaty, the Nice Agreement and the Patent Law Treaty.
  • Global Affairs Canada has announced consultation on the renegotiation and modernization of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The government invites submissions on a variety of topics including intellectual property.

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