Summary of the UPC month
In March, UPC users continue the steady trend of new infringement case filings from December 2024 onwards (with only a slight dip in January 2025), bringing 19 new infringement cases before the Court of First instance. In total, the CFI now received a number of 798 cases.
While the Munich LD is leading in terms of infringement actions, the Paris CD certainly stands out with its share of 74% of stand-alone revocation actions. That’s no coincidence given that – apart from being competent for 5 out of 8 IPC sections – it is competent for “electricity” matters, which also still make up the lion’s share of infringement actions.
The Court continues to grow its personnel by upgrading part-time judges to full-time positions and by hiring new judges and/or opening additional panels of judges. This is an important development to be able to dedal with the increasing workload.
Meanwhile, English has firmly secured its place as the predominant language of proceedings with a steady market share of 54%. This development is only logical as English is the language in which most European Patents are granted. Having the language of the patent as the language of the UPC proceedings is a natural choice.
Key decisions in a nutshell
The key decisions of the month are dealing with:
(1) The necessity of provisional injunctions regarding new market entries
Competition drives prices down. Patentees however do have a legitimate interest in excluding competition based on their efforts to drive innovation. Therefore, in case of the patentee’s product being the only one on the market, a new market entry and the risk of price erosion that comes with it is a very important factor when considering the necessity of a provisional injunctions, as the CoA rightly holds.
(2) Interpretation of the UPCA being independent from Brussels I recast
The LD Brussels continues a line of UPC case law which makes clear that the UPCA’s provisions on territorial competence of Local Divisions do not have to be interpreted in the same way as the provisions on international jurisdiction in Brussels I recast, i.e. not as strictly. Especially, there is no hierarchy between lit. a) and lit. b) of Art. 33 (1) UPCA comparable to that between the general jurisdiction acc. to Art. 4 (1) and special jurisdictions in Brussels I recast.
(3) The front-loaded nature of UPC proceedings
The LD Duesseldorf emphasizes the front-loaded nature of UPC proceedings, stating that strategic considerations based on using elements of surprise are alien to the UPC’s rules. Another reminder to fully set out your case as early as possible in UPC proceedings.
Remarks
In March, the UPC user community also focused on the far-reaching ramifications of the landmark decision of the Court of Justice of the European Union, BSH ./. Electrolux, C 339/22. This decision means that cross-border litigation is back on the agenda when planning global patent litigation campaigns and that the territory of the UPC spans wider than the 18 Contracting Member States if the defendant has its seat in one of them.
If so, the UPC is competent to decide on all national parts of a European bundle patent, meaning that the UPC can issue injunctions for all member states of the European Patent Convention (including important territories like United Kingdom, Switzerland, Spain, Turkey, etc).
It is unlikely though that the UPC can issue injunctions for third states patents, e.g. US or Chinese patents, as the competence of the UPC is limited to European patents pursuant to statutory law.
