CLASS WARFARE; IP WRITING SKILL COURSE

Class warfare

Speaking at a meeting of the Competition Law Association hosted by law firm Simmons & Simmons in its CityPoint headquarters, IPKat co-blogmeister Jeremy was discussing the collision between intellectual property law and competition law. The focus for this collision was the problems facing ordinary traders who are faced with ordinary decisions like "can I sell this batch of toothpaste?" - the issue at the heart of Case C-405/03 Class International BV v Colgate-Palmolive Company and others [2006] ETMR 12 . Even in the trade-friendly European Union lawyer just can't say "yes" or "no": he has to consider the following counterpoint (using the traffic-light colour scheme of green for 'go' and read for 'stop'):

1. GENERAL RULE of free trade — anyone can import goods into any European Economic Area (EEA) country and then sell or distribute them there.

2. EXCEPTION for the protection of intellectual property — where a third party owns a trade mark which that importation infringes.

3. EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION: where the trade mark owner has put the goods into the market himself or has consented to their marketing.

4. EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION: where the goods were first marketed by the trade mark owner outside the EEA.

5. EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION: where the trade mark owner gave unequivocal express or implied consent to the importation into the EEA of the goods first marketed outside it.

6. EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION: where the condition of the goods has changed or other circumstances indicate that the sale of those goods will harm the third party’s trade mark.

7. EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION: where what the importer does with the goods, once he has brought them into the EEA, does not constitute putting them on to the market there.

8. EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION TO THE EXCEPTION: where, notwithstanding the fact the goods have not been regarded as being placed on the market, the trade mark owner has found a means of interfering with their storage or free movement.

Jeremy is giving further thought to this issue and is contemplating turning his talk into an article. For this reason he is making his (unusually full, for him) PowerPoint presentation available to anyone who has any interest in the IP/competition law interface and would like to comment on it.

If you want to see the PowerPoint slides, just email Jeremy here.
Join the Competition Law Association here ...
... and the Ligue Internationale du Droit de la Concurrence here


IP writing skill course

Readers of this blog who attended the first course on 5 June will be receiving their homework exercises back in the course of the weekend. Those who attended this week's course (4 July) have until 31 July to hand their homework in.

The third and final course takes place on 11 September and there are still a couple of vacancies. If you'd like to know more about it, click here.