Showing posts with label importance of geographical indications. Show all posts
Showing posts with label importance of geographical indications. Show all posts

Tuesday, 25 August 2020

Priority Watch List Strikes Again


The Special 301 report prepared yearly by the United States Trade Representative (USTR) includes the Priority watch list countries identified as having several serious Intellectual Property Rights inadequacies that need increased USTR surveillance. India once again becomes a victim of this outrageous list for the 27th year in a row due to its insufficient measurable improvements on the Intellectual Property Rights framework that have long-lasting impacts and challenges leading to negatively affecting the American right holders. Although India has taken several steps to discuss the problems of the protection and enforcement of the IP rights, many of the actions have not yet converted into tangible advantages for the creators, due to which India, according to the latest Special 301 report, still prevails as one of the world’s most challenging economies with respect to management of IP rights.

It is a matter of fact that, yes, India has definitely dismissed the observations in the Special 301 report over the years admitting it as a unilateral report of the US since India was completely amenable with multi lateral IP directives.

Along with India, USTR has identified 11 countries in its Priority Watch List including China, Indonesia, Russia, to name a few. In the report, the US mentioned that India has major long-standing IP issues making it arduous for creators to receive and perpetuate patents in their respective businesses, particularly for pharmaceuticals. Besides these long-standing concerns, India furthermore confined the transparency of information on state-issued pharmaceutical manufacturing licenses.

Moreover, India failed to create a productive system for protection against the inequitable commercial use and the unsanctioned disclosure of data produced to acquire marketing approval for various chemical products used in agriculture. The report even asserts that both China and India were the leading origins of the spurious medicines distributed on a broad scale. “Though the exact figure is not disclosed, studies have suggested that up to 20% of the drugs sold in the Indian markets could pose a serious threat to human life.”

In spite of India’s repeated premises of restraining IP laws to increase access to the growing trend in technologies, the USTR declared that India maintained exceptionally high custom duties towards IP intensive products such as pharmaceuticals, medical devices, solar energy equipment, etc.

At the same time, the report also pens down some of the best practices by India in the IP sector last year. India’s Cell for Intellectual Property Rights Promotion and Management (CIPAM) assembles the government’s efforts to unravel processes, encourage commercialization, and increase IP awareness.

As a result of the deterrent given to India and other countries, the USTR wants the governments to support the predictability of IP systems by making sure to use obligatory licenses only when the circumstances are extremely unlikely and after putting in all the efforts required to procure authorization from the patent owner using rational terms and conditions.

According to the report, The US will continue to look at developments as required with the trading partners including India. 👉 ✅  For view source: https://bit.ly/3ljauJy

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Friday, 14 August 2020

US Court Orders Apple to Pay $500 Million Over PanOptis 4G Patent Violations


A Texas court has quite recently ordered the American multinational technology company, Apple Inc., to pay even more than $500 million, near about Rs. 3, 742 crores, in damages and interest for 4G Patent Violationsheld by Intellectual Property (IP) Company PanOptis.

According to the local media, the US tech giant – now worth almost $2 trillion (roughly Rs. 1, 49, 70,000 crores) has vowed to appeal this decision.

In an email response, Apple thanked the jury for their time and also expressed how disappointed it is with the court’s verdict. The company said that it has plans to appeal the court’s decision. The tech giant believes that lawsuits like the one in question by companies who accumulate patents to harass the industry serve only to harm the customers and stifle innovation in general.

PanOptis, a company specializing in licensing patents, took Apple to court in February 2019 by claiming that the US tech giant refused to pay for the use of 4G LTE technologies in its watches, tablets, and smartphones. According to the court filing, PanOptis did make a lot of effort repeatedly to reach an agreement with Apple for a FRAND license over its infringed upon Patent Portfolios. FRAND is an acronym for fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory terms and refers to the IT industry standard for technology use. PanOptis said that the negotiations proved to be unsuccessful as Apple refused to pay a FRAND royalty to its patent license. Apple, on the contrary, said that the patents were invalid according to the legal publications.

This case is one of the many Patent Infringement lawsuits filed by the licensing companies that make no products of their own but do hold the rights to several technologies.

In the past, the Texas court has ruled twice against Apple by demanding it to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to VirnetX, which is another company specializing in Patent Litigation.

On its official website, PanOptis offers services corresponding to managing its clients’ patents by allowing them to concentrate well on new development and innovation. For view source: https://www.kashishipr.com/blog/us-court-orders-apple-to-pay-500-million-over-panoptis-4g-patent-violations/

 

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Wednesday, 29 July 2020

Understanding the Critical Elements of a Cost-Effective Legal Department


intellectual property protection

Without any second thoughts, controlling the costs in a legal department can, at times, prove to be exceedingly challenging, specifically when it comes to a growing business. Although it is imperative to protect and maintain the legal rights of businesses adequately, it is equally imperative to ensure that the legal and business strategies are well-aligned so that the legal services can effectively manage the Intellectual Property (IP) portfolio. So, let us now make ourselves familiar with a few aspects, using which a legal department can minimize its cost, that too, with little optimization.
1.     IP Benchmarking
As a brand or a business grows, there may be a coinciding growth of the IP portfolio as well. The same can prove to a bit challenging for the legal departments in business companies or organizations as every new IP asset comes with a set of additional costs. In this scenario, the concept of IP benchmarking can help the legal departments in controlling the costs of Intellectual Property Protection within the IP portfolio. With effective IP benchmarking, the legal team shall be able to understand the value and influence of every other IP asset not only individually but also as a part of the overall IP portfolio. Furthermore, the IP benchmarking process can offer valuable insights into the costs of IP protection in the market by comparing the service providers and seeing what the competitors are paying for the same set of services. It will help in making sure that a business company or organization doesn’t overpay for external legal services or fees.
2.     Resource Allocation
If the legal department of a company operates within a growing business, then it sometimes becomes difficult to control the costs as there may be a need to hire new staff members for supporting the legal work associated with the business growth. It can also include the requirement for having a specialized legal counsel. For the same reason, the legal department and the general counsel should together evaluate how the different staff members are allocated among different cases, both by time and skillset. Also, in the scenario where there is a need for specialized legal knowledge, it can be beneficial to consult an external legal services provider. As per various recent reports and surveys conducted, the tools and techniques used by the legal departments hold immense potential for cost savings. The overall costs of maintaining these resources can increase as the legal department grows; so, it is essential to assess these resources and understand whether they provide a suitable ROI for the business or not.
3.     Outsourcing Specialized Tasks
After understanding the allocation of the internal resources, you can have a better insight into the skillset and resources, which are more cost-effective to outsource. Irrespective of whether your team is managing a high workload or you require the assistance of a specialized team for a short term project, outsourcing legal work and tasks can prove to be beneficial for many reasons. The prime advantage is that your legal team would have access to additional resources and specialists with no obligation of hiring permanent staff members or paying the high costs for legal tools. If your business owns a growing IP portfolio, then you can consult an IP specialist and enable access to a broad network of legal resources, which can lead to better IP protection, specifically when it comes to tasks like IP docketing or performing a Trademark Search. The overall benefits of outsourcing can differ from one business to another; so, it is highly advisable to seek advice from different service providers and then determine what is more cost-effective for your legal department. 



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Monday, 27 July 2020

IBM Files Second Lawsuit against Zillow Alleging Patent Infringement

patent infringement

The American multinational technology company, IBM (International Business Machines Corporation), has quite recently escalated its legal battle by filing a second lawsuit against Zillow (an American online real estate database company) alleging Patent Infringement. According to IBM, Zillow has infringed upon its patents to build a real estate search engine.
In the lawsuit filed on 21st July 2020 in federal court in Washington, IBM claimed that Zillow has infringed upon five of its patents, which improve the searches by ranking results and simplifying the content displays, among several other things. IBM also alleged that despite the written notifications, Zillow has engaged in a policy of willful blindness and is still very much using the technology. As per IBM’s statement in its complaint, dozens of similar companies, including Apple, Amazon, Facebook, and Google, have agreed to come into license agreements with IBM; however, Zillow is not among them. IBM stated that Zillow, instead, has chosen to infringe upon the five patents mentioned in the lawsuit filed without even paying due attention to having adequate licensing discussions in place.
For several years now, IBM and Zillow have been fighting over patent licensing deals.
Last year in September, IBM sued Zillow in federal court in California by accusing it of building its portal with the unauthorized use of IBM’s seven patented technologies. In that complaint, IBM stated that it had tried hard for three years to enter a licensing agreement with Zillow but wasn’t able to do the same. In that particular case, IBM is now seeking royalties on the billions of dollars in revenue, which Zillow has reportedly earned based on its infringement of IBM’s patented technology.
As per various reports and surveys conducted, IBM invests even more than $5 billion in research and development every year. The company has a history of filing patent infringement lawsuits against other tech giants like Twitter and Groupon. In March, this year, IBM filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Airbnb by accusing the travel startup of using its patents corresponding to improved navigation with advertising and bookmarks in an interactive service.
In a recent statement delivered, Zillow mentioned that it is very much aware of the lawsuit filed against it by IBM. Zillow believes that the claims in the lawsuit filed are without any merit. It further said that it would safeguard itself vigorously from this patent infringement lawsuit. For view source: https://www.kashishipr.com/blog/ibm-files-second-lawsuit-against-zillow-alleging-patent-infringement/
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Wednesday, 22 July 2020

Twitter Disables Trump's Retweet over Copyright Claim by Linkin Park


copyright violation

The widely known social networking platform, Twitter, has quite recently disabled a campaign-style video retweeted by President Donald Trump on 18th July 2020 over Copyright Violation. The video, which had music from Linkin Park (American rock band from Agoura Hills, California), disappeared from President Trump’s Twitter feed on 18th July 2020 with the notification – “This media has been disabled in response to a complaint filed by the Copyright Owner.”
Trump had retweeted the video from the social media director at White House, Dan Scavino. Twitter deleted the video after Machine Shop Entertainment had sent it a notice corresponding to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The notice was posted on the Lumen Database, which gets the requests for the removal of online material. According to Linkin Park’s LinkedIn profile, Machine Shop Entertainment is a management company owned by the rock band.
A Twitter representative said in an email statement that the platform responds well to all the copyright claims, which it receives from the copyright owners or their representatives. The White House, on the other hand, hasn’t yet responded to the request for comment.
This year in May, Twitter began challenging Trump’s tweets and has been clashing with him repeatedly since then. The social networking service has multiple times disabled or commented on the tweets by President Trump over violations of a policy against threatening violence and copyright complaints.
On 30th June 2020, Twitter also deleted an image tweeted by President Trump, which included a picture of himself, because of a complaint filed by The New York Times’ photographer, who had shot the image. It also disabled a tweet from President Trump behind a warning label at the end of May. According to Twitter, the tweet violated the rules against ‘glorifying violence’ when President Trump advocated that the Minneapolis authorities should have been tough in responding to the protests over the death of George Floyd. For view source: https://www.kashishipr.com/blog/twitter-disables-trumps-retweet-over-copyright-claim-by-linkin-park/

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Monday, 20 July 2020

Madras High Court Restrains Patanjali from Using the ‘Coronil’ Trademark


trademark renewals

The controversial drug, Coronil (claimed as a cure for COVID-19), by yoga guru Ramdev’s Patanjali Ayurved Ltd, has quite recently received a blow, with the Madras High Court restraining the company from using the ‘Coronil’ trademark.
Justice CV Karthikeyan has passed the interim order valid till 30th July 2020 on the plea of Arudra Engineering Private Limited, a Chennai-based company claiming that it owns the ‘Coronil’ trademark since 1993. According to the company, which specializes in manufacturing chemicals and sanitizers for cleaning containment units and heavy pieces of machinery, it got the ‘Coronil-213 SPL’ and ‘Coronil-92B’ trademarks registered in 1993 and has been diligently filing all the Trademark Renewals since then. The company stated that its Trademark Rights are valid until 2027. While claiming that its products with the Registered Trademark own a global presence, the company mentioned that its clients include Indian Oil and BHEL. For substantiating its claim, the company also presented the sales bills of its products in the last five years.
The company said that the mark adopted by Patanjali for selling the drugs is identical to its registered trademarks in all aspects. The company further stated that although the products sold by Patanjali are different; however, the use of identical trademarks would still infringe upon its Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs). According to the company, permitting Patanjali to continue using the mark shall have a direct effect on its goodwill and reputation created over its registered trademark for even more than 26 years in both domestic and international markets.
After Patanjali came up with ‘Coronil,’ the Union AYUSH Ministry (the Ministry of Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha, and Homoeopathy, abbreviated as AYUSH) had, on 1st July 2020, said that the company would be allowed to sell the drug only as an immunity booster and not as a cure for COVID-19.
Ramdev, on the other hand, had reacted to the criticism received on the efficacy of ‘Coronil,’ by saying that some people were hurt by the rise of indigenous medicine. For view source: https://www.kashishipr.com/blog/madras-high-court-restrains-patanjali-from-using-the-coronil-trademark/

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Thursday, 16 July 2020

Instagram Opposes the Registration of Instagem Trademark


trademark registration

The widely known photo and video-sharing social networking platform, Instagram, has quite recently filed an opposition before the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) against the Trademark Registration of the word INSTAGEM by Market Organization Inc. In its opposition filed, Instagram has claimed that the INSTAGEM trademark will cause a lot of consumer confusion and also damage the reputation of Instagram. The applicant, Market Organization, is willing to get the mark INSTAGEM registered in International Class 41 for ‘Video Editing.’
According to Instagram, its social media platform was launched in 2010, and since then, it has been consistently using the INSTAGRAM trademark in connection with its platform in the US. It also owns a variety of Trademark Applications and registrations for the mark INSTAGRAM covering several goods and services. Besides Instagram’s social networking platform, the trademark applications and registrations include –
1.     Providing use of online temporary non-downloadable software for allowing the transmission of images, audiovisual, and video content
2.     Both downloadable and non-downloadable computer software for modifying the appearance and allowing the transmission of images, audio-visual, and video content
Instagram has alleged that Market Organization’s services are quite similar to the ones it offers corresponding to the INSTAGRAM mark. Instagram is now opposing this trademark registration as it believes that the applicant’s proposed trademark is deceptively similar to the INSTAGRAM mark, and the same holds immense potential for creating confusion in the minds of the customers or users. According to Instagram, the customers might also end up thinking that the applicant is or has been connected or affiliated with Instagram. Another possibility lies in the customers believing that the applicant’s services provided under the proposed trademark have been authorized, sponsored, endorsed, or licensed by Instagram. Additionally, it has also stated that the INSTAGEM mark shall dilute the INSTAGRAM mark and cause great damage to its reputation.

All in all, Instagram wants the trademark registration of the INSTAGEM mark to get refused.

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Monday, 13 July 2020

Understanding the Importance of Data Verification in an IP Strategy


intellectual property rights (iprs)

When it comes to forming an Intellectual Property (IP) strategy, high-quality, accurate, and relevant data play an integral role. Without any second thoughts, the strength of every other IP asset depends highly on the accuracy of data obtained during the process of data verification. The process offers valuable information, which helps in identifying discrepancies, prioritizing patents, mitigating potential risks, and enabling the team members and managers to make strategic and well-informed decisions. So, let us now make ourselves familiar with a few considerations, which you need to keep in mind while including data verification in your overall IP strategy.

The Importance of Data Resources
The most crucial aspect of data verification is making sure that you have the right access to up-to-date and high-quality resources. It can indeed prove to be challenging for some businesses as the same requires access to various data sources, some of which may not be in the electronic format. Besides, it can become a costly affair to maintain consistent and accurate data entry in your overall IP portfolio, especially at the time of organizational changes, like mergers and acquisitions. As per a report issued by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in 2015, somewhere around 25% of the patent data is inaccurate, due to which the data verification process becomes even more challenging.
However, it is imperative to make a point of the fact that maintaining data integrity is critical to securing and safeguarding your Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs). While considering the value of different data sources, it is always worth getting in touch with an IP expert to come across the most cost-effective way of accessing the valuable data.

The Role of Data Management Tools
After defining the accurate and relevant data sources, the next step is selecting an adequate IP data management tool, which helps significantly in accessing the data and maintaining data integrity. Before selecting the IP data management tool, you need to define the specific requirements of your business, as they usually vary from one business to another, and there are a lot of tools available in the market. Irrespective of whether you select one or more tools, you need to consider well all the functions that you require. To be specific, an IP management tool should make all your IP assets more valuable to your business.
The tool used for data verification should also offer protection for sensitive information, such as disaster recovery solutions, access controls, and security against manipulation or theft. Additionally, you should consider the tool as an integral element of your IP strategy as it provides ease of access and transparency and also makes sure that none of your IP operations are hindered. Besides, it is equally imperative to make sure that your IP strategic operations are secure.
It is a matter of fact that yes – integrating a new IP data management tool in your business shall take some time, resources, and money. It is undoubtedly a complicated process, which shouldn’t be taken lightly. Given the complexity of such tools, it is highly advisable to research the potential solutions that can adapt to your future business needs conveniently without requiring excessive time or financial investment. Hence, every other business out there should consider its current and future needs wisely as it becomes difficult at a later stage to make the changes.  For view source: https://www.kashishipr.com/blog/understanding-the-importance-of-data-verification-in-an-ip-strategy/



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