BUSIneSS
YoU cAnnoT PATenT eVeRYThInG” Pierre Kihn
PIeRRe KIHn: ECJ ruling does not answer all the questions
which allows you to commercially exploit your invention more easily. But the fact that you don’t have a patent does not mean you cannot exploit your invention.” In Kihn’s view the ECJ decision does not necessarily dampen the prospects for biomedical research in Luxembourg and will not inevitably lead to researchers decamping en masse from the EU. “The fact that you do research in Europe or the US or somewhere depends on national laws,” says Kihn. “A European firm could simply register their intellectual property elsewhere.” Stem cell technologies can still be patented in the US, for example. American firms will not automatically gain any advantages because they too will be restricted from obtaining patent protection in the EU.
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APR
5.1%
February unemployment rate, up 0.1% from January (OECD)
But Phillips says “it’s probably impossible” to create stem cell-based therapies in Europe “unless somebody makes money from it. You need the vigorousness of a commercial setting to make it viable.” Kihn also sees one major stumbling block in the advancement of biomedicine: the exchange of ideas between scientists. “If the research is allowed but patenting is forbidden, people will not publish the results of their research. It will all be kept secret because that will be the only way to keep people from copying you. This is what we did before the patent system.” “The danger is that overall the level of R&D will decrease,” warns Pieter van den Broecke, head of the intellectual property practice at Linklaters in Brussels. Patent filings require detailed dis-
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APR
8,257
Luxembourg domiciled funds in 2011 (Lipper)
closures about the technology be made public. “If you take away the patent system, you could see a dramatic drop in R&D because people are no longer aware of what competitors are doing. Even though you can’t use competitors’ technology [during a patent’s lifetime] at least you know what he’s doing and you can adjust your own R&D.” At the same, he stresses that any lessening of R&D activity in Europe will likely be the result of future court rulings. “It remains to be seen how lower courts will construe” the ECJ decision when evaluating future patent cases. one DooR cloSeS... “The research will go on. In countries like the UK and France people will do the
NAMED Attorne Jacques Loesch APR was named honorary chair of the British Chamber of Commerce for Luxembourg. Loesch-a Linklaters partners, former president of the Luxembourg Bar and a founding member of the BCC--succeeds Edmond Israel, who died last year.
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20
+25
• APR
biLLion
Value of euro area mutual fund shares issued in February (ECB)
May 2012 - delano - 29