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MTS settles patent dispute with Cobra
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Mobile Traffic Systems Corporation (MTS),
a subsidiary of Acacia Research Corporation filed a patent
infringement case on April 11, 2007 in Alabama Northern
District Court against Cobra Electronics Corp., Garmin
USA, Inc., Magellan Navigation, Inc. and TomTom, Inc. for
infringing two patents delivering real time traffic
information through GPS navigation system. MTS finally
settled the patent litigation with Cobra Electronics Corp.
on 4 February, 2008. The settlement includes a license
agreement between the two companies over the use of the
impugned patents. However the other three companies have
decided to continue with the patent infringement case. |
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Legal
tussle between Matsushita and Samsung ends |
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A legal battle between Japan’s
Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., the maker of the
Panasonic brand of products and South Korea’s Samsung
Electronics Co. started with a lawsuit filed by the former
in the New Jersey court in January, 2002 which led to a
row of cases over the years. The lawsuits involved patents
regarding semiconductors. The long running legal tussle
ended with a settlement between the two companies in US
and Japan with a cross-licensing agreement deal for 10
years and the termination of all pending cases between the
two companies. |
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Novartis agrees to supply Glivac for
free |
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Novartis has agreed to
supply the cancer drug, Glivac, to a certain number of
patients in Thailand for free under the Glivec International
Patient Assistance Programme. The drug will be made
available under a State Health Program of Thailand under
which forty three million patients are covered. The drug
will be given to about nine hundred cancer patients
belonging to the lower income group. In response, the
Thailand government has agreed to restrain from granting a
compulsory license on the patent held by Novartis over Glivac. |
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London Agreement comes into
force |
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On grant of an European
patent, certain countries require a translation into
official languages of such countries in order to give effect
to the patent. The London Agreement, or as put formally, the
Agreement on the application of Article 65 of the Convention
on the Grant of European Patents was concluded in London on
October 17, 2000 to reduce the high costs involved in such
translation.
The agreement provides that each country has to choose one
of the three official language of the European Patent Office
i.e. English, French or German for translation to make a
european patent effective in that country. As per the
agreement, any country will have the right to require
translation of the claims in one of its official language.
In case of patent litigation, a country can require a
translation to be provided in one of the official languages
of the country.
The agreement had to be ratified by the UK, Germany and
France to make it effective. Germany and the UK had ratified
it long ago but France had been holding the same for quite a
while. Finally, on 29 January 2008, the instruments of
ratification was deposited by France and the agreement shall
now enter into force on 1 May 2008. It is estimated that the
agreement will reduce the cost of translation for getting
patents in Europe by about forty percent. |
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