SpicyIP Highlight of the Week!
On 10th April, Thomson Reuters released a report titled ‘The Research and Innovation Performance of the G20’ highlighting the decisions taken in respect of scientific research and innovation activity by the G20 countries. It was heartening to discover that the report demonstrates how India has inched closer to bridging the scientific research and innovation gap with developed countries. Spadika has covered this here.
We, at SpicyIP, love blogging about the wackiest things doing the rounds on social networking sites, which are often a hotbed of IPR claims. Last week was abuzz with the ‘Ab Ki Baar’ meme, popularized by Narendra Modi’s election campaign ‘Ab ki Baar, Modi Sarkar’. Spadika, in a post titled ‘At SpicyIP We Love IPR, Ab Ki Baar…’ has explored whether political parties can protect the intellectual property rights which might emerge out of their election campaign.
Sometime last week, Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (SUNP), India’s largest drug-maker by market value announced that it is buying competitor Ranbaxy Laboratories Ltd. (RBXY) from Japan’s Daiichi Sankyo Co. If this deal comes through, it would make Sun the world’s fifth largest generic drug maker and at present, it is under scrutiny of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in USA. Gopika has blogged about it here.
Novartis, in a bid to protect its anti-diabetic drug ‘vildagliptin’ has filed a quia timet patent infringement suit against Biocon Ltd. Novartis had, in an earlier infringement suit against Wockhardt, been granted a preliminary injunction by the Delhi HC on 5th March 2014. Madhulika has reported this here.
UNITAID, a global health initiative which is hosted by World Health Organization, in its report, ‘The Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement: Implications for Access to Medicines and Public Health’ has slammed the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) for delaying generic market entry and competition which will in turn lead to increased prices of pharmaceuticals and the consequent increase in public expenditure for health programs. Read Mathews’ blog here.
Wrapping up the posts for last week, we had Thomas reporting that film director Sanjay Leela Bhansali has threatened Punjab police with legal action for producing a pirated copy of his film in a court as evidence against the film director.
International development(s):
With the revival of the East African Community (EAC), the member countries in the bloc are involved in the task of harmonizing their intellectual property rights laws; at present, member nations have different levels of intellectual property rights law protection. One of the guiding tools is the TRIPS Agreement which lays down the minimum standard of intellectual property rights protection that each member nation must provide for.
IPKat carried an interesting blog on the publication of the responses to the Public Consultation on the Review of EU Copyright Rules and how it is rumoured that the people in the Commission might have “manufactured” the responses.
In Italy, an interesting debate surrounding off-label use of pharmaceuticals is making the headlines.
Recently, Brussels’ highest court invalidated a European Union directive which required that telecom operators retain data for two years ruling that the directive threatened the right to privacy of citizens.
We would also like to inform our readers that International trademark Association (INTA) will be holding its annual meeting for the first time in Asia from 11th to 14th May, 2014 (Online registrations for the same are open till 2nd May, 2014).
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