Dear Christoph, Dear all,
Thanks for the good news!
We had a further meeting with the Austrian minister's adviser today and the feedback was not quite so positive. She informed us the president of the Austrian Patent Office had spoken to her counterparts in friendly countries (including Germany) and did not feel there was much support for pursuing this issue. I am trying to find out some more details of who exactly said what, and it was unclear if these discussions took place before or after the issue was added to the agendas (as the adviser unfortunately did not seem to be aware of that). There will be a stakeholder roundtable here on this issue at the end of November as well.
Finally, it seems the possibility to get changes to the Austrian law regarding the exclusions to patentability (one of our goals) will have to take place at the same time as the changes to the law needed to implement the UPC, once its ratification is complete. It looks like Germany could complete ratifications soon, which means there could be some progress on the UPC next year: https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=fdf991eb-fba1-4247-a4af-44c2c...
Best Katherine
-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht----- Von: Npos_2018 [mailto:npos_2018-bounces@testbiotech.de] Im Auftrag von Christoph Then Gesendet: Mittwoch, 14. Oktober 2020 15:13 An: npos_2018@testbiotech.de Betreff: [Npos_2018] !! 2 very nice updates: We are now on the agenda of the patent law committee and the hearing melon will take place without industry.
Dear all
in her response to our letter from August, the German Minister for Justice now replies that she managed to get our issues on the agenda of the patent law committee as well as on EU Patent Law working group. Both will deal with our requests this autumn.
In addition, next year a conference is announced from the Ministry in which we might contribute.
very nice, very good. Please see attached (in German). Please do not distribute at this stage.
furthermore, the EPO will hold its hearing on the melone as announced despite Bayer (Monsanto) and BASF (Nunhems) have withdrawn their request for a public hearing. This will give us the opportunity to explain our findings directly to the Board. It looks like the companies so far also missed to explain their answers to the question of the Board. Good fun.
Today, Johanna sent out the first set of letters to Experts of Member States. Please help us to it done in your country. We are making progress.
Cheers
Christoph