20th Nov 2023
In a UK Patents Court case decided earlier this year, Gilead Sciences v NuCana, Gilead sought revocation of the UK designations of two of NuCana’s European patents, EP 2955190B1 and EP 3904365B1, from the same family. These patents covered NuCana’s anti-cancer drug acelarin. NuCana counterclaimed that their patents were infringed by Gilead’s anti-viral products containing the compound sofosbuvir.
13th Oct 2022
A petition for review is a way to challenge the final decision of the Technical Board of Appeal (“the TBA”) of the EPO. Since December 2007, when petitions for review were first made an available recourse, only 9 of 191 petitions succeeded – that is, resulted in the decision under review being set aside – putting the overall hit-rate at 4.7%. Clearly, the petitioner is rarely triumphant.
22nd Feb 2019
An EPO Board of Appeal has referred the question of double-patenting to the Enlarged Board of Appeal (EBA).
10th Jul 2018
A recent Court of Appeal judgment clarifies the UK approach to the patentability of numeric ranges.