Impact of EPO Opposition on National Actions
Since Turkey’s inclusion as a member of the EPC, a hot topic has been the enforcement or invalidity of Turkish validation of European Patent(s) (“EP”) while proceedings before the European Patent Office (the “EPO”) are pending. Once an EP is validated in Turkey, it becomes a national patent three months after its first granted decision by the Examination Board of the EPO. For EPs, the Turkish Patent and Trademark Office (the “TPMO”) acts only as a procedural agency. Thus, the… »
2nd Damages Judgment in the Pharma Sector for Unjust PI
In 2018, the Istanbul IP Court decided on a generic pharmaceutical company’s damages claim based on an unjust PI, in what appears to be the first decision of its kind by the Turkish IP Courts within the pharmaceutical sector. The dispute between an originator firm and a generic firm derived from an infringement claim. The Court had issued a PI, which was lifted after 13 months based on the findings of an expert’s report, which found that no infringement had been made. The… »
FICPI-Turkey Holds Intellectual Property Law Seminar in Izmir
FICPI-Turkey arranged the seventh of its traditional roundtable meetings in September, this time focusing on the trade mark similarity concept for the assessment of likelihood of confusion and the approach of the Turkish Patent and Trademark Office, Türk Patent, and the Courts. Ms. Gökçe İzgi, a member of the Board of Directors of FICPI-Turkey, moderated the meeting accompanied by Mr. Türkay Alıca, who is a Retired Judge of Civil Courts for Intellectual and Industrial… »
Determination of Non-Infringement Action Is To Be Rejected If Marketing Authorisation Is Not Granted Yet
As per Article 154 of the Turkish IP Law any person who has a legal interest can file an action to have the Court determine that his acts do not constitute an infringement of the intellectual property rights of a rights owner. For a quite long time patent owners were squeezed between conflicting approaches in the implementation of, on the one hand, the legal interest condition in determination of non-infringement actions (DNI), and, on the other hand, the Bolar exemption in… »
Significant Amendments to the Regulation on the Implementation of the Industrial Property Code
Amendments to the Turkish Property Code were published in the Official Gazette on 8 July 2019 Notarised signature declarations/notarised signature circulars are no longer required for a number of procedures It is hoped that this will eliminate paperwork and speed up processes at the Patent and Trademark Office The Turkish Regulation on the Implementation of the Industrial Property Code, which is the main regulation for industrial property rights, has been amended by a… »
Filing an Abridged Application Within Terms of RDP Does Not Constitute Unfair Competition
Co-published Regulatory data protection (RDP) terms are dealt with only in the Licensing Regulation of the Ministry of Health (MoH). In principle the provision grants the protection of data for six years following the first marketing authorisation for a drug granted in the European Union. However, there is no mechanism to prevent a generic drug company from using the data before the term expires. The MoH interprets the provisions as granting market exclusivity and allows… »
The Importance of Evidence Gathering for Criminal Cases
In Turkey, the prosecution of criminal offenses in trademark law depends on a proper complaint filed by the trademark owner. Once the complaint and the evidence is submitted to the local prosecutor’s office, the file is brought before the local Criminal Court. The Criminal Courts, however, become more and more reluctant to issue the decisions recently. Hence, it is now more important than ever for the trademark owners to be well-prepared before filing the complaint, in terms… »
Patents in Europe: Helping Business Compete in the Global Economy 2019/2020
Q: What options are open to a patent owner seeking to enforce its rights in your jurisdiction? Article 149 of the Industrial Property Code 6769 (IP Code) sets the legal framework for claims that can be asserted by the rights holder and the scope of the injunctions that can be granted by the court. Accordingly, a person can request the court to: determine whether the third party infringes the patent; decide on the prevention of the infringement; decide to stop the action that… »
Key Developments and Predictions for Patent Law in Turkey – 2019
When the Industrial Property Law came into force on 10 January 2017, the introduction of the post grant opposition procedure for national patent applications or the new “satisfying national market’s need” criteria concerning compulsory license due to non-use of the patent appeared to be of the most significance. However, as usual, the devil was hidden in the detail. When we first put the new law into practice, we experienced that other provisions such as the use requirement… »
Trademark Rights vs. Freedom of Expression: A Recent Decision of the Turkish Constitutional Court
A discussion whether the freedom of expression is violated by prohibiting the access to a website where a trademark of a third company is used in the domain name was heard before the Turkish Constitutional Court (“the Court”) upon an individual application. In order to understand the ruling of the Court, it is worth looking at the history of the dispute. Using a trademark of a reputable cargo company “yurtiçikargo” in a domain name as “yurticikargomagdurları.com”, having the… »
Imprisonment for Breaching Injunctions is Annulled by Constitutional Court
Constitutional Court has annulled Article 398 of Code of Civil Procedure, which established imprisonment for breaching preliminary injunction This court ordered that this come into effect within nine months It is hoped that proposals for new punishment for acting against preliminary injunction will come before Parliament within this period Upon the application of the Istanbul First IP Court, the Constitutional Court has cancelled Article 398 of Code of Civil Procedure, which… »
Key Developments and Predictions for Trademark Law in Turkey – 2019
It has now been over two years since the Industrial Property Code No. 6769 (“the IP Code”) came into force. While the interpretation and implementation of most of the issues in relation to the key changes introduced by the IP Code have been addressed by the Turkish Patent and Trademark Office (“TÜRKPATENT” or “the Office”), there are still some outstanding issues requiring interpretation by the Court of Appeals. The primary legislative development in trademark law in 2018… »