MARKET MOVES: CENTRALISING IP CASES JURISDICTION REPORT: FINLAND
Marko Rajaniemi Backström & Co
On March 26, 2010, Finland’s Ministry of Justice published its draſt bill to move all civil IPR matters from the general district courts to the Market Court in 2012. Te Market Court is dedicated to matters of market law, competition law and public procurement.
Te proposal was on the government’s budget agenda for August 2010. Te government of Finland decided in 2007 that judicial proceedings for intellectual property matters would be made more efficient by assigning cases to a special court, which would be resourced for the purpose.
Objectives of the proposal
Te overall objective is, first and foremost, to improve the efficiency of judicial proceedings.
Te aim of the proposal is that civil IPR matters would be handled by judges with even greater IP expertise than those presiding in the general district courts. Centralising various civil IPR cases in the more specialised and professional court should ensure more uniformly high-quality decisions. Another aim is to shorten judicial proceedings.
According to the proposal, high-standard court processing is a prerequisite to develop and maintain intellectual property expertise in Finland. Te aim is to ensure that Finnish judicial proceedings are competitive at the EU level.
It will be seen in the years ahead whether or not the Market Court will fulfil the great expectations placed upon it. Some doubts have been raised about whether this is possible.
The contents of the draft bill
Currently, the District Court of Helsinki handles cases dealing with patents, utility models, trademarks, designs and trade names. Copyright cases are tried by the district court with jurisdiction in the area where the defendants reside. Te district courts have a quorum of only one judge, if the nature or scope of the case does not require consideration by three judges. In patent cases, the Helsinki district court is assisted by two court-appointed technical experts, though they do not act as judges or have a vote.
Under the draſt bill, all civil IPR matters would be centralised at the Market Court. Moreover, appeals against the IP decisions of the National Board of Patents and Registrations (NBPR) would be moved from the NBPR’s board of appeal to the Market Court, and the board of appeal would be abolished.
Te Market Court would also issue precautionary measures, including interlocutory injunctions, and would hear appeals against domain name decisions of the Finnish Communications Regulatory Authority.
In most of the cases, the Market Court would have a quorum with three legally trained judges. However, in patent and utility model cases, the court would also use a specialist engineer, who would also act as a judge and vote on the decision.
Appeals against NBPR decisions on patent and utility models would be considered by one legally trained judge and two specialised engineers. In these cases, the court would follow the Administrative Judicial Procedure Act, as required when an administrative decision is brought to the court.
Appeals against Market Court decisions would be lodged at the Helsinki Court of Appeal. From there, appeals would go to the Supreme Court.
However, not everyone supported these proposals. A considerable minority in the preparing committee of the Ministry of Justice wanted appeals to be lodged directly with the Supreme Court, in order to speed up judicial proceedings. If the minority’s proposal had been adopted, in effect, most cases would be considered by only one court, as leave to appeal is granted by the Supreme Court only in a limited number of cases. In practice, less than 10 percent of leave to appeal applications are accepted.
Marko Rajaniemi is a lawyer at Backström & Co. He can be contacted at:
marko.rajaniemi@backstrom.fi
80 World Intellectual Property Review September/October 2010
www.worldipreview.com
“ CENTRALISING VARIOUS CIVIL IPR CASES IN THE MORE SPECIALISED AND PROFESSIONAL COURT SHOULD ENSURE MORE UNIFORMLY HIGH-QUALITY DECISIONS. ANOTHER AIM IS TO SHORTEN JUDICIAL PROCEEDINGS.”
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112