This session will address current procedural and substantive questions of the EU courts’ case-law in trade mark matters. The esteemed speakers include judges of the EU General Court in Luxembourg as well as Chairpersons of the EUIPO Boards of Appeal, who will share their invaluable perspectives and insights on the changing trade mark jurisprudence environment.
In recent years, design law has undergone important developments. With significant revamping of relevant legislation well underway in the EU, there is a surge in market interest surrounding designs of product parts, disclosure in a high-tech environment, and how to identify the common features of a design when considering invalidity on the ground of lack of individual character. The second session promises to make for compelling listening, with insightful information that will encourage debate on these evolving topics.
As industries, business practices, consumer behaviour and innovative technology add further layers of complexity, the need to understand what drives trade mark modernisation, and the legal challenges it poses, becomes increasingly crucial. Key professionals from both the private and public sectors will consider, from the applicant’s perspective, the level of acceptance and adoption of motion, multimedia, and other forms of non-traditional trade mark types.
While many undertakings and organisations still grapple with the challenges brought about by digital transformation, cutting-edge blockchain technologies and virtual reality transform everyday life. How have businesses coped? Do artificial intelligence and the Metaverse have a role to play in legal practice? Do generative AIs, such as ChatGPT, have an impact on lawyers’ work? The fourth session will look into these pressing matters, as well as the IP enforcement challenges posed by Cyberspace.
Protection of original literary, scientific and artistic works and the respective rights of their authors, performers, producers and broadcasters is crucial for fostering investment in creativity and promoting cultural diversity through content. This panel brings together experts and practitioners to exchange views on a wide range of topics, from copyrighted works becoming trade marks to the potential construction of an EU-wide copyright protection system and what it might look like.
The new Regulation (EU) 2023/2411 establishes a unified GI instrument for the protection of craft and industrial product names throughout the EU. This GI is granted to products originating from specific places or regions, possessing qualities, reputation, or characteristics essentially linked to their geographical origin, and involving at least one production step in that area. As well as considering the more traditional AGRI GI regime, panel experts drawn from a wide range of business backgrounds will analyse the new Craft GI instrument. Additionally, pivotal topics like the interplay between GIs and EU certification and collective marks, together with the third-country dimension to GIs, will be considered.
Harmonisation through soft law has been at the heart of numerous EUIPO initiatives over the past years. While the EUIPO’s guidelines strive to achieve predictability at the first level of decision-making within the EUIPO, the Boards have made multiple efforts to encourage consistency and coherence at appeal level. This session discusses the steps that have been taken both within the EUIPO and nationally to foster decision-making quality and predictability, as well as considering what the future might hold.