Handbuch Immobilienwirtschaftsrecht with contribution by Dr. Rudolf Böckenholt on the subject of protection concepts and exploitation of the name of a property

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Together with his research assistant, Ms. Melanie Müller, Dr. Rudolf Böckenholt takes the opportunity to contribute his expertise in the field of trademark law in the area of real estate business law, as far as the protection of the name of a property or a real estate project is concerned and the possibilities of exploiting this protection. The article is part of an interdisciplinary handbook published by C.H. Beck on all legal aspects of the real estate industry.

The publication of the work is planned for early summer 2021.

Dr. Rudolf Böckenholt discusses a ruling by the Mannheim Regional Court in his latest GRUR-Prax article

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Foreign tax consultancy firms which offer all the services of a tax consultancy firm in Germany without being entered in the register of tax consultants cannot invoke the freedom of establishment and the freedom to provide services but act in an anti-competitive manner

In issue 8/2020 (page 168), Dr Rudolf Böckenholt discusses a decision of the Hamm Higher Regional Court (OLG) according to which barriers to admission for tax assistance do not infringe the fundamental freedoms of freedom of establishment and freedom to provide services in the EU because they are justified by overriding general interests and the targeted public requires high-quality advice from representatives entered on the list of qualified advisers within the confusing and difficult to understand German tax law. A foreign company with advisers qualified under the law of another Member State does not meet those conditions. If, nevertheless, all tax services are offered in Germany, the company acts anti-competitively and the partners representing it are personally liable.

The technical framework conditions of the ERVV concretise the standard for file formats that can be processed in court, but are not conclusive – Dr. Rudolf Böckenholt discusses a ruling by the Mannheim District Court in his latest GRUR-Prax article.

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In issue 20/2020, Dr. Rudolf Böckenholt explains the decision of the Mannheim District Court (LG Mannheim), according to which the mere infringement of the legal requirements regarding file formats in electronic legal transactions with the courts does not mean that the document is deemed not to have been submitted, provided that the court can actually process the submitted format. The procedural document in DOCX format submitted in the dispute could be used as a representative document in PDF/A format due to the technical capabilities of the court. Dr. Rudolf Böckenholt describes that the litigant concerned was lucky in these proceedings, but that the decision cannot be generalised.

The magazine GRUR-Prax can be obtained from the publisher. Further details can be found here.

LESI Article of the Month September 2020 by Prof. Dr. Heinz Goddar on “Patent law based concepts in the age of AI and IoE”

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How can modern patent systems, in the face of huge portfolios, create freedoms to exploit and develop inventions in the field of AI/IoE? Additionally, how can it be guaranteed that SEPs can be used by competitors under FRAND conditions? 

BOEHMERT & BOEHMERT partner and patent attorney Prof. Dr. Heinz Goddar explicates these and other questions – together with co-author Lakshmi Kumaran, Esq., Lakshmikumaran & Sridharan, Delhi, India – in the article “Patent Law Based Concepts For Promoting Creation And Sharing Of Innovations In The Age Of Artificial Intelligence And Internet Of Everything”. 

The paper, which has been available on the Elsevier portal “Social Science Research Network” (SSRN) since the end of 2019, has now been selected by LES International as article of the month and published on the society’s website under “Les Nouvelles September 2020”. 

You can download the full article here!

“No General Third Party Effect!” – Comment by Dr. Martin Schaefer on the DSM Directive on the CCC portal

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The EU Directive on the “Digital Single Market” (DMS) must be transposed into German law by the beginning of June 2021. The subject of the controversial directive is copyright law in the digital single market and thus a whole bundle of legislative issues ranging from text and data mining to the preservation of cultural heritage and copyright contract law. 

Special focus is given to Article 17 of the DMS Directive and thus the role of Online Content Sharing Service Providers (OCSSP) – providers of online services for user-generated content such as YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Co.

For the general public, the Directive is linked to the debate about the so-called “upload filter”, which is nothing more than the routine known for many years as “notice and stay-down” and which has been practiced without any problems. But it also raises licensing issues: Who needs a licence in connection with such user-generated content and who does not? 

In his blog article “No General Third Party Effect!” on the portal of the company “Copyright Clearance Center” BOEHMERT & BOEHMERT attorney Dr. Martin Schaefer provides answers  and refers to old familiar structures which continue to exist unchanged in the new environment.

Read the complete article here! 

About CCC
The Copyright Clearance Center (CCC) is, according to own statements, a world leader in voluntary collective licensing and a promoter of copyright law. For more than 40 years, the company has been setting standards with its products and services for an efficient global market of exploitation rights and licensing solutions. 

Dr. Eckhard Ratjen in an interview with the trade magazine “Tightly Packed” on the subject of “How do I protect a packaging?”

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In the jungle of offers of similar products, not only the brand serves potential customers as orientation, but also the packaging of a product. Consequently, their protection under trademark law is often very important. 

But how do you proceed when applying for registration of a packaging as a trademark? Which protection criteria must be fulfilled? And can any product packaging be protected as a trademark? 

BOEHMERT & BOEHMERT attorney Dr. Eckhard Ratjen addresses these and other questions as well as prominent case studies in his detailed interview with the trade magazine “Tightly Packed”. 

Read the complete interview here (temporarily only available in German)!

Dr. Laura Haas on “Supplementary Protection Certificates” in the summer 2020 issue of European Biotechnology

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In the “Summer Edition 2020” of the specialist magazine “European Biotechnology”, BOEHMERT & BOEHMERT patent attorney Dr Laura Haas discusses a legal case before the Court of Justice of the EU which resulted in a specific set of rules for patent protection in the case of SPCs (Supplementary Protection Certificates). 

In detail, the CJEU ruled that it is in principle possible to grant an SPC, even if the product is not specifically disclosed in the basic patent. However, a person skilled in the art must be able to deduce directly and unequivocally that the product falls within the scope of protection of the basic patent. 

As a consequence of this CJEU ruling, Laura Haas, who holds a doctorate in biochemistry, sees the option that an infringement defense can be created based on a later obtained patent which is the result of “independent inventive activity” over a basic patent. 

Read the detailed presentation of the ECJ decision here and learn more about the background (only available in English)!

Silke Freund and Dr. Sebastian Engels contribute to the “International Comparative Legal Guide – Digital Business 2020“

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The Global Legal Group has published the first edition of the “International Comparative Legal Guide – Digital Business 2020”. The guide is aimed specifically at corporate attorneys and offers a comparative legal analysis of current legal requirements and topics for digital business. 

Under the heading “Digital Business Laws and Regulations – Germany”, BOEHMERT & BOEHMERT attorneys Silke Freund and Dr. Sebastian Engels provide an insight from a German perspective. 

In eleven chapters, they deal with regulations for e-commerce, data protection, cyber security, cultural norms, brand enforcement online, cloud computing and further digital topics. 

The complete article is available here online or as PDF.

Interview with Prof. Dr. Heinz Goddar in the current issue of “IAM Global Leaders 2020”

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Every year, the editorial staff of IAM GLOBAL LEADERS talks to the elite of international patent and trademark attorneys about their insights into IP law, politics and practice and their many years of experience in the IP environment.

This year, Professor Dr. Heinz Goddar was also asked for an interview as “IP Hall of Famer”, according to the IAM quote, and awarded the Gold Level of the IAM Patent 1000. 

In it, Mr. Goddar talks about his professional career, his rewarding work as Professor of IP Law and his commitment to LES International, which culminated in the founding of LES Chinese Taipei and a fruitful cooperation with China.

Other topics include the challenges of managing big portfolios of patents, win-win situations and attorneyorney skills as prerequisites for business success, and new evolvements in the European patent environment. 

Read the detailed interview with Prof. Dr. Heinz Goddar here!

Dr. Florian Schwab discusses important case of the Court of Justice of the European Union regarding genuine use of an EU collective mark for packaging system in WTR Daily

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Attorney Florian Schwab reports on a legal dispute before the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) on genuine use of a collective mark in the online portal of the trade journal World Trademark Review.

In the case Der Grüne Punkt – Duales System Deutschland GmbH v European Court of First Instance (EUIPO) (C-143/19 P, 12 December 2019), the CJEU, overruling the judgment of the General Court, has given guidance on the genuine use of a collective mark. The court fundamentally strengthened this type of EU trade mark as proof of genuine use of a collective mark concerning a system of collection and recovery of packaging waste was also accepted for countless (every day consumer) goods (such as beverages, foodstuff or clothing) on whose packaging the collective mark was affixed. .

Read the whole article here.

The article was published on 09.01.2020 in WTR Daily (part of the World Trademark Review).