The next training for economic courts representatives was carried out within EU Twinning Project

On 5–7th of April 2016 a training for economic courts of Ukraine representatives was conducted within European Union (EU) Technical Assistance Twinning Project «Strengthening the protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights in Ukraine» (Twinning Project) at the premises of the State Enterprise «Ukrainian Institute of Intellectual Property» (Ukrpatent).

Representatives of the Supreme Council of Justice of Ukraine, Supreme Economic Court of Ukraine, Kyiv Appeal Economic Court, Kyiv Economic Court, Kyiv Region Economic Court as well as of the economic and economic administrative courts of different regions of Ukraine participated in the activity which consisted of 8 thematic modules.

Resident Twinning Advisor Mr. Pablo Rodenas in his welcome speech informed the audience on the three-day agenda of the training and thanked the Spanish experts for their time and provided opportunity to receive latest information on the court protection of Intellectual property rights (IPR) in Spain and EU directly from the specialized courts representatives.

The main part of the training was carried out by Mr. Alberto Arribas, judge, Appeal Economic Court of Madrid, and Mr. Luis Antonio Soler, judge, Economic Court of Alicante. At the beginning Mr. Alberto Arribas outlined the issues which were discussed on the previous training for economic courts of Ukraine representatives. During his presentation the Spanish judge gave examples of European Court of Justice decisions on IP cases which demonstrated the importance of provision of legal protection of industrial property objects at international level and informed the audience about the web-source containing available for review EU Court of Justice cases materials. The Spanish expert also focused on the importance of IP rights in the context of country’s economic development citing figures of relevant researches.

Many of presentations were dedicated to the protection of trademarks. In particular, the following issues were covered: conflicts between marks; protection of well-known marks according to Resolution 2015/2436/ECC, art. 6bis of Paris Convention and TRIPS Agreement; reputed trademarks. The EU Court of Justice decisions examples of such cases as of General Motors, Pago, Adidas AG - Marca Mode CV, L´Oreal, Intel-CPM, Davidoff, Lloyds were provided. Organizers dedicated a separate module to right holder’s duties and requirements to rights preservation. Mr. Luis Antonio Soler elaborated the issue of usage of a mark in a form differing from the registered one, partial usage; spoke about the reasons for non-usage of mark; explained the reasons and consequences of invalidity and expiration. A separate topic for consideration was problematic aspects of using the trademarks in the Internet, namely domain names, contextual advertisement, sale of goods with marks put by suppliers which do not have a status of exclusive distributors, etc.

Within the patent law module the examples of direct patents infringements by equivalence were considered as well as examples of indirect infringements; claims on infringements of rights to a patent were analyzed and the implementation peculiarities of Regulation 2004/48/EU and TRIPS Agreement relevant provisions when considering such claims in court. Speakers also drew attention to other means of industrial property rights protection, in particular utility models, supplementary protection certificates, plants varieties, topographies of integrated circuits and cited relevant examples from European Court practice. A separate module was devoted to industrial designs protection with studying EU legislation and legal systems comparison; requirements to industrial designs protection; differences between registered and not registered industrial designs; concept of an informed user. To illustrate jurisprudence the EU Court of Justice and general jurisdiction courts decisions were provided.

During the copyright module Spanish experts focused on related rights attributed to performers, producers of phonograms and audiovisual works, simple pictures (non-photographic works), broadcasting organizations, publishers of non-published and orphans works, as well as developers of databases which do not meet requirements related to copyright objects.

The audience was enthusiastic with the proposed possibility to ask additional questions directly during the presentations. The training was conducted in a form of active discussions of the peculiarities of European and national IP protection courts practice.

At the end of the training its participants received relevant certificates from the Twinning Project. The Spanish experts also provided their kind consent to publish training presentations. The presentations (in Ukrainian) are available at:

«Промислова власність загальна інформація» (PDF, 2,4 МБ)
«Особливості торговельних марок; Конфлікти із іншими знаками» (PDF, 0,4 МБ)
«Обов’язки та припинення прав» (PDF, 0,2 МБ)
«Торговельні марки у мережі Інтернет» (PDF, 0,3 МБ)
«Патентне право (II)» (PDF, 2,5 МБ)
«Патентне право (II)» (PDF, 3,6 МБ)
«Промисловий зразок. Директива та Регламент ЄС» (PDF, 0,9 МБ)
«Суміжні права. Інтелектуальна власність у мережі Інтернет» (PDF, 2,5 МБ)