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Singapore is often referred to as a food paradise. Given the plethora of cuisines and gastronomical delights, it is not surprising to encounter litigation in the food industry. But this year seems to yield a bumper crop of food-related trade mark disputes. This article provides a short summary of three of these cases, the brands of which may be familiar to some: Kelloggs Smacks for snacks; Kickapoo for soft drinks; and Rainforest Café for restaurants.

A company's intellectual capital includes a lot more than mere patents and trade marks

The Supreme Court of Cassation has confirmed in a decision dated October 28 1998 and now published that section 1-bis of the Trade Mark Law prevents the registrant from the enforcement of his exclusive rights against third parties who use his trade mark, if it is necessary to indicate the destination of a product or service, especially as an accessory thereto or as a spare part thereof.

Internet entrepreneurs beware. Registering a domain name does not give you an automatic right to the equivalent trade mark.

When applicants appeal Korean Industrial Property Tribunal (KIPT) decisions on unpatentability matters to the Korean Patent Court (KPC), they are usually frustrated at the decisions made by the court. Considering that most of judges at the KPC have limited technical background, it is extremely difficult for an appellant to persuade judges to overturn a KIPT decision sustaining the examiner´ s rejection on a patent application by discussing complex technical principles and theories as to why such an invention should be patentable. In other words, judges at the KPC customarily defer the technical aspects of an invention, ie whether an invention is patentable, to the KIPT because the KIPT is comprised of technical experts whose decisions are usually supported with precise and accurate technical reasons.

Article 6 of Law 255/1998 for Protecting New Varieties of Plants stipulates the conditions the variety must meet in order to be considered novel. These conditions are fully harmonized with the corresponding provisions of UPOV (the International Convention for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants), Article 6 (1) (b).

Increasingly, the decisions of the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reflect the need for patent applicants, particularly non US-based applicants, to be assisted by a lawyer who is a skilled linguist. This is a natural outgrowth of the now-established principle that patent claim interpretation is a matter of law to be determined independently by the courts at each level of the litigation process (Cybor v FAS Technologies, 138 F 3d 1448 (Fed Cir 1998 en banc); Markman v Westview Instruments, 52 F 3d 967 (Fed Cir 1995 en banc); affirmed 517 US 370 (1996).

A patent application was filed in the Czech Republic with the priority claim of a German utility model application, but after the publication of the said German utility model application. This fact was used by a petitioner, who filed a request, to cancel the patent granted on the mentioned Czech patent application in a first instance proceeding.

Even a casual student of United States patent law developments during the past year unavoidably would have happened on multiple discussions of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit´ s State Street Bank & Trust Co v Signature Financial Group (149 F3d 1368 (Fed Cir 1998)) decision, that held computer software for conducting methods for doing business to be patentable subject matter and not per se unpatentable subject matter. Not only has a majority of the US legal community positively responded to this decision because it addresses critical patentability questions involving software, but also technology owners have responded with increased patent application filings. By last December, the US Patent and Trademark Office reported that applications claiming inventions in a fashion similar to the claims in State Street Bank had increased by over 40% over the previous year and that it expected to issue over 300 patents with business method type software claims by October of this year. Unmistakably, the pump was primed even before the State Street Bank decision issued.

CHINA: Intcera High Tech Group is adding a new plant in mainland China to expand its manufacture of fibre-optics components. CHINA: The Ministry of Information Industry and National Copyright Administration prepared a draft amendment to the Regulations for the Protection of Computer Software. Changes include an extension of the period of protection for software from 25 years to 50 years. EUROPE: From January 1 2001, new Block Exemptions and Guidelines, which affect trade between the member states of the European Union, became effective. The aim of the Guidelines is to provide a simplified framework for assessing whether a horizontal agreement comes within the Article 81 (1) prohibition and, if it does, whether it is exempt from it. UK: Protocol Solutions, which specialized in NT and desktop systems, has been forced into receivership following legal action taken by the police over counterfeit software. US: Brobeck Phleger & Harrison raised its first-year associate pay by $10,000 to $135,000. A first-year associate can now expect to receive $170,000. US: In the first case of its kind, federal prosecutors in Los Angeles have claimed a website selling counterfeit software on the internet as part of a criminal case. Maria Yolanda and Sola Lirola, who made $900,000 in profit, sold software billed as retail products from companies such as Adobe and Microsoft.