Formation | Established by treaty |
---|---|
Type | Intergovernmental organization, court of several EU member states |
Legal status |
|
Headquarters | Paris (court of first instance, central division) Luxembourg (court of appeal and registry) |
Region served | 17 EU countries |
Official languages | Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Slovenian, Swedish |
Presidium Chair | Klaus Grabinski |
Administrative Committee Chair | Johannes Karcher |
Registrar | Alexander Ramsay |
Website | Official website |
The Unified Patent Court (UPC) is a common patent court of 17 countries of the European Union,[2] which opened on 1 June 2023.
The UPC hears cases regarding infringement and revocation proceedings of European patents (regular European patents unless they were opted out and unitary patents). A single court ruling is directly applicable in the member states that have ratified the UPC Agreement.[3]
The UPC Agreement is the legal basis for the court. It was signed as an intergovernmental treaty in February 2013 by 25 states, all then-EU member states except; Spain, Poland and Croatia. The United Kingdom was a member who signed at the time but left the EU before the UPC came into existence. The UPC entered into force after meeting three predefined conditions on 1 June 2023.[4] Provisional application of the UPC Agreement was triggered on 19 January 2022 to enable preparation for the proper functioning of the court after entry into force.[5] While the United Kingdom originally ratified the agreement, it withdrew from the UPC in 2020, following Brexit.[6]
The UPC comprises a Court of First Instance, a Court of Appeal in Luxembourg, an Arbitration and Mediation Center and a common Registry. The Court of First Instance consists of a central division in Paris (with a thematic section in Munich and a further section planned in Milan),[7] along with 13 local and one regional divisions.[8] Before the central division, the language of procedure is English, French or German, while English in combination with a local language is the language of procedure before the local division.
Requesting European patents with unitary effect which apply in all countries where the UPC Agreement is in force upon the grant of European patents is possible since the entry into force of the Unified Patent Court Agreement. Appeal against decisions of the European Patent Office (EPO) regarding the grant of unitary effect is also possible at the court.
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