At the 44th IPO annual meeting on Tuesday 13th September, Senior Associate Matthew Georgiou moderated a panel discussion involving EPO and industry representatives. The session at this annual event, which attracts Intellectual Property professionals from around the world, focused on the changing IP landscape in Europe particularly in light of the Brexit vote earlier this year. Some of the effects of this are as yet unknown but the Unitary Patent and Unified Patent Court remained high on the agenda for many delegates.

Speaking about the event Matthew highlighted the key message for corporations with interests in Europe,

“The bottom line is that Brexit does not affect the way that the EPO grants patents covering the UK and the rest of Europe. There will be some changes to the Unitary Patent and the Unified Patent Court, but companies still need to understand how the currently proposed system will operate in preparation for these coming changes.”