UPC Litigation

Proceedings before the Unified Patent Court

The Unified Patent Court (UPC) has fundamentally changed the enforcement and validity challenges of European patents.

A single judgment can affect markets across multiple EU Member States. Proceedings before the UPC are conducted under compressed timelines, are technically complex, and often carry significant commercial importance for the parties involved.

We Support You With

Patent Infringement Proceedings

If a competitor infringes your patent, we analyze potentially infringing products and develop robust arguments for enforcing your patent before the UPC.

If you need to defend yourself against a patent infringement claim, we assess the merits of the infringement allegations in relation to your products and develop non-infringement arguments.

Nullity Action

Before filing a lawsuit, we identify and assess key risks to the validity of the patent in question at an early stage. We develop promising strategies to distinguish the patent from critical prior art, while always keeping the infringing product in focus.

If claims of alleged patent infringement are brought against you, we coordinate the search for relevant prior art to mount a promising challenge to the validity of the patent in suit. In doing so, we engage our in-house research team. Based on the identified prior art, we formulate lines of attack against the patent in suit, which we present in persuasive briefs and oral arguments.

Opt-Out and Jurisdiction Strategies

We provide strategic advice on selecting the appropriate jurisdiction, weighing the pros and cons of national proceedings versus centralized proceedings before the UPC.

We are also assist law firms with patent disputes before the UPC.

Our Strengths

We manage UPC proceedings in collaboration with specialized law firms and in close coordination with our clients.

Our focus is on the technical issues that determine the outcome of these proceedings: claim interpretation, infringement analysis, and the state of the art.

In this way, we lay the groundwork for successfully enforcing patents or defending against allegations of infringement.

Our in-house search team works closely with the patent attorneys handling the case to identify the prior art relevant to a nullity action against the contested patent.

When preparing an infringement action, it is also often advisable to analyze the legal validity of the patent being challenged and to conduct a corresponding search.

With our team of over forty patent attorneys and experts from various technical fields, we are able to quickly assemble a customized litigation team for the specific field in question, equipped with the necessary resources even for complex technology sectors. We have extensive experience with UPC proceedings on both the plaintiff’s and defendant’s sides.

Thanks to our many years of experience with industrial clients, we always keep the respective business context in mind when developing a sound litigation strategy and place great importance on a strategy tailored to our clients’ needs. We present complex issues at the business decision-making level and identify concrete courses of action.

Key Success Factors in UPC Proceedings

UPC proceedings require technically sound and strategically well-thought-out case management from the outset and are generally subject to significant time pressure.

Successful litigation requires:

the rapid assembly of a strong team with excellent technical and legal expertise,
a coordinated approach to issues of infringement and validity,
early and comprehensive substantiation of all arguments for both the prosecution and the defense, including evidence (front loading), and
a compelling presentation of technical facts to adjudicative panels composed of legal and technical experts.

In UPC proceedings, therefore, representation by a patent attorney of the highest caliber is critical to the outcome of the case.

Meet our UPC team!

Are you a plaintiff or defendant in UPC proceedings, or are you planning to initiate such proceedings? Do you need assistance with strategic issues related to the UPC?

Our UPC team is here to support you.