SEP: Navigating the Technology-Driven World
Standard-Essential Patents (SEPs) is a concept arising from the interaction between patent rights, which provide exclusive use of an invention and “standards” aimed at the widespread and mandatory use of this innovation in the relevant market. Considering the upward trend in patent litigation arising from SEPs, it would be fair to say that SEP has become patent law’s new buzzword. Licensing SEPs: FRAND Terms Standard Developing Organisations (“SDOs”) determine the technical… »
Fending Off Tactical Patent Invalidation Actions
Filing patent invalidation actions for tactical purposes, such as jeopardizing patent infringement actions of patent owners and gaining time by complicating the infringement proceedings, has become a common strategy of infringers in recent years. With this strategy, the parties infringing the patent may cause the patent owner to suffer due to the inability to enforce their patent as they are entitled to during the limited protection period of 20 years, even if the invalidity… »
Possible Effects of a Unified Patent Court in Türkiye
The concept of the Unified Patent Court (UPC) entered the lives of European Patent holders with the UPC Agreement, an international agreement dated 19 February 2013. The Unified Patent Court started operating as of 01 June, 2023. The Unified Patent Court constitutes a big and important step towards unity of the judiciary for European Union member states. The Statistics and Trends Centre of the European Patent Office (EPO) reported that 17,788 unitary effect requests were made… »
Preventing Price Decreases of Original Pharmaceutical Products with Partial Preliminary Injunctions
Timely and appropriately strategized action is key for owners of pharmaceutical patents wishing to maximise benefits of the rights granted to them. The Turkish Industrial Property Code regulates the exemption of patent rights concerning experimental acts regarding the product subject to the invention, as well as marketing authorisation, and the necessary testing and experiments within its scope. In practice, the Courts occasionally erroneously interpret the wording of the law… »
EU Pharmaceutical Package - EU Pharmaceutical Legislative Reform and its Impact on Türkiye
On 26 April 2023, the European Commission (the “Commission”) adopted a proposal for a new Directive and Regulation (the “Proposal”) which revise and replace the existing general pharmaceutical legislation. The proposal adopted by the Commission replaces the existing general pharmaceutical legislation (Regulation 726/2004 and Directive 2001/83/EC) and the legislation on pharmaceuticals for children and rare diseases (Regulation 1901/2006 and Regulation 141/2000/EC… »
Inventorship of AI and Türkiye’s Position
Artificial intelligence has begun taking over roles normally performed by humans with little difficulty, including the act of inventing. As a result, debates on whether artificial intelligence can be the owner of an invention have emerged across the global and are likely to open many novel discussions. The debate on whether an artificial intelligence system can be an inventor began after the development of DABUS, the artificial intelligence system developed by Dr. Stephen… »
Recent Changes in the Turkish Commercial Code
With the Law no. 7511 Amending the Turkish Commercial Code and Certain other Laws (the “Amendment Law”), which entered into force after being published in the Official Gazette dated 29.05.2024 numbered 32560, amendments are made primarily to the Turkish Commercial Code numbered 6102 (the “TCC”) and other certain laws. We present below the important amendments introduced by the Amendment Law within the scope of the TCC in order to provide convenience to corporate transactions… »
Time Extension Granted: August 7, 2024 - Allocation of Domain Names in Structure of “a.tr”
In addition to domain names such as "com.tr" and "org.tr", which are already being allocated in Türkiye, allocation of domain names in the structure of "a.tr" has also become possible as of September 14, 2023. Domain names in the structure of “a.tr” do not include extensions for generic top-level domains (gTLD) such as ".com", ".net", ".org", etc. but have a direct country code extension of ".tr". The initial allocation of these domain names is carried out by the Information… »
Advertisement Board: Use of Competitors' Trademarks as Keywords Leads to Unfair Competition
Google Adwords / Google Ads, a type of commercial advertising that has emerged as a result of technological developments, allows advertisers to select keywords related to the product or service they offer and to help determine when and where the ad can be displayed. In this context, Google does not automatically prevent the advertiser from using trademarks or commercial names belonging to competitors in their advertisements. In Google Adwords ads, whoever pays the highest… »
Corporate Governance in Türkiye 2024
What are the primary sources of law, regulation and practice relating to corporate governance? Is it mandatory for listed companies to comply with listing rules or do they apply on a ‘comply or explain’ basis? The Turkish Commercial Code (TCC) dated 13 January 2011 (Law No. 6102) entered into force on 1 July 2012. The TCC has important objectives, such as ensuring transparency, adopting corporate governance standards and introducing internationally accepted auditing and… »
Update on Legal Interest, Late Payment Fee and Deferment Interest Rates
Legal Interest Rate According to Article 1 of the Law No. 3095 on Legal Interest and Default Interest (“Law No. 3095”), interests to be paid as per Turkish Code of Obligations and Turkish Commercial Code, shall be made at an annual rate of 12%, unless a different contractual rate is agreed. The president is authorized to adjust this rate on a monthly basis, and to reduce it by up to 10% or increase it up to one time. The legal interest rate was 9% since January 1, 2006… »
Türkiye's Update: Key Changes in Named Patient Program
Pharmaceuticals that are not authorized in Türkiye or authorized but not available on the market shall be procured from abroad as per a special authorization and on a case by case basis (Named Patient Program-NPP). This supply can be conducted by public institutions approved by the Ministry of Health that are defined as Foreign Pharmaceutical Suppliers (Suppliers) and currently constitute of the Social Security Institution and the Turkish Pharmacists Association. The… »