EU Intellectual Property Law

European Union law affects the law of intellectual property in two main ways. The first is under EC Treaty provisions on non-discrimination, free movement of goods (in relation to parallel imports) and principles of competition law (in relation to licensing of IPRs or refusal to grant such licenses). A significant part of this book deals with those aspects of Community law that are common to most intellectual property rights across the EC, including the effect of the EC treaty on national intellectual property rights, limited harmonisation of those rights in some areas, and how EU law impacts on enforcement. The second way in which EU law effects intellectual property is in those areas where the substantive national intellectual property laws of the member states have been harmonised, or supplemented, by the establishment of Community-wide unitary intellectual property protection. The rest of the book looks in detail at the effect of Community law and of harmonisation on specific intellectual property rights, including copyright and related rights, trade marks, geographical indications, designs, database rights, patents and plant variety rights .

Table of Contents:
1: Introduction 2: The Effect of the EC Treaty on National Intellectual Property Rights 3: Copyright and Related Rights - Harmonisation 4: Trade Marks - Harmonisation of National Rights and Establishment of Unitary Community Right 5: Geographical Indications - Establishment of Community Regime 6: Industrial Designs - Harmonisation and the Establishment of the Community Design 7: Patents, Utility Models and Plant Variety Rights - Partial Harmonisation of Patent Laws and Establishment of Community Regime for Plant Variety Rights 8: Semi-conductor Chip Topographies - Harmonisation 9: Unfair Competition, Including Under TRIPs, The Protection of Undisclosed information - Partial Harmonisation and Partial Establishment of a Community Regime 10: Measures Having Horizontal Effect On Intellectual Property, Including Those Concerning The Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights 11: Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights Appendix - Texts of Main Regulations and Directives Index

About the Author :
Trevor Cook is a partner with the London law firm of Bird & Bird and is an established expert in the field of intellectual property law. He specialises in the legal and regulatory issues affecting businesses in the pharmaceuticals, biotechnology and information technology sectors. He is the author of numerous leading textbooks and reference works in this field.

Review :
`Apart from the comprehensive coverage and the systematic descriptive analysis one needs to mention another strong point about the book. Each chapter comes accompanied by the relavant legislative texts. The reader therefore immediately has all the references and the whole package to hand. This book does very well in what it sets out to do and it clearly responds to a need in doing so.' Professor Dr Paul L.C Torremans, European Intellectual Property Review `I am not aware of any similar compilation of all the EU IP law texts and must applaud Trevor for a book that has clearly taken a huge amount of effort to compile. We have needed a book covering this subject for along time and it was well worth the wait (and the weight). I recommend not only having a copy in your library for reference but also taking the time to read it.' CIPA July 2010 `...a useful research tool as a case citator or basic introdution to particular legislation...also doubles as a statute book for those who like their EU legislative materials in hard copy.' Christopher Stothers, University College, London