Spada: «We need a real patent court in Milan». Government negotiations for the headquarters

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There are 33 days to go and it’s all over the place. Yesterday afternoon with France and in the next few hours with Germany. Just over a month to go and a fair compromise has not yet been found between Italy, France and Germany for the possible reassignment to Milan of that third seat of the Unified Patent Court (TUB), which was in London before Brexit. In fact, the yes of the other strong partners is conditioned by the skills in the pharmaceutical and chemical fields which had already gone as a dowry to London but which, with this unexpected (at least when the international agreements were written) need for reassignment, Paris and Berlin would like to keep to themselves (a “theft” that the agreements themselves would not provide for) and which has seen, in recent weeks, the outcry of the lawyers and the concerns of the Italian industrial system, especially the pharmaceutical sector.

Yesterday – on International Intellectual Property Day – it was discussed in the Aula Magna of the Palace of Justice, in Milan, at the conference “New System of the Unitary Patent”, an event of training, analysis and political support for the city’s candidacy to third headquarters. Waiting for the intervention of the Minister for Justice, Carlo Nordio (who today participates in a bilateral meeting, also in Milan, with his French counterpart Eric Dupond-Moretti).

«We are working – affirmed the Minister of Justice – to convince our counterparts of the need to place Milan at the centre. It’s not an easy path, everyone brings grit to their own mill, we’re doing the same. With my government colleagues, I am very confident that Milan’s candidacy can soon become a reality”.

The latest draft of the agreement offered by France and Germany to Italy – on which the margins for improvement remain extremely narrow – in fact provides for a “unbundling” of the competences on patent lawsuits in the field of chemistry, life sciences and pharmaceutical. That is, the chemical patents in Monaco and the (more delicious) pharmaceutical ones in Paris if equipped with supplementary protection certificates (Spc) as are about 90% of the drugs currently on the market.

The risk is that a Tub office in Milan with residual competences will be reduced to an empty box, unable to generate real induced activities for the city and for its own self-financing which should be achieved by the three offices within 7 years of entry in effect. Some dated estimates (made when Milan was only waiting for the local court) gave the revenues of around 350 million euros a year. While a 2012 report by FTI consulting for the London headquarters already estimated volumes between 600 and 2 thousand million pounds.