The final version of the Court of Appeal's "mystery decision" in E I du Pont Nemours & Co v United Kingdom Intellectual Property Office [2009] EWCA Civ 966 , which was handed down in draft form on 19 September, has at last been made generally available today. This decision reverses that of John Baldwin QC, sitting as a High Court judge (see The SPC Blog here) in which he upheld the Intellectual Property Office's decision to refuse to grant a paedriatric extension to the term of an SPC for Losartan.At para 59 Lord Justice Jacob (with whom the other appellate judges agreed) explains:
"We indicated at the conclusion of the oral hearing that the appeal would be allowed. This was necessary in order that the Patent Office could extend the SPC before it expired. These are my reasons for that decision. They are largely the same (though I fear expressed at much greater length) as those of the Dutch Patent office [noted here on the SPC Blog] which, by its letter of 2nd June, extended the corresponding Dutch SPC".The SPC Blog welcomes further comment on this very full decision, and may provide some additional comments of its own in due course.
