The Italian Competition Authority (AGCM) has recently launched investigations against global leading providers of cloud computing services. AGCM is concerned that the service providers’ terms & conditions violate Italian consumers’ protection rules. In particular, AGCM alleges that the investigated providers are engaging in unfair business practices consisting of: improper collection of user data for commercial purposes; undue influence on consumers, whose consent to the collection and use of their personal data for commercial purposes is…

Parallel import is not easily tolerated by brand owners. Parallel import products, sometimes referred to as grey market goods, create market distortions, attack the official supply chain, double the risk of product liability and dilute trademarks. Brand-owners know, however, that trademarks are not a viable tool to stop parallel import of foreign cosmetic brands into China, as the first sale of these cosmetics abroad exhausts their exclusive right in China. However, holders of trademark rights…

With the Brexit transition period ending on December 31st, the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) is issuing guidance for the UK Life Science industry – including guidance on clinical trials, market authorizations, and manufacture and supply, among other areas. The guidance will apply from the start of 2021. Squire Patton Boggs’ Triage Health Law blog provides more information in a recent post.…

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is providing a new forum for innovation – designated as Tech Sprints – to generate “actionable ideas” for reducing regulatory burdens and improving consumer understanding of financial services. Tech Sprints will be held virtually, and competing teams will work to realize identified goals. The first Tech Sprint, to be held October 5-9, 2020, will focus on “developing a range of innovative approaches to electronically-delivered adverse action notices” required under the…

In an opinion that will be of particular interest to writers, the Ninth Circuit has confirmed that authors of non-fiction works cannot later claim that elements of their work were, in fact, fictional in order to extend the scope of copyright protection. The plaintiff in Corbello v. Valli et al., Case No. 17-16337 (9th Cir., September 8, 2020) was the estate of the co-author of an autobiography of Tommy DeVito, one of the original…

In Godo Kaisha IP Bridge 1 v. TCL Commun. Tech. Holdings Ltd.,[1] the Federal Circuit definitively answered the question: “Who determines the standard-essentiality of the patent claims at issue—the court, as part of claim construction, or the jury, as part of its infringement analysis?” According to this precedential decision authored by Judge Kathleen O’Malley: “Where . . . there are material disputes of fact regarding whether asserted claims are in fact essential to all implementation…

Recent Supreme Court decisions have added clarity to the interpretation of the law of Standard Essential Patents (SEPs) and Fair, Reasonable And Non-Discriminatory (FRAND) licensing rules in Europe. On 5 May 2020, the German Federal Court of Justice issued its decision in Sisvel v. Haier.[1] The reasons for the judgment were published on 7 July 2020. Equally eagerly awaited were the judgments in Unwired Planet vs. Huawei [2] as well as in Conversant vs.…