On 7 October 2022, the UPC Preparatory Committee shared its latest version of the European Unified Patent Court (UPC) implementation roadmap .

The Preparatory Committee currently plans on the Court officially opening its doors and starting to receive cases on 1^st April 2023. According to this schedule, a sunrise period would start 1^st January 2023. The sunrise period allows holders of European patents to opt these out of the system if they wish to avoid the jurisdiction of the UPC.

Getting to full UPC launch in the first half of 2023 requires some preparation at the operational and political levels.

Among key tasks will be the recruitment and training of the legally qualified judges and technically qualified judges. The Administrative Committee appointing the judges will meet on 19 October 2022 and the roadmap indicates that selection of judges will be completed at that point.

An operational Case Management System (CMS) must also be established as all filings with the UPC will be done electronically. According to the roadmap, the CMS will be available for practising opt-out as of second half of November 2022. 

On the more political side, the sunrise period and UPC can actually start only if Germany deposits its ratification instrument regarding the UPC Agreement. For the roadmap deadlines to be met, this means such a move from Germany is required in December 2022 at the latest.

Additional issues arising from Brexit also remain to be resolved, including important jurisdiction questions such as which cluster of the Central Division of the UPC would be the proper venue for pharmaceutical nullity cases.

As the UPC progressed towards launch and the abovementioned issues evolve, our uniquely positioned European patent litigation team is available to assist you in preparing for the UPC, and will provide further updates on Hogan Lovells Engage.

Authored by Stanislas Roux-Vaillard