Comment on the Canadian Competition Bureau’s Draft Updated Intellectual Property Enforcement Guidelines

Posted by Social Science Research Network

Comment on the Canadian Competition Bureau’s Draft Updated Intellectual Property Enforcement Guidelines Joshua D. Wright (Federal Trade Commission) & Douglas H. Ginsburg (U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit)

Abstract: This comment is submitted in response to the Canadian Competition Bureau’s (the Bureau’s) draft stage 2 update of its Intellectual Property Enforcement Guidelines (Draft Updated Guidelines). This comment addresses five issues in the Draft Updated Guidelines: (1) product switching in the context of pharmaceutical patents; (2) settlement of patent infringement litigation between competitors, commonly referred to as “reverse-payment settlements”; (3) deceptive failure to disclose patents essential to a standard, commonly referred to as “patent ambush”; (4) reneging on a commitment to license a standard-essential patent (SEP) on fair, reasonable, and nondiscriminatory (FRAND) terms; and (5) seeking injunctive relief against infringement of a FRAND-encumbered SEP.