Jan Lindberg
Finland became the ninth country to ratify the UPC Agreement when President Sauli Niinistö signed the law on its ratification on 8th of January 2016. The Parliament approved the ratification in December 2015, following the Judiciary Committee’s report on the 6th of November 2015 and the Constitutional Committee’s report on the 17th of November 2015, supporting ratification in an ordinary legislative process (as opposed to a more complicated process according to the most solemn constitutional provisions). The end result was naturally warmly welcomed and expected conclusion to the legislative process, as we have outlined also earlier (see our earlier post at here).
The agreement will enter into force after 13 Member States have confirmed participation (estimated to take place 1 January 2017). This means that only four more signatures are still needed, two of which must however be the UK and Germany. As discussed also earlier in Kluwer Patent Law blog (read more from here), the schedule for these missing signatures is still unclear, and especially taking note of the speculations surrounding possible Brexit, nothing is yet clear. However, at least we are now one step closer to seeing this system live.
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