Is there any chocolate bar more recognizable than the KitKat? Maybe, but that does not make it special according to the recent decision from the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”) in Société des Produits Nestlé SA v Cadbury UK Ltd [Nestlé]. Nestlé has produced the KitKat chocolate bar for over 80 years. In 2010, the company filed an application […]

The Honourable Mr. Marshall Rothstein is a tough act to follow, especially when recounting his own majority decision. At the recent UNPACK SODRAC: Technological Change and Copyright Tariffs after CBC v SODRAC (SCC 2015) symposium, the former Supreme Court justice stood firmly by his decision in the case during his keynote address. The panelists during […]

Patent law can be a polarizing topic, but it is especially so during international trade negotiations. Perhaps this is because the principles of patent law create fundamental conflicts between those that own patents and those that pay for patents. Despite this divide, these negotiations, along with some international diplomacy, often produce patent chapters that fall […]

An overview of what the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement would change in Canadian policy The Government of Canada is inviting Canadians to read and comment on the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP), along with the government’s Summary of the Agreement, which provides an overview of how the TPP would affect Canada. The summary suggests that the largest […]

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (“TPP”) agreement pages of both the Office of the United States Trade Representative and the White House display an understandable, if not provocative, logo extolling that the trade deal is “Made in America”. For a trade deal whose negotiations spanned the length of President Obama’s term in office, this is hardly surprising: with the end of […]

IP Osgoode recently hosted the Orphan Works Hackathon at Osgoode Hall Law School. Typically, a hackathon brings together professionals from a common field, such as computer programming, and assigns them a complex problem to solve. The organizers of the Orphan Works Hackathon used the same premise but invited a broad spectrum of stakeholders of orphan […]