Short Summary
Order of the Local Chamber Mannheim of the Unified Patent Court in case UPC_CFI_210/2023 concerning patent EP2568724 held by Panasonic Holdings Corporation. The court granted the defendant's requests for extension of time (App_39329/2024 and App_39331/2024), extending deadlines for filing the duplik on the rejoinder regarding FRAND and the rejoinder on the reply to the FRAND counterclaim from July 17, 2024 to August 14, 2024.
Detailed Summary
This is an order (Anordnung) issued by the Local Chamber Mannheim of the Unified Patent Court on July 9, 2024, in case UPC_CFI_210/2023, presided over by Judge Dr. Peter Tochtermann. The patent in suit is EP2568724, held by Panasonic Holdings Corporation, with OROPE Germany GmbH appearing as the defendant.
The order addresses two requests for extension of time (Fristverlängerungsanträge), filed as App_39329/2024 and App_39331/2024. The defendant sought extensions of its currently running deadlines (set to expire on July 17, 2024) for two filings: (1) its duplik (reply) to the rejoinder (Replik) on the statement of defense (Klageerwiderung) concerning FRAND, and (2) its rejoinder (Replik) on the reply (Erwiderung) to the FRAND counterclaim.
The court granted the extension, setting the new deadline at August 14, 2024. The court reasoned that the extension was necessary and sufficient to allow the defendant to take a final position on the FRAND aspects of the dispute, particularly because the final decision on the confidentiality protection regime (Geheimnisschutzregime) had only just been rendered. The court noted that the natural persons on the defendant's side were also part of the confidentiality protection regime in parallel national proceedings and, according to the defendant's own submissions, were already familiar with the underlying contract documents, so they did not need to familiarize themselves with the materials for the first time.
The court further considered that the plaintiff had been granted a short three-day deadline to object to the use of certain documents, following the partial rejection of its confidentiality protection requests. The court also informed the parties that, based on the current status and subject to the outstanding written submissions, no interim hearing (Zwischenverhandlung) was intended, as the written proceedings had already provided extensive preparation of the case material. Instead, a written preliminary ruling (schriftliche Verbescheidung) on any questions to be clarified in the interim proceedings would likely suffice.
Practitioner Note
This case demonstrates the evidentiary and procedural standards applied in patent matters before Mannheim (DE) Local Division. Understanding the court's reasoning in Panasonic Holdings Corporation vs OROPE Germany GmbH is valuable context for structuring arguments or assessing risk in similar proceedings.
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