Rule 101 – Role of the judge-rapporteur (Case management)

1. During the interim procedure, the judge-rapporteur shall make all necessary preparations for the oral hearing. He may in particular, where appropriate, and subject to the mandate of the panel, hold an interim conference with the parties which may be held on more than one occasion and may exercise the powers provided for in Rule 334.

2. The judge-rapporteur shall have the obligation to ensure a fair, orderly and efficient interim procedure.

3. Without prejudice to the principle of proportionality, the judge-rapporteur shall complete the interim procedure within three months of the closure of the written procedure.

Relation with Agreement: Articles 43 and 52(2)

Case Law:

IPPT20240627, UPC CFI, LD Mannheim, Panasonic v Orope
Case management order. The following information and questions have been sent to the parties by the judge-rapporteur in order to structure the further proceedings (Article 43 UPCA, Rule 9(1) RoP, Rule 101(1) RoP). In case of technically complex subject-matter statements on the interpretation of features of the asserted patent claim which are not readily understandable by themselves must already be made in the statement of claim (Rule 13(1)(n) RoP). Here: Location of reference signals for determining the uplink channel quality in an available transmission bandwidth to avoid interference with control channels in the context of LTE standardisation. In the Defence to the counterclaim for revocation, the patent proprietor must base his argumentation on specific features of the patent claim (Rule 29A RoP). The plaintiff's statements in the reply to the counterclaim are not clearly recognisable in relation to the individual features - this must be made up for. It is insufficient to deal with the defendant's arguments without a clear reference to the features of the asserted claim, without it being clearly recognisable why a specific feature of the claim is not covered by the prior art disclosure. Rule 30(2) RoP is a strict rule of preclusion which allows subsequent requests for amendment of the patent only with the permission of the court. Corresponding requests must be substantiated in detail. When assessing whether a new amendment is permitted, it will be important to consider whether the new amendment would have been necessary at an earlier stage in response to the invalidity plaintiff's arguments and whether the late request for amendment causes delays in the proceedings. Defendants will have to clarify what the current version of the FRAND counterclaim (seeking a FRAND licence rate determination and/or a declaratory judgemen) is aimed at.

IPPT20240430, UPC CFI, LD Mannheim, Panasonic v Xiaomi
Plaintiff is upon its own request ordered to submit redacted licence agreements, subject to further to be determined confidentiality regimes under Rule 262 and 262A RoP. Order is based on the extensive case management powers vested in the Court (Article 43 UPCA) and the judge-rapporteur (Rules 101, 111 and 331 et al. RoP), not Rule 172 RoP or Rule 190 RoP.

IPPT20240227, UPC CFI, CD Munich, Sanofi-Aventis v Amgen
Interim report after interim hearing in relation to combing actions (Rule 9 RoP, Rule 101 RoP). Request for interim conference after interim hearing rejected in view of the opportunity to be heard in relation to its requests and the combining of both actions at the present hearing. Case management instructions in relation to combining the actions in preparation for oral procedure to provide that all parties are “on the same page” where it concerns the grounds for revocation, arguments, facts and evidence. Value of proceedings set at 100 million euro in accordance with agreement between the parties (article 36 UPCA). Reasonable and proportionate costs recoverable up to a ceiling of 2 million euro in accordance with table published by the Administrative Committee (article 69 UPCA). Court and parties must have access to information showing at least a detailed description of the number of hours spent working on this particular case, by whom, what for and at what rate. The same applies to any expenses incurred. The judge-rapporteur informed the parties that the Court will, in principle, respect an agreement between the parties on the amount of costs that is deemed reasonable and proportionate. Use of slides during oral hearing of 4 June 2024 (Rule 9 RoP, Rule 112 RoP). Use of reasonable number of slides as demonstratives, which may not introduce any new facts or substance to the case, permitted; to be submitted by all parties by 7 May 2024 at the latest. Both parties are to include with the slides a table indicating exactly where in the pleadings/evidence already on file the contents of the slides can be found.