International Litigation in Intellectual Property and Information Technology

The pressure to develop an intellectual property litigation framework at a
supranational level is enormous. The tensions among technological change, the
forces of an ever-more global market, the quest of market actors for tactical
advantage and of legal actors for equitable solutions, and the ever-present
imperative of the principle of economy in judicial proceedings all cry out for
resolution. In the progress toward this framework, the fourteen leading
authorities who have put this remarkable symposium together show that European
Community law, and particularly its effect on judicial cooperation among
Member States in civil and commercial matters, has led and continues to lead
the way.

This is the first book to emphasize the role of the judicial cooperation
aspect of cross-border intellectual property litigation. Starting from
European private law as it is currently evolving, the authors focus
intensively on the issues surrounding such central questions as the following:

How different should the treatment of IP litigation be from other
transnational private activity?

How different should the treatment of different IP forms be, at least from a
private international law perspective?

How do the answers to these questions relate to methodological shifts within
the discipline of private international law itself?

How should the doctrinal solutions we give integrate "substantive" values
such as the EC basic freedoms or new ideas about the meaning of "property" in
the context of intellectual works?

What should the relationship be between the rules on jurisdiction and the
rules on applicable law?

How global or how distinct do we want the European legal regime in this area
to be?

What should be the coordination and/or allocation of competences between the
various international institutions and instruments?

The wide-ranging analyses presented here will contribute substantially to the
establishment of a common frame of reference among intellectual property
lawyers and private international lawyers, across the EU and on a global
scale. For policymakers, practitioners, and academics in international IP law,
this book offers food for thought for legislative projects, reviews and renews
doctrines in private international law and the transnational legal treatment
of intellectual property, and affirms a forward-looking dialogue on these
crucial matters.