Face-to-face , first term, 30 hours of theory.

First term
Monday from 13:30 to 15:30 at 43 Botanique 5

The course is taught in English. All the course documents are also in English.

The course has two main objectives:
- to initiate students to the reasoning method specific to intellectual property law. By the end of the course, the student should (i) know the main components of the studied protection systems (subject matter, conditions, effects, prerogatives and exceptions, duration, etc.), (ii) be able to identify the applicable texts and jurisprudences (learning to manipulate legislative texts and put jurisprudential texts to good use) and (iii) analyse a concrete situation (how to best protect this or that creation?).
- to highlight some general issues encountered in intellectual property law (enforcement) as well as questions of public interest (relation between intellectual property law and freedom of expression, challenges posed by the internet, etc.).

For the Bachelor in Law :

None

Intellectual property (IP) is an area of law that has long be framed by supra-national rules. This course thus focuses on international, European and comparative law aspects of IP and is based on international and European legal instruments (international Treaties, EU Regulations and Directives). [For a presentation of the Belgian law on intellectual property, see the course “Droit de la propriété intellectuelle”.]

After some introductory sessions on IP in general (overview of the basic features of IP, rationale, international sources, etc.), the next sessions serve to present the building blocks (subject matter, conditions of protection, scope of protection and exceptions, ownership, duration, etc.) of the most common IP rights: copyright, trademark, patent and design.

Other sessions are used to study and discuss selected issues, which usually raise public policy questions and/or relate to other bodies of law (IP and freedom of expression, overlap of protection, etc.). These issues will be discussed on the basis of court decisions or other documents.

The students are requested to carry out preliminary readings. For almost each session, the agenda handed out to students at the beginning of the term includes reading materials. The textbook used for the course is: Dack, S., Kooij, P. A. C. E. van der, Visser, D. J. G., & Vrendenbarg, C. J. S. (2019), EU IP LAW. A short introduction to European intellectual property law. The lecture is based on many examples, including from the news. Practical questions, sometimes based on elements taken from concrete cases, are submitted to the students to make the course more interactive.

Students are also invited to participate by writing a blog article as a group, presenting a case or an issue related to the subject. Substantive issues (e.g. how to combine freedom of expression and protection of creations) will also be discussed during the sessions devoted to selected issues.

Different course materials are prepared for the students: (1) a collection of texts (mainly court decisions that the students should prepare for the course), (2) a collection of legislation, (3) computer presentations for each session.
A bundle with the court decisions and the legislation is available at the service Reprographie. The materials including the powerpoint presentations are made available to students via Moodle

The evaluation consists of a written examination (15 points out of 20) and an assessment of participation (5 points out of 20)

- The written examination consists of two parts:
Part [A]: a closed book short answer test (R/W or MCQ) to assess the student's knowledge of the main elements of the protection regimes studied. (5 marks out of 20)
Part [B]: open-ended (partially) open-book questions (students may consult the textbook provided), designed to assess the student's ability to analyse a practical situation or to test their ability to develop critical thinking (10 out of 20 marks)

Students who choose to participate in the Oxford IP Moot Court and are selected to do so (to be discussed with the lecturer), which involves preparing a 3000 word paper by the end of December (see https://www.law.ox.ac.uk/centres-institutes/oxford-intellectual-property-research-centre/oxford-intellectual-property-moot ), are exempt from taking the written examination.

- Student participation is assessed throughout the course on the basis of the blog post (4 points out of 20) and their involvement in the classes.

The main source is Dack, S., Kooij, P. A. C. E. van der, Visser, D. J. G., & Vrendenbarg, C. J. S. (2019), EU IP LAW. A short introduction to European intellectual property law (available on Moodle)

Students are encouraged to explore the subject further by consulting
- A. Kur and Th. Dreier, European Intellectual Property Law, Text, Cases and Materials, Edward Elgar, 2019.
- L. Bently and B. Sherman, Intellectual Property Law, Oxford UP, 5th ed., 2018. - The 6th ed. Should be available soon.
- W. Cornish, D. Llewelyn & T. Aplin, Intellectual Property: Patents, Copyrights, Trademarks and Allied Rights, Sweet & Maxwell, 9th ed., 2019
- G. Dinwoodie, W. Hennessey, S. Perlmutter & G. Austin, International Intellectual Property Law and Policy, LexisNexis, 2d ed., 2008.