1 When in the late seventies the Commission started its preparatory work on a plan of action(l) for the creation of a real Community Innovation market, obviously the question came up, how patents or industrial property could specifically help in stimulating technological and industrial innovation and technology transfer in the Community. From an earlier contractor's study(2) about possible items of action in patent law for the improvement of the impact of patents and patenting upon innovation, it was clear that, in principle, there was room for improvement but shortage of information as to how and to what extent efficient improvements should and could be made. 2 In the early 1980s then, the need for clarifying the potential for improve ment in patent law and patent practice became more pressing, so that the Commission convened an informal meeting of experts on 3/4 November 1982 in Luxembourg, in order to discuss the issues relevant to the relation ship between patent protection and innovation and to identify suitable subject matter for action or study. 38 experts from nine Member States, coming from different areas of activity in industrial property or in innova tion attended the meeting, which was chaired by two of them.

'The art of editing is to bring contributions together, which melt into one book. This is what Emanuela Arezzo and Gustavo Ghidini have achieved with their own critical mind by composing a book of papers, in which internationally renowned experts measure the tensions created for the patent system by the needs and problems of protecting biotechnological and software inventions. All together, they present a comparative law challenge to the very fundaments of patent protection. As such, they are or may become a "must read".' Hanns Ullrich, College of Europe, Bruges, Belgium 'Arezzo and Ghidini have put together a fine collection of essays addressing developments in patent law from general themes to emerging ones in the infotech and biotech sectors. It is notable that the international array of authors includes contributions from both established and rising young scholars, all of them ably tackling difficult issues that merit our attention.' Rudolph J.R. Peritz, New York Law School, US The new millennium has carried several challenges for patent law. This up-to-date book provides readers with an important overview of the most critical issues patent law is still facing today at the beginning of the twenty first century, on both sides of the Atlantic. New technological sectors have emerged, each one with its own features with regard to innovation process and pace. From the most controversial cases in biotech to the most recent decisions in the field of software and business methods patent, patent law has tried to stretch its boundaries in a way to accommodate such new and controversial subject matters into its realm. Biotechnology and Software Patent Law will strongly appeal to postgraduate students specializing in IP law, international law, commercial and business law, competition law as well as IP scholars, academics and lawyers.

This collection of essays was written in honour of David Vaver, who recently retired as Professor of Intellectual Property and Information Technology Law and Director of the Oxford Intellectual Property Research Centre at the University of Oxford. The essays, written by some of the world's leading academics, practitioners and judges in the field of intellectual property law, take as their starting point the common assumption that the patent, copyright and trade mark laws within members of the 'common law family' (Australia, Canada, Israel, Singapore, South Africa, the United Kingdom, the United States, and so on) share some sort of common tradition. The contributors examine, in relation to particular topics, the extent to which such a shared view of the field exists in the face of other forces that are producing divergence. The essays discuss, inter alia, issues concerning court practices, the medical treatment exception, non-obviousness and sufficiency in patent law, originality and exceptions in copyright law, unfair competition law, and cross-border goodwill and dilution in trade mark law.

The Exploitation of Marine Genetic Resources in Areas beyond National Jurisdiction by Valérie Wyssbrod begins by identifying the legal regime applicable to these underexploited resources which offer vast potential for the development of new drugs, bioplastics, depolluting products and other innovations. The author then outlines provisions for a new treaty, currently under discussion at the UN and presents alternatives to a new regime including revised legal instruments, the development of soft law and the creation of an applicable ecolabel. Dans L’exploitation des ressources génétiques marine hors juridiction nationale, Valérie Wyssbrod détermine en premier lieu le régime juridique actuellement applicable à ces ressources. Ces dernières représentent à l’heure actuelle un potentiel énorme pour le développement de nouveaux médicaments, bioplastiques, dépolluants, etc. Encore peu exploitées, elles seront sans aucun doute au coeur d’un futur processus d’innovation et de nouveaux brevets. Dans un second temps, l’auteur dessine les contours et les principaux axes d’un nouveau traité spécifique, projet actuellement discuté à l’ONU. Valérie Wyssbrod explore finalement trois alternatives au nouveau traité : le remplacement du régime actuel par un autre régime existant, le développement d’un instrument de soft law et la création d’un écolabel.

How can we simultaneously conserve biodiversity and use its components (genetic resources) to create new medicines and better seeds ? Signed in 1992, at the Eearth Summit in Rrio, the Convention on Biological Diversity answers this question by resorting to intellectual property rights on living material with the objective to create a market for genetic resources. Fifteen years later, we cannot but observe that biodiversity keeps eroding and that the proliferation of intellectual property rights hinders research and innovation on new medicines and seeds. Combining legal, economical and historical approaches, this book explains in simple terms how the Biodiversity Convention came into existence, and how the providing countries and bio-industries (pharmaceutical and seeds industry) are striving to implement it, and why the Convention and its project of a market for genetic resources do not work properly. The book, then, examines new orientations and suggests avenues for solutions. What makes this book different ? It puts the Convention on Biological Diversity back in the wider context of the organization of both innovation and conservation of nature. This approach highlights what is really at stake: • Financing innovation and conservation: what should be the distribution of tasks between the market and public funding ? • Coordinating the agents of conservation and innovation (providing countries, local communities, universities, firms, etc): what should be the distribution of tasks between the market and regulation ?

This report reviews efforts under way in a number of OECD countries to advance innovation in energy technology, with a particular focus on hydrogen fuel cells.