Giulia Tagliafico
European and Italian Patent and Trademark Attorney
LITAPAT
Rome, Italy

Simona Venturini
IP documentation specialist
SVIPsearch
Meda, Italy

Its importance for the pharmaceutical field and the relevant changes in Europe from the ‘90s to now

Powered by

The Supplementary Protection Certificates (SPCs) are tools that allow pharmaceutical patents to extend their exclusive rights on a certain drug, facilitating the recovery of the money invested in research & development and compensating in some way for the lengthy procedure (and high costs) required to obtain the marketing authorization. The introductive paragraph of the European Regulation of 18 June 1992, stresses this point:
“The Council of the European Communities, […] whereas at the moment the period that elapses between the filing of an application for a patent for a new medicinal product and authorization to place the medicinal product on the market makes the period of effective protection under the patent insufficient to cover the investment put into the research; whereas this situation leads to ... ...