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Legislative Implementation of Flexibilities - Greece

Title:Articles 13- 14 of the Law on "Technology transfer, Inventions and Technological innovation" No. 1733 of 1987
Field of IP:Patents
Type of flexibility:Compulsory licenses and government use
Summary table:PDF

Provisions of Law

Article 13 - Non-contractual licence

1. The competent court mentioned in paragraph 10 of the present article may grant to a third party, without prior consent of the patentee, a licence for exploitation of the patent in case that the following prerequisites concur accumulatively:

a. A period of three years has elapsed since the grant of the patent or a period of four years has elapsed since the filing date of the patent application;

b. The relevant invention has not been exploited in Greece or, in case it has, the production of the products thereof is insufficient to cover local demand;

c. The third party is in a position to exploit productively the invention covered by the patent;

d. The third party notified the patentee, one month prior to the initiation of the judicial proceedings, regarding his intention to request a non-contractual licence.

2. The non-contractual licence shall not be granted in case the patentee justifies lack of exploitation or insufficient exploitation in the country. The importation of the product does not constitute an excuse for the invocation and application of this paragraph.

The regulation of item 1 above shall not apply to products imported from Member States of the European Union and the Member States of the World Trade Organization(1).

3. The grant of a non-contractual licence may not exclude other contractual or non-contractual licences. The non-contractual licence may be assigned only along with the part of the enterprise which exploits the invention.

4. The owner of the patent may request from the competent court mentioned in paragraph 10 the grant of a non-contractual licence on an earlier patent, provided that his invention relates to the invention of the earlier patent, the productive exploitation of said invention is not possible without offending the rights of the owners of the earlier patent and his invention constitutes a significant progress in comparison with the invention of the prior patent. When the aforementioned non-contractual licence has been granted, the owner of the earlier patent may request the granting of a non-contractual licence for the subsequent invention.

5. The non-contractual licence shall be granted following petition of the interested party before the competent court mentioned in paragraph 10.

The petition is accompanied by the opinion of the Industrial Property Organisation regarding the existence of the prerequisites for granting the non-contractual licence in accordance with the preceding paragraphs, the amount, the terms of the compensation to be given to the owner of the patent, and the exclusive or non exclusive character of the exploitation of the invention.

The Industrial Property Organisation states its opinion following petition of the party interested in exploiting the patent. The opinion of O.B.I. is granted within one month form the date the relevant petition is filed and is not binding for the competent court. Copy of the application for granting a non-contractual licence along with the relevant opinion of O.B.I. and the note fixing the day of the trial shall be notified to the owner of the patent and to the beneficiaries of other contractual or non-contractual licences.

6. In case the petition is approved, the competent court grants a non-contractual licence. The licence pertains to the extent of the exploitation rights of the invention, the duration of its validity, the date of commencement of the productive exploitation of the invention in Greece and the amount and terms of compensation to be paid to the patentee by the beneficiary of the licence. The amount and the terms of the compensation are determined in accordance with the extent of the industrial exploitation of the protected invention.

7. The decision of the court in accordance with paragraph 6 shall be recorded to the Patents Register of O.B.I., published in the Industrial Property Bulletin and notified to the persons mentioned in paragraph 5.

8. Following petition of the owner of the patent or the beneficiary of the non-contractual licence, the competent court mentioned in paragraph 10 may amend the terms of granting of the licence if new data justify the amendment or revoke the non contractual licence if its beneficiary does not respect the terms of the licence or if the prerequisites for its granting have ceased existing. If the immediate revocation brings about a significant damage to the beneficiary of the non-contractual licence, the court may allow the continuation of the exploitation for a reasonable period of time.

9. The non-contractual licence does not grant the right for importation of the products covered by the invention.

10. The competent court for the grant, assignment, amendment or revocation of a non-contractual licence is the three member court of first instance at the place of residence of the petitioner, which judges in accordance with the proceeding of article 741 to 781 of the Code of Civil Procedure Law.

Article 14

Licence to the Public Sector

1. For imperative reason of serving public health and national defence after justified decision of the Minister of Industry, Energy, and Technology and, according to the case, any competent Ministers, a licence for exploitation of an invention can be granted to bodies of the public sector which may exploit the invention in Greece, provided that the relevant invention has not been productively exploited in Greece or the production of the products thereof is insufficient to cover local needs.

2. Prior to the issue of the relevant decision, the patentee and anyone who is in position to give useful advice, are called upon to express their views.

3. By the same decision, following the opinion of O.B.I., the amount and the terms of the compensation to the owner or the patent are determined. The amount of the compensation is determined in accordance with the extent of the industrial exploitation of the invention. In case of disagreement of the patentee as regards the amount of the compensation, the compensation is determined by the relevant one-member court of first instance of the jurisdiction, in the injunction proceedings.

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