Unified patent progress delayed

The path to a pan-European patent has hit a legislative obstacle, with a German court considering whether ratification would be constitutional, according to reports.

Germany’s president Frank-Walter Steinmeier has delayed introducing legislation that would ratify the unified patent in response to a request from the country’s constitutional court, the newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported on 13 June.

The court’s request was prompted by a complaint about the ratification that, according to Steinmeier’s office, is “not considered to be hopeless”. The exact nature of the complaint has not been disclosed, FAZ reported.