The European Court of Justice recently breathed new life
into the phenomenon of cross-border injunctions – a
cost-effective tool originally developed by the Dutch courts to
stop infringement.
A cross-border injunction, which enables a patent holder to
start proceedings in a single country instead of all countries in
which its patents are infringed, is a great time and money saver.
The Dutch courts used to issue such injunctions routinely, both in
cases on the merits and in preliminary proceedings, but over the
years this practice had been considerably limited by the European
Court of Justice (ECJ). However, a recent ECJ decision (Solvay
v Honeywell, C-616/10, July 12 2012) appears to have reversed
the trend, at least as far as cross-border measures in preliminary
proceedings are concerned. The ECJ stated that if one or more
companies infringe the same European patent with the same product
in multiple EU member states, the patent holder may be entitled to
claim and
