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The EU is currently considering the future of the Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Directive (2004/48/EC), known as IPRED. This discussion comes at a delicate moment for Europe’s wider competitiveness agenda, including efforts to close the innovation gap highlighted in the Draghi report, attract private R&D investment, promote technology transfer, and strengthen Europe’s leadership in strategic fields such as AI, 5G/6G, semiconductors, and clean technologies. Europe's competitiveness agenda depends on innovation. Innovation depends on investment, and investment in intangible technologies depends on confidence that intellectual property rights can be effectively protected and, if need be, enforced. A well-functioning intellectual property framework plays an important role in the EU’s ability to deliver on these overarching political goals.

Article 3 of IPRED requires remedies to be "effective, proportionate and dissuasive." These three principles are meant to work together. Yet much of the current policy debate has focused primarily on the application of the proportionality principle in patent disputes. This event will broaden the discussion by considering how all three principles work in practice, and the importance of policies that preserve the effectiveness and dissuasiveness of enforcement while allowing remedies to reflect the circumstances of each case.

The discussion will also take account of the incentives that underpin the innovation ecosystem. Predictable and balanced enforcement can support licensing negotiations, fair compensation and technology transfer. Any potential changes to the framework should therefore be assessed carefully, with attention to their practical impact on the EU’s attractiveness as a destination for investment and on development of new technologies.

The Unified Patent Court (UPC), launched in 2023, is already contributing to a more harmonised approach to patent enforcement. Its Court of Appeal has already given guidance on the application of IPRED, including the proportionality principle. This developing case law offers valuable insight into how the existing framework operates in practice and should be considered in any future policy discussions.

This event will bring together policymakers, industry representatives, and legal experts to discuss how Europe can maintain an IP enforcement framework that is balanced, predictable and fit for purpose, and how it can support the Union’s wider ambitions for competitiveness, investment, and technological leadership.

The discussion will explore:

.What does proportionality mean in practice?

.What can existing data, and its limitations, tell us about the patent enforcement in Europe, and what further analysis is needed to support sound policy discussions?

.How can enforcement remain effective and dissuasive?

.And how can IP policy support Europe's ambitions for competitiveness, investment, and technological sovereignty?

Sponsored by: IP Europe
Media Partner: Rapporteur