Patent leading to market exclusion finally made illegal
The online printers unitedprint.com SE http://www.unitedprint.com and their subsidiary print24 GmbH http://www.print24.de have won a landmark patent dispute against Vistaprint. On Thursday, March 22 the German Federal Court of Justice (BGH) handed down its final verdict on the legal dispute initiated in 2007. The judges finally declared the controversial Vistaprint patent EP 0 852 359 B 1 null and void.
The patent described a process for preparing, processing and transmitting templates via the internet. In 2006, Vistaprint filed the first lawsuit against unitedprint.com SE and print24 GmbH. Vistaprint alleged that the subsidiary of unitedprint.com SE had, with its powerful FreeDesign tool, violated their patent. The whole European software industry was in a panic over Vistaprint?s attempt to secure a monopoly on the European software market. Had the patent leading to market exclusion obtained by Vistaprint proved valid, it would have been illegal to transmit and process digital data via the internet without infringing the patent.
In 2007, unitedprint successfully appealed to the German Federal Patent Court against the patent. The final verdict delivered by the BGH a few days ago confirmed the patent?s revocation by the Federal Patent Court. With its decisive victory in the dispute, unitedprint has laid the foundations for more open and legally compliant competition in the European software industry. unitedprint is now entitled to considerable damages totaling six figures from the proceedings, after the BGH increased the litigation value.
unitedprint.com SE is Europe?s market leader in the online-printing sector. It provides its customers with top-quality flyers, posters, postcards, prospectuses, business cards, writing paper, and much more besides, in the quickest delivery times, and at the lowest prices.
You can find more information on unitedprint and its products and services at http://www.unitedprint.com.
The original source-language text of this announcement is the official, authoritative version. Translations are provided as an accommodation only, and should be cross-referenced with the source-language text, which is the only version of the text intended to have legal effect.
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