The Forum in Prague provided the opportunity for a number of the Groups within the CET to meet and discuss issues of current interest and importance to the Federation. In addition to the Group Meetings, two full meetings of the CET were held to review current matters and formulate a formal FICPI position on a number of important international developments and proposals on intellectual property. Some of the issues discussed in the respective CET Groups were:

• Revision of the Trade Mark Law Treaty, Reform and Improvement of the CTM System, EU Enlargement;
• the EU Community Design Regulation;
• the USPTO 21st Century Strategic Plan; Developments with the Substantive Patent Law Treaty in particular issues such as "made available to the public", "technical effect" and "observations by third parties" and "multiple invention disclosures"; Developments with the Patent Corporation Treaty in particular the dialog issue;
• Possible Grace Period, the Implementing Regulations under the EPC 2000, European Litigation Protocol,
• the Patenting of Stem Cells,
• the U.S. FESTO Decision,
• the European Draft Directive on software inventions,
• Genetic Resources and Traditional Knowledge.

For a list of CET papers presented at Prague go to: CET Papers/Prague

"Practical Patent Matters" - CET Brainstorming Meeting - Prague October 5

The CET also arranged a brain storming meeting to discuss a number of "practical patent matters" some of which were being discussed within the SPLT and PCT. This meeting which was arranged by the Group Chair and Reporter of Group 3 Jan Modin and Julian Crump respectively and considered various topics including information disclosures statements, unity of invention, claim structures and fees and the approaches taken by various patent offices to "support in original disclosure for amendments" and the complex issue of added subject matter. A summary of the discussions which took place at that meeting is available as Paper EXCO/CZ02/CET/1311.