E-TIPS

In January 2021, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) released a report examining the impact of non-market factors on filing trends and IP systems in response to the growing number of “suspect” trademark applications filed in the United States from China.

On December 18, 2020, the Supreme Court of Canada released its decision in C.M. Callow Inc. v Zollinger, 2020 SCC 45, holding that no party should exercise a contractual right in a dishonest manner. This decision builds upon the SCC’s findings in Bhasin v Hrynew, 2014 SCC 71, where it introduced the general organizing principle of good faith in contract and a duty of honest contractual performance.

Thank you for your readership over the last year and welcome to what we hope will be a promising 2021!  In this year’s first issue of the E-TIPS® Newsletter, we will recap our most noteworthy reports from 2020 covering developments in intellectual property (IP) and Information Technology (IT) law, under the following categories: (1) “COVID-19”, (2) “Supreme Court of Canada Matters”, (3) “Legislative, Treaty and Policy Developments”, (4) “Patents”, (5) “Trademarks”, (6) “Copyright”, (7) “Privacy”, and (8) “IT/Telecommunications”.

Canada’s Intellectual Property Office (CIPO) announced that, effective December 14, 2020, CIPO began accepting requests for expedited examination of trademark applications associated with medical goods or services related to COVID-19. To be eligible for expedited examination, the application must include at least one of the following types of goods or services:

On December 9, 2020, the Federal Court of Appeal of Canada (FCA) issued its decision in Group III International Ltd v Travelway Group International Ltd, 2020 FCA 210, finding that a trademark registration is a defence to damages or an accounting of profits during the period that it is registered.

On December 14, 2020, the Privacy Commissioner of Canada released a statement on the findings of the joint investigation of the Office of the Privacy Commissioner (OPC) with the Commission d’accès à l’information du Québec into the security breach at Fédération des caisses Desjardins du Québec (Desjardins) that occurred in May 2019 and affected almost 10 million individuals in Canada and abroad.

On December 7, 2020, the state government of California announced its partnership with Apple and Google to launch its COVID-19 exposure notification app, CA Notify, throughout the state. With this announcement, California joins nearly 20 states and territories who have launched apps based on Google and Apple’s Exposure Notification technology.

On December 8, 2020, Deeth Williams Wall LLP received an industrial design registration for its distinctive business card. The novelty promotional card has a unique appearance that quite literally flies out of your hand.

On November 17, 2020, Bill C-11, the Digital Charter Implementation Act, 2020 (the “Bill”) was introduced by Canada’s Innovation, Science and Industry Minister, Navdeep Bains, in the House of Commons. The Bill is a first major overhaul of Canada’s federal privacy legislation in the past 20 years, since the enactment of the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (“PIPEDA”).

On November 26, 2020, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, and the Competition Bureau jointly announced that the agencies sent 36 letters to mobile app companies as part of a Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation (CASL) compliance awareness-raising campaign.

On November 25, 2020, the European Commission (the Commission) published a new Action Plan entitled “Making the most of the EU’s innovative potential: An intellectual property action plan to support the EU’s recovery and resilience” (the Action Plan). The Action Plan is intended to assist European innovative industry players, especially small and medium-sized companies (SMEs), to better protect their inventions and capitalize on their intellectual property (IP), while supporting EU’s economy.

On November 19, 2020, the Privacy Commissioner of Canada issued a statement regarding the tabling of Bill C-11 (the Bill), the Canadian government's proposed new private-sector privacy legislation (as previously reported by the E-TIPS® Newsletter here).

On November 3, 2020, the Federal Court of Appeal of Canada (the Court) issued its decision in Amgen Inc v Pfizer Canada ULC, 2020 FCA 188, dismissing an appeal from a Federal Court decision that found claims 43 to 47 of Canadian Patent No. 1,341,537 invalid due to obviousness.

The European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) refused Formula One racing driver Lewis Hamilton’s request to cancel Swiss watchmaker Hamilton International’s ‘HAMILTON’ trademark.

On November 17, 2020, the Honourable Navdeep Bains, the federal Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, announced changes to Canada's privacy framework through the introduction of Bill C-11, which introduces two new statutes, the Consumer Privacy Protection Act and the Personal Information and Data Protection Tribunal Act, to replace provisions of the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) dealing with Canadian private sector privacy laws.

On November 3, 2020, the Canadian Intellectual Property Office (CIPO) issued a guidance document explaining how it will determine whether claimed subject-matter is patentable, particularly in respect of computer-implemented inventions, medical diagnostic methods and medical uses.

On November 12, 2020, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (OPC) released key recommendations for regulating artificial intelligence (AI). The recommendations are the result of a public consultation that occurred earlier this year.

On November 2, 2020, the United States District Court for the Northern District of California (the Court) in Google LLC v. Sonos, Inc., No. 20-cv-03845-EMC, granted Sonos’ motion to dismiss an action brought by Google alleging patent infringement of its U.S. patent no. 8,583,489 (‘489 Patent) on the ground that the invention is patent-ineligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101.

On November 9, 2020, the Canadian Government announced the launch of the $1.75 billion Universal Broadband Fund (the Fund), an investment aimed towards connecting more Canadians to high-speed internet, growing businesses and creating jobs.

On October 29, 2020 the Canadian Office of the Privacy Commissioner (OPC) published a news release finding that commercial real estate company Cadillac Fairview (Cadillac) contravened applicable privacy laws through the use of embedded cameras inside digital information kiosks across twelve Canadian shopping malls to collect images of customers and generate biometric information from the images without the customer's knowledge or consent.