ENGLISH PATENT LAW.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9129, 30 June 1908, Page 4

ENGLISH PATENT LAW.

A cablegram on Saturday last stated that German trade continues to be effected by the new English Patent Act, and that many firms are urging Germany to take steps to counteract the serious losses of her exports. The main purpose of the Act is the protection of the British manufacturer from the unfair use of the British patent laws, and it effects this by providing that foreign patents registered in Great Britain must be worked in that country unless satisfactory reason can be shown for not doing so. It thus prevents, on the one hand, foreigners blocking British manufacturers by taking out patents in England without having any intention to work them, and, on the other, it compels a foreign manufacturer who does not wish his British patent rights to be revoked to establish in Great Britain a factory for the manufacture of any patented article or articles. In order to save their patent rights foreigners are now establishing factories in England, and in these establishments the majority of the employees will, no doubt, be Englishmen. A foreigner owning a patent which is protected in Great Britain must either work it himself or be prepared to have his monopoly taken from him, so that English manufacturers can use it.