UPC: A quiet demise

When the UK left, it was all over. Then, when the Germans declared its ratification was “null and void”, it was definitely all over. But is it?

The Unified Patent Court (UPC) has had a tough year. In late February, the UK quietly left the project it had ratified two years earlier, with a spokesperson citing the conflict with the Brexit “red line” of EU law.

Then in March, the German  Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) delivered a surprise decision, stating that the way the country had ratified the UPC was unconstitutional.

Between the UK’s stab in the back and Germany’s slap in the face, the project’s proponents should have been left reeling. But its future has been endlessly discussed since the UK referendum in 2016, so it was perhaps not surprising that the UK’s withdrawal was met with defiance from Alexander Ramsey, chair of the UPC Preparatory Committee, who said afterwards: “Once Germany will be in a position to ratify the UPC Agreement and the Protocol on the Provisional Application, arrangements will be made to deal with the practical implications of the UK’s departure.”