The Hargreaves Review of Intellectual Property

The Business Innovation and Skills Committee publishes a report - "The Hargreaves Review of Intellectual Property: where next?" - as part of its inquiry into the Hargreaves Review of Intellectual Property and Growth. The Committee believes further work remains to be done in analysing whether the economic benefits of a parody exception would be as extensive as claimed. However, other grounds may yet support a change to the law by extending what is legally permissible. which would probably help improve public respect for copyright law in general. On content mining, the Committee agrees that the ability to read published scientific data automatically is useful and needs to be opened up. On the the issue of Digital Copyright Exchange, the Committee encourages the Government to push forward with this idea provided that the system is kept simple and there is a proper cost/benefit analysis. On the Government's approach to negotiations on the Unified Patents Court, the Committee is concerned about the Government's approach on this. A unified patent and litigation system could bring many benefits, particularly if the central court were situated in London, but the current proposals have not been welcomed by practitioners or industry.