There are few risks so long as the national option is preserved. Almost free competition between a system at EU level and a system at national level, allowing business to choose the system which in terms of its own criteria gives best results seems to be the optimal solution. The Community trade mark Regulation is the only EC-wide Industrial Property measure to have been concluded. National IP laws have developed separately but are slowly drawing together. The trade mark Directive and the Supplementary Patent Certificate harmonised national law on the one hand as to grant, validity, and infringement, and on the other as to the life of pharmaceutical patents.
Applicants gain from speed and simplicity.
Competitors gain in speed of dissemination of information. There is some dissatisfaction with costs, especially of translation. Enforcement at national level is variable and a source of problems, not least because EPO opinions are not relied on by national courts. It will be used by companies in all sectors once confidence has been gained. Slowness of opposition procedures for patents, and in future for trade marks, is a cause of concern.