Finland officially ratified the Unified Patent Court Agreement (UPC Agreement) on 19 January 2016, becoming the ninth country to do so.

Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Malta, Sweden, Luxembourg and Portugal are the other eight countries that had already ratified the agreement before Finland.

The UPC Agreement creates a court system that will eventually have exclusive jurisdiction in respect of European patents and unitary patents (European patents with unitary effect).

The agreement’s entry into force is conditioned on ratification by 13 signatory states, mandatorily including France, Germany and the United Kingdom.

21 January 2016