Pharmaceutical Law Insight
The EU Biotech Directive – legislation for disharmony?
Nina White of Boult Wade Tennant discusses major divergences in practice in gene and stem cell patenting.
Seven years have passed since Directive 98/44/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on the Legal Protection of
Biotechnological Inventions (the Biotech Directive) came into force. The Directive was introduced to harmonise the laws of
the EU with regard to what is and is not patentable in the biotechnology field. As will be seen, seven years on we are perhaps
further than ever from the intended goal of harmonisation.