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Tag: nicoventures

  • PMI Retains European Vape Patent

    PMI Retains European Vape Patent

    European patent officials tossed a challenge from a British American Tobacco subsidiary allowing Philip Morris to retain its patent for a type of power supply for electronic vapes.

    The patent from PMI primarily describes a power supply system for an e-vaping device, including a sensor and a sensor holder designed to regulate airflow and house a power source. Nicoventures claimed the patent was not new because it used similar features in three older patents for its “Vuse Solo.” The BAT side argued that there were several features in the older patents that effectively served as sensor holders similar to the PMI design.

    In a Feb. 20 decision that was published yesterday (March 5), the appellate board at the European Patent Office upheld an earlier decision dismissing Nicoventures’ opposition because Philip Morris’ power supply design contains a unique structure.

    “The board concurs with the respondent’s arguments [that] the structure of the e-vaping device in [the older inventions] and the patent are not identical,” the Technical Board of Appeal said.

    PMI further argued that Nicoventures failed to prove that Vuse Solo “was available to the public before it filed its own patent application, therefore Nicoventures cannot argue that its design is not new,” Law360 wrote.

  • HTPs: EU Rulemaking Challenged in Court

    HTPs: EU Rulemaking Challenged in Court

    Photo: nmann77

    The European Commission will face a legal challenge over its attempt to restrict the sale of heated tobacco products (HTPs).

    On Nov. 3, 2022, the European Union published a directive banning flavored HTPs throughout the union. The ban, which covers all flavors except tobacco, officially took effect Nov. 23, 2022. EU member states were given until July 23, 2023, to transpose the rule into national legislation.

    When the Ireland did so, it was challenged in the Irish High Court by PJ Carroll & Co. and Nicoventures Trading. The nicotine companies argued that the European Commission had exceeded the powers delegated to it under tobacco products legislation approved by the European Council and the European Parliament. According to them, the Commission made its decision based on political grounds rather than legal grounds.

    In his judgment, Irish High Court Justice Cian Ferriter noted that the Commission had effectively prohibited “a category of tobacco product which was new on the market, which had not been in existence at the time of the enactment of the Tobacco Products Directive in 2014 and which had not been the subject of separate policy and health assessments…”.

    “It is at least arguable that this involved a political choice which was only open to the EU legislature and not to the Commission,” Ferriter said.

    According to Eureporter, the Dublin court will now refer the case to the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg.

    The nicotine companies and the Irish High Court are not the first to raise concerns about regulatory overreach. When the Commission adopted its directive in 2022, four EU member states objected that the directive involved “essential elements reserved for the European legislators.”