JUST KEEP CALM & CARRY ON: THE IMPACT OF BREXIT ON INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY LAWS IN BRITAIN AND THE EUROPEAN UNION.

Abstract

Britain’s decision to “Brexit” from the European Union (“EU”) has generated great uncertainty about what will happen to existing and future intellectual property laws and interests. This Article examines the effects that Brexit seems likely to have upon copyright, patent, trademark and design law in Britain and the EU. It outlines the current frameworks in operation in each of these areas, and discusses how these might be developed in response to Britain’s departure from the EU. Brexit’s prospective impacts on plant variety rights, geographical indications, semiconductor topographies, trade secrets, and intellectual property practice issues in the EU and Britain are also considered. The Article concludes that, from an intellectual property perspective, the economic interests of both Britain and the rest of the EU are likely to be best served in the mid- to longer-term by taking a “soft Brexit” approach to intellectual property laws. Avoiding rhetorical posturing or retaliation for perceived slights seems, ultimately, likely to produce the best intellectual property-related consequences for both parties. Britain and the EU both stand to damage their commercial environments if their intellectual property arrangements are dramatically altered as a result of Brexit. By contrast, if Britain maintains many existing single market arrangements with respect to intellectual property law – even at the cost of reducing the policy-making freedom that it would enjoy under a “hard(er) Brexit” – the result may be mutually beneficial interdependence. This would arguably produce the best commercial outcomes for the EU and Britain alike.