Arrow declaration

In UK patent litigation, an Arrow declaration is a declaration or order sought, for reasons of legal certainty, from a court that a product (or process) to be launched was old (i.e., not novel) or obvious in patent law terms at a particular date, so that the product (or process) cannot be affected by (i.e., cannot infringe) any later granted patent, which would itself necessarily also either lack novelty or inventive step.{{cite journal |last1=Brazell |first1=Lorna |title=Pre-emptive product patentability declarations |journal=Pharmaceutical Patent Analyst |date=1 September 2017 |volume=6 |issue=5 |pages=197–200 |doi=10.4155/ppa-2017-0023 |pmid=28818023 |issn=2046-8954|doi-access=free }}{{cite journal |last1=Adair |first1=Dominic |title=Arrow declarations: here to stay or a flash in the pan? |journal=Pharmaceutical Patent Analyst |date=1 July 2018 |volume=7 |issue=4 |pages=133–136 |doi=10.4155/ppa-2018-0009 |pmid=29882713 |s2cid=46983781 |url=https://www.future-science.com/doi/abs/10.4155/ppa-2018-0009 |issn=2046-8954|url-access=subscription }}{{cite journal |last1=England |first1=Paul |title=Arrow declarations: a creative new remedy, but what are its limits? |journal=Pharmaceutical Patent Analyst |date=November 2019 |volume=8 |issue=6 |pages=217–219 |doi=10.4155/ppa-2019-0024|pmid=31718455 |s2cid=207963034 }}{{cite journal |last1=Gilbert |first1=Penny |last2=Kendall-Windless |first2=Carissa |last3=Rowlatt |first3=Benjamin |title=Will Arrow Relief Take Flight? |journal=Managing Intellectual Property |date=2020 |volume=286 |pages=45 |url=https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/manintpr286&div=15}} The order is named after Arrow Generics Ltd. v Merck & Co Inc [2007] EWHC 1900 (Pat), in which it was originally suggested that this mechanism would be available as a declaratory relief.{{cite journal |last1=Daniels |first1=Mark |last2=Parsons |first2=Giles |title=Patents Court grants declarations that dosage regimens were obvious |journal=Journal of Intellectual Property Law & Practice |date=1 August 2017 |volume=12 |issue=8 |pages=624–626 |doi=10.1093/jiplp/jpx112 |url=https://academic.oup.com/jiplp/article-abstract/12/8/624/4079509 |issn=1747-1532|url-access=subscription }} Such a declaration was granted for the first time in Fujifilm Kyowa Kirin Biologics Company Ltd v Abbvie Biotechnology Ltd [2017] EWHC 395 (Pat), Patents Court, England, 3 March 2017.

The defense is similar to a so-called "Gillette defense", i.e. "the argument in infringement proceedings (...) that the defendant's product implements prior art technology, such that any patent which it infringes must be invalid."