Resource Library

Canada is an attractive market for pharmaceutical manufacturers. Most Canadian consumers have some form of drug coverage through government programs and/or private insurance. Below are ten patent and regulatory topics that in-house counsel need to know before bringing an innovative product to Canada.

Editor's note: This article was updated to reflect recent developments; the original version of this article was published on December 16, 2020.

The September 2017 amendments to the Patented Medicines (Notice of Compliance) Regulations introduced a new scheme for pharmaceutical patent linkage litigation in Canada. That scheme is now much closer to the United States' (US) Hatch-Waxman scheme, but with remaining key differences that are explained in this chart.

Amendments to the Canadian Patent Act and enactment of the Certificate of Supplementary Protection Regulations flowing from the Canada-European Union (EU) Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement introduced a new framework in Canada for the issuance of Certificates of Supplementary Protection (CSPs).

This chart compare key aspects of the two regimes, Canada's and the EU's.

This is a sample assignment of trademark where the Assignor is the owner of or has rights in certain trademarks, including all common law rights, and Assignor wishes to convey all of its right, title and interest in and to the Trademarks to Assignee.

This is a sample employment, confidential information and invention assignment agreement, under which a new employee assigns the right, title, and interest in and to inventions and other intellectual property items that the employee may conceive, develop or reduce to practice during the employment period. 

This is a sample employee intellectual property assignment and confidentiality agreement, under which an employee, among other covenants, assigns to the company intellectual property such as designs, inventions, improvements, technical information, know-how, technology and suggestions relating in any way to the products or services of the company, which the employee conceives, develops, or contributes to or acquire during the employment period.

In this multi-country guide, learn the rules for the protection of trade secrets in a wide range of jurisdictions.

A sample policy for directing employees, customers and partners in proper trademark usage.

These template website terms of use are intended for use on non-transactional, information-based websites. The terms of use are not intended for use on websites through which users can place orders for or buy goods, services or digital products. If the website permits User Generated Content (UGC), then additional "acceptable use" terms will be needed, for example, a user's undertaking that he/she will not post UGC that is defamatory, infringing or illegal, and details of the website operator's notice-and-take-action procedures.

Sharing sensitive data with ChatGPT for work, such as source code and meeting minutes, may be labeled a “data leak” due to fears that ChatGPT can disclose the data to the public once it is trained on the data. In response, many companies took action, such as banning or restricting access, or creating ChatGPT data disclosure policies. This resource from Seyfarth and Shaw discusses the implications of ChatGPT on trade secrets, disclosures, and provides key takeaways to consider with AI tools.