Rule 235 – Statement of response

1. Within three months of service of the Statement of grounds of appeal pursuant to Rule 224.2(a), any other party to proceedings before the Court of First Instance (hereinafter "respondent") may lodge a Statement of response, which shall be served on the appellant.

2. Within 15 days of service of grounds of appeal pursuant to Rule 224.2(b), any other party to proceedings before the Court of First Instance (hereinafter "respondent") may lodge a Statement of response, which shall be served on the appellant.

3. If the respondent fails to lodge a Statement of response, the Court of Appeal may give a reasoned decision.

Case Law

IPPT20260121, UPC CoA, Valeo v Bosch
Respondents invited to submit within seven days comments on the admissibility of an appeal on the basis of R. 220.2 RoP  of an order allowing a Preliminary Objection (R. 21 RoP, R. 220 RoP, Article 73 UPCA). Time limit filing Statement of response suspended (R. 235 RoP)

IPPT20250812, UPC CoA, Lionra v Cisco
Undisputed extension for submission Statement of response as Cisco did not have access to the unredacted version of the appeal when it filed its statement of appeal (R. 262A RoP, R. 235 RoP). Extension limited to only two weeks since the information concerned is a relatively small portion of the grounds of appeal.

IPPT20250505, UPC CoA, Meril v SWAT
Due to inadmissible self-representation, the formal requirements for lodging a Statement of response have not been met (R. 235 RoP). A party not being allowed to represent himself or a co-applicant has to instruct an authorised representative and it is not  appropriate for him to lodge an application to change of representative pursuant to R. 293 RoP. Respondents failed to lodge a Statement of response as the submitted Statement of response is not signed by the stated new representative. Reasoned decision (R. 235.3 RoP) or default decision (R. 357.1 RoP): it is the discretion of the Court of Appeal to give a reasoned decision or a default decision. A reasoned decision (R. 235.3 RoP) is a lex specialis of the default decision (R. 357.1 RoP). This means that the remedy of R. 356.1 RoP – an application to set aside that decision within one month of service of the decision by a party against whom a decision by default has been given – applies mutatis mutandis to reasoned decisions. 

IPPT20250324, UPC CoA, Amazon v Nokia
Request for opportunity to comment on Statement of response denied. The written procedure before the Court of Appeal is limited to the submission of a statement of grounds of appeal by the appellant and a statement of response by the respondent. It is fundamentally inconsistent with the written procedure to give Amazon the opportunity to submit a written statement merely a few days before the oral hearing in order to counter the respondent Nokia’s legal arguments, as the oral hearing is specifically intended to serve that purpose. 

IPPT20241009, UPC CoA, Eoflow v Insulet
Request for expedition of the appeal admissible but unfounded (R. 9.3(b) RoP, R. 235 RoP). EOFlow has not sufficiently substantiated, and the Court of Appeal fails to see, why it was necessary for EOFlow to await the decision of the Central Division on Menarini’s request for intervention, before filing the present request. By nevertheless doing so and taking ten days to file its Statement of appeal and grounds of appeal and this request, an order of the Court of Appeal would only be possible prior to the aforementioned oral hearings if Insulet would be given substantially less time for filing its response. The Court of Appeal is of the opinion that EOFlow has thus by filing its request at an unnecessary late point of time, insufficiently taken into account the interests of Insulet.

IPPT20240730, UPC CoA, Alexion Pharmaceuticals v Samsung Bioepsis
No expedition of the appeal (Rule 9(3) RoP, Rule 220(1) RoP)(Rule 235 RoP) Due account must be given to the principles of due process, among which equality of arms. The Court of Appeal does not consider that the circumstances of the present case are so urgent that the interests of the appellant outweigh those of the respondent. The appellant’s arguments that it is seeking patent protection as soon as possible and that the appeal concerns a purely legal issue, are not sufficient to shorten the time limit for lodging the statement of response. This time period is already relatively short for appeals against orders referred to in R. 220.1(c) RoP, such as the present appeal, namely only 15 days. The fact that the appellant did not make use of the entire time period within which it could have lodged its statement of grounds of appeal, does not lead to a different assessment.

IPPT20240726, UPC CoA, Abbott v Sibio
Allowability of auxiliary requests to be argued and decided at the oral hearing (Rule 263 RoP). In view thereof, time extension for Statement of response reasonable, also taking into account the summer holiday period (Rule 9 RoP, Rule 235 RoP).

IPPT20240711, UPC CoA, Apple v Ona
Motion to expedite appeal denied (Rule 9(3)(b) RoP, Rule 235(2) RoP). No particular interest shown by Apple. Having regard to Ona's interests and the principles of proportionality, fairness and equity, and taking into account the above reasons and the time Apple has taken to file its statement of grounds of appeal - which is significantly longer than the time Ona is to be given to file its Statement of response - the Court of Appeal is unable to see any reason for shortening the time limit for Ona to file its statement of defence as requested by Apple.

IPPT20240707, UPC CoA, ARM v ICPillar
Deadline extension and confidentiality club Time period for lodging Statement of response extended with 15 days after unredacted version of Exhibit 4 has been made available to ARM’s representatives (Rule 9 RoP, Rule 262A RoP, Rule 235).