header-logo header-logo

Confidentiality too far?

01 June 2018 / Dr Chris Pamplin
Issue: 7795 / Categories: Features , Expert Witness , Profession
printer mail-detail
nlj_7795_pamplin

Chris Pamplin considers the question of expert confidentiality & trade secrets

  • An illustration of the heavy weight of confidentiality that experts often carry, particularly in cases involving subject matter of a commercially sensitive nature.

When litigation involves sensitive commercial information it poses particular problems with expert confidentiality. On occasion, the court and parties might consider that the expert’s standard obligations and duties are insufficient.

Such a situation may arise in cases dealing with experimental processes and patents, particularly the experiments carried out in the ‘work-up’ to the final outcome.

In Mayne Pharma Limited & Another v Debiopharm SA & Another [2006] EWHC 164 (Pat), the claimants sought to invalidate four patents relating to a drug used in the treatment of colorectal cancer. The claimants alleged that one of the patents (which defined a method of preparing the compound under conditions within a specified pH range) was anticipated by a piece of prior art. The claimants filed a notice of the prior art and a notice of experiments they themselves had carried

If you are not a subscriber, subscribe now to read this content
If you are already a subscriber sign in
...or Register for two weeks' free access to subscriber content

MOVERS & SHAKERS

DWF—19 appointments

DWF—19 appointments

Belfast team bolstered by three senior hires and 16 further appointments

Cadwalader—Andro Atlaga

Cadwalader—Andro Atlaga

Firm strengthens leveraged finance team with London partner hire

Knights—Ella Dodgson & Rebecca Laffan

Knights—Ella Dodgson & Rebecca Laffan

Double hire marks launch of family team in Leeds

NEWS
Artificial intelligence may be revolutionising the law, but its misuse could wreck cases and careers, warns Clare Arthurs of Penningtons Manches Cooper in this week's NLJ
Small law firms want to embrace technology but feel lost in a maze of jargon, costs and compliance fears, writes Aisling O’Connell of the Solicitors Regulation Authority in this week's NLJ
The Supreme Court issued a landmark judgment in July that overturned the convictions of Tom Hayes and Carlo Palombo, once poster boys of the Libor and Euribor scandal. In NLJ this week, Neil Swift of Peters & Peters considers what the ruling means for financial law enforcement
Charles Pigott of Mills & Reeve reports on Haynes v Thomson, the first judicial application of the Supreme Court’s For Women Scotland ruling in a discrimination claim, in this week's NLJ
Bea Rossetto of the National Pro Bono Centre makes the case for ‘General Practice Pro Bono’—using core legal skills to deliver life-changing support, without the need for niche expertise—in this week's NLJ
back-to-top-scroll