On 27 May 2016 the European Council approved the text of the Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on the protection of undisclosed know-how and business information (trade secrets) against their unlawful acquisition, use and disclosure (the “Trade Secrets Directive”). This followed a vote to adopt the legislation by the European Parliament on 14 April 2016. It now remains for the Member States to implement the Directive into their national laws.
The Trade Secrets Directive arises from the Commission’s Europe 2020 strategy, in which the Commission undertook to create an “Innovation Union” to: “[e]ncourage higher levels of investment in R&D by the private sector, through more extensive, including cross-border, collaboration in R&D and technological developments between universities and industry, open innovation and allowing for improved valuation of intellectual property (IP) such that access to venture capital and financing is enhanced for research-oriented and innovative economic agents.”
In particular, the Trade Secrets Directive aims to achieve uniformity by adopting:
common definition of ‘trade secrets’ and of the circumstances in which the acquisition, use and disclosure of a trade secret is unlawful;
measures, procedures and remedies that should be made available to the holder of a trade secret in the event of its unlawful acquisition, use or disclosure;
sanctions in the event of non-compliance with the measures provided and provisions on monitoring and reporting.
The text of the Directive is available here.
News Source: Taylor Wessing