SINGAPORE Law and Practice Contributed by: Tony Yeo, Meryl Koh, Rozalynne Asmali and Javier Yeo, Drew & Napier LLC
appeal is granted by the court, the party has to file and serve on all parties who have an interest in the appeal a Notice of Appeal within 14 days after the date of the decision granting permis - sion. If the matter involves patents, the appel - late court hearing the appeal will be the Court of Appeal. The appeal will be heard by way of a rehearing. The matter will not be heard de novo. There is no further right of appeal after the Court of Appeal. If the preliminary injunction is overturned on appeal, the preliminary injunction is lifted imme - diately from the date of the order. For the substantive suit, the parties have a right of appeal to the Court of Appeal. Appeals to the Court of Appeal are by way of a rehear - ing. The parties are entitled to appeal on all issues, including findings of facts. When filing the appeal, the party must therefore indicate whether it is appealing against the whole or part of the judgment or order. If the matter is bifurcated into two tranches on issues of validity and infringement, the parties will have a right to appeal the trial judge’s deci - sion in each of these tranches. Procedurally, the matter will not move to the second tranche (assuming the patent is found to be valid) until the issues in the first tranche have been com - pletely disposed of, including the exhaustion of any appeals. In general, the appellate court will be slow to upset an exercise of discretion by the trial judge. In relation to finding of facts, the appellate court is also generally slow to overturn a trial judge’s findings because the trial judge is in a better position to assess the veracity and credibility of the witnesses, unless they can be shown to be
plainly wrong or against the weight of the evi - dence. Similarly, in relation to patent matters, the appellate court will be cautious in differing from the trial judge’s evaluation of what was obvious. On the other hand, there is a distinction between the perception of facts and evaluation of facts, the latter of which the appellate court is in as good a position as the trial court to make an evaluation from primary facts. If a final injunction is overturned, or if the pat - ent is revoked, the final injunction will be lifted immediately from the date of the order. For completeness, the Court of Appeal will usually include in its orders that all orders by the trial judge (including the order for the final injunc - tion) are set aside, if the appellant is successful on appeal. 7.2 Appeal Court(s) Arbiter Singapore has specialised Intellectual Property Judges who will be docketed to hear patent mat - ters. 7.3 Special Provisions The substantive act that governs patents in Sin - gapore would be the Patents Act. There are two sets of court rules that govern IP matters. The first set of rules will be the ROC 2021, which applies to all court proceedings regardless of subject matter. The second set of rules will be the IP Rules, which applies in addition to the ROC 2021, for matters involving IP.
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