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Article 386: Without prejudice to the payment of damages, the temporary or final injunctions
covered by Article 405 may not be issued in the following cases:
1. after expiration of a four-year period starting from the date of filing of the
patent application or three years starting from the date of grant of the patent,
the applicant or the person with his consent fails to exploit the invention in a
manner making it possible to meet market demand in terms of quantity, or has
not begun serious preparations to this effect or do not actually intend to
commence such exploitation; this period shall not apply if the invention is
exploited in a manner that does not meet market demand in terms of quality;
2. the injunction causes serious harm to the public interest;
3. the patented goods or the goods manufactured according to a patented process
are sold by the applicant or by a third party with the applicant’s consent at a
price deemed excessive in view of consumers’ average purchasing power and
the special nature of the need which the goods must meet, if there is no
competing product on the market;
4. the patent was obtained in violation of the provisions of Articles 19 and 20;
should this be the case, the court shall reject the appeal; after verifying
compliance with Articles 19 and 20, the patent holder may at any time
institute proceedings for infringement of the patent or utility model; however,
he may not be granted any corrective measures for an act performed by a
third party before being in compliance with said Articles.
Article 387: The rights attached to a patent concerning a pharmaceutical process shall not be
binding on third parties before January 1, 2016 if other processes for
manufacturing pharmaceutical products which are not subject to exclusive rights
are not available, as a result of which these patents, if they were binding, would
indirectly lead to commercial exclusivity for the pharmaceutical products in
question.
Section 2: Infringement of marks, collective marks or certification signs and corrective
measures
Article 388: Subject to Article 313, any act covered by Article 311 which has been
committed in Burundi by a person other than the owner of the market without
the owner’s consent shall constitute an infringement of a registered mark, a
registered collective mark, a registered certification sign or a well known
unregistered mark.
Article 389: Any use of a sign which is identical to a well known mark or similar to such an
extent that it creates confusion with a well known mark without the consent of
the owner of said mark shall constitute an infringement of a registered well
known mark, provided that the sign is used for:
- goods or services which are identical or similar to goods or services for which
the well known mark has been registered;