The U.K.'s exit from a proposed EU-wide patent court could muddy multinational drug manufacturers’ already tenuous outlook on the plan.
The Unified Patent Court was supposed to be a single forum for patent disputes across most European Union member nations. Great Britain threw the plan for a loop when the country said it wouldn’t participate in the project after its formal departure from the EU.
London was set to host the court’s branch that would hear pharmaceutical and life sciences cases. With the U.K. out, drugmakers and other companies in patent disputes face logistical, legal and strategic uncertainties. Those include ...