Sar & Partners is reporting that, in the nearly two-decade long patent dispute with Adidas in Hungary, the country's Supreme Court has now ruled, on appeal, that the lower court's ruling regarding the amount of unjust enrichment to be returned to firm client Laszlo Oroszi — the developer of Adidas's Predator Precision and Predator Mania football shoes, who patented the ribbed top of the shoes in 1996 — should stand, although the specific reasoning for the award was incorrect.
Oroszi brought an action against Adidas Budapest Ltd. in 2002, seeking a declaration of patent infringement and other measures. In its decision of November 8, 2016, the Metropolitan Court of Appeal of Hungary obliged Adidas Budapest Ltd. to return four times the amount of its enrichment plus interest since March 23, 2002 to Oroszi (as reported by CEE Legal Matters on November 25, 2016). The Metropolitan Court of Appeal based its decision on the assumption that the football shoes were entirely protected by the patent, and thus that Adidas was obliged to return the entire amount of its enrichment. According to a Sar & Partners spokesman, the Supreme Court, however, in its recent ruling, held that the patent did not protect the entire shoe, but nonetheless that because "the invention had such a large significance, both in functionality and economically ... it entirely covered the amount of enrichment achieved in sales." According to Sar & Partners, "consequently the [Supreme Court] found no reason to decrease the amount to be returned as enrichment but this time the reason for it was the 100% cover ratio of the invention."
Oroszi was represented by both Sar & Partners and the Danubia Patent and Law Office.
