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Würtenberger, Gert --- "Parallel imports within the European Union" [2017] ELECD 826; in Matthews, Duncan; Zech, Herbert (eds), "Research Handbook on Intellectual Property and the Life Sciences" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2017) 439

Book Title: Research Handbook on Intellectual Property and the Life Sciences

Editor(s): Matthews, Duncan; Zech, Herbert

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781783479443

Section: Chapter 25

Section Title: Parallel imports within the European Union

Author(s): Würtenberger, Gert

Number of pages: 12

Abstract/Description:

Trade in goods sold outside established distribution channels is often forged by the producer of the goods to safeguard the advantage of achieving different prices in different markets. This is a worldwide phenomenon and an opportunistic exercisewhich causes traders to take advantage of price differences for the same goods in various countries. While such trade supports the consumers’ interest to obtain a certain product for the best price, it may undermine the producer’s interest to obtain the best profit for their product from country to country. Moreover, another legitimate interest of producers may be to maintain a certain prestige of products, which, in most cases, inevitably requires a high price level in relation to the average buying power of the consumers. Goods which have been produced and put on a certain market by the rights holder, or which were put there with his consent by third parties and subsequently imported into another territory, for which they were not intended, are called parallel imported goods, or grey market goods.