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LEGAL REPORT/Intellectual Property "This is actually a huge area and involves lots of companies and the entire oil and gas sector transcends all technological areas so I think it's a lot bigger than people think it is." Philip Mendes da Costa, Bereskin & Parr LLP against leakage and loss of oil at the surface of a producing oil well. Weatherford sued Corlac, alleging the enviro stuffing box infringed its patent. "Both cases involved oil and gas service companies, which underlines the concept that patenting is particularly important for oil and gas companies," says Sajewycz. While historically the oil and gas sector has not been as competitive as the highly litigious brand name/generic pharmaceutical industry, all that is changing as the race to lock down technology in the sector starts to speed up. In fact more recently, extraction technologies (e.g. horizontal drilling, fracking) have been further developed to the point hard-to-reach oil and gas resources are now becoming more economical to extract. This has resulted in an increase in available oil and gas supplies in the marketplace. "Sooner or later, oil sands producers may feel competitive pressures, and this will incent them to develop improved processing/upgrading technologies Insight & Perspective We bring new meaning to ip. Insight and perspective. Two of the key benefits that accrue with experience. The lawyers at Dimock Stratton are among the most experienced in Canada when it comes to intellectual property litigation and, as a result, rank among the most successful and effective. If you're looking for winning ip representation, look no further than Dimock Stratton. Click on read about our rankings and recognition from our firm profile page at dimock.com to find out more. Dimock Stratton llp experience. results. 20 Queen W. 32nd fl, Toronto | 416.971.7202 | dimock.com 40 ntitled-1 1 J u ly 2013 www.CANADIAN so as to reduce production costs, so we may see an uptick in future patenting activity by oil sands producers," says Sajewycz. An analysis by The Globe and Mail in 2011 examined patent filings by 10 energy companies — including Suncor, Imperial Oil, Nexen, Calfrac, and Laricina Energy Ltd. — and found those companies applied for 2.5 times more patents between 2005 and 2010 than between 2000 and 2004. "This is actually a huge area and involves lots of companies and the entire oil and gas sector transcends all technological areas so I think it's a lot bigger than people think it is," says Philip Mendes da Costa, managing partner of IP firm Bereskin & Parr LLP. "I think technology is going in at all levels so at the end of the day the more oil you can extract per unit you treat, the higher the profits." The large oil and gas companies have historically resisted suing each other for the most part — it's generally not in their best interest to spend a lot of time and money fighting over technology — because as long as they have access to the technology, they've been happy. But that is changing. "I would say these days the temperature is rising in the oil sands and, especially if you're a service providing company, the patent route is the only practical way to go. Trade secrets are not really practical in this current environment," says Michael Crinson, a partner and patent and trademark agent with Dimock Stratton LLP. "Trade secrets in my mind right now are limited in application to a producer and only to the small steps they make in their own extraction processes. Anything other than that — whether it's producers or supplier innovation — I think patent protection is the only way to go, otherwise you're just rolling the dice." When talking hot technologies in oil and gas, says Crinson, it's not just the technology to extract material from the ground but also technologies for environmental remediation related to the extraction or green technologies in relation to the oil sands that is getting attention worldwide. "There's been political pressure or social pressure that has significantly increased over the last several years and that accounts for a lot of the motivation perhaps to try and protect these new technologies on that side more so than on the extraction and capitalization side," he says. Some of the service providers in the industry are made up of four or five engineers who have formed a company and provide a specialized service to the larger oil companies. In the past, they've used trade secrets to protect their innovation — that way they don't have to publicize their technology and the larger companies can't take it and copy it. That is changing as they see the value in having a solid patent, especially where licensing opportunities exist. James Baker, a partner and registered patent agent with Gowling Lafleur Henderson LLP in Ottawa, says he expects to see L a w ye r m a g . c o m 13-06-04 2:25 PM

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