When a distributor is sued over your product: what it costs to be wrong
When a distributor is sued for patent infringement over a product you supplied, the claim usually names the distributor because it is the visible seller. Your supply agreement determines who pays for defence and damages. The forum, the deadline, and the evidence needed depend on the type of patent asserted.
Basis
The forum depends on the type of patent asserted. A European patent with unitary effect falls under Regulation (EU) No 1257/2012.
The translation regime for that unitary patent is set by Council Regulation (EU) No 1260/2012.
Both unitary and classical European patents, in states that ratified it, come before the Unified Patent Court under the Agreement on a Unified Patent Court.
If goods were stopped at an EU external border, the detention itself is governed by Regulation (EU) No 608/2013. That regulation decides the hold, not the infringement.
| Patent type | Forum | Governing instrument |
|---|---|---|
| European patent with unitary effect | Unified Patent Court | Regulation (EU) No 1257/2012 |
| Classical European patent, contracting state | Unified Patent Court, unless opted out | Agreement on a Unified Patent Court |
| National patent only | National civil court | Not covered by the instruments above |
| Goods detained at an EU external border | Customs authority, detention stage only | Regulation (EU) No 608/2013 |
What changes in deadlines and risk
A distributor served with a claim faces its own procedural clock, separate from your clock as supplier. Your indemnity obligation, if the supply agreement contains one, starts running from notice, not from judgment.
Legal costs at the Unified Patent Court are awarded to the winning party under rules the Court itself sets. The exact scale is not fixed by the instruments listed here.
Waiting to see how the case develops narrows your options rather than preserving them. A supplier who stays silent for weeks often loses the chance to control the defence strategy.
What to do
- Legal counsel retrieves the claim and any customs or court documents named in it, and confirms the forum.
- The contracts team pulls the supply agreement and checks the indemnity and defence-cost clause.
- Technical staff assemble the product's design history to support a non-infringement or invalidity position.
- Management notifies the distributor, in writing, of your position on defence and cost-sharing.
- Counsel confirms whether the asserted patent is unitary, classical European, or national, using the table above.
- If goods sit with customs under Regulation (EU) No 608/2013, counsel responds within the procedure that regulation sets, before the detention lapses.
Who decides
The Unified Patent Court decides, under the Agreement on a Unified Patent Court, if the patent is unitary or classical European and the case falls within its competence.
A national civil court decides for a national patent, or where competence has not shifted to the Unified Patent Court.
Customs decides only whether to maintain or release a detained shipment under Regulation (EU) No 608/2013. The infringement question moves to the competent court either way.
If your situation differs
- If the patent is a European patent with unitary effect, the case sits with the Unified Patent Court, and the translation regime under Council Regulation (EU) No 1260/2012 applies to the proceedings.
- If the distributor opted the classical European patent out of the Unified Patent Court's jurisdiction before the claim, a national court decides instead.
- If the dispute started with a customs stop, the detention under Regulation (EU) No 608/2013 runs in parallel with the substantive claim, not instead of it.
Provenance across asset types
A distributor's exposure over a physical product is one version of a wider problem: showing where a right came from.
The same absence of a clean origin recurs elsewhere. When the training corpus has no provenance explained, the model owner sits where your distributor sits now.
When the creator disputes the mint explained, the platform holding the tokenised right faces an identical question: who guarantees the chain back to the original creator.
In each case, the party facing the claim is rarely the one who created the underlying gap. The cost of being wrong still lands on whoever is named first.
What this page does not cover
This page sets out forum and procedure. It does not draft your indemnity clause, and it does not value the claim.
This page does not check whether the distributor itself can pay. Counterparty report before extending credit and the deadline it runs on belong to a separate check, before you extend further credit or supply.
If you are named in a report overview and want to know what personal-data rights apply to that mention, the data subject rights page covers the request channel.
Related situations
A related question arises before infringement even starts: When the same invention is granted to someone else covers what happens when the patent office itself creates the conflict.
Verified
Checked on 10 March 2025 against primary sources: Regulation (EU) No 608/2013; Regulation (EU) No 1257/2012; Council Regulation (EU) No 1260/2012; Agreement on a Unified Patent Court.
FAQ
What is the first step when a distributor is sued over your product?
Retrieve the claim and the supply agreement together, then confirm the forum named in the claim before any other step.
Which deadline is already running?
The clock the forum sets starts from service or from customs notification, whichever applies. Its length is fixed by that forum, not by this page.
Who decides, and on what evidence?
The Unified Patent Court or the national court decides, on technical evidence of the product and the patent's claims. Customs decides only the hold, under Regulation (EU) No 608/2013.