Patent – Infringement. The Patents Court considered the practical effect of the costs sanction in s 68 of the Patents Act 1977 where both patentee (L'Oréal Société Anonyme) and exclusive licensee (L'oréal (UK) Ltd) had been successful claimants in a patent and registered design infringement claim, and where the exclusive licence had not been registered within a six-month period. The court considered that, in circumstances where the claimants were parent and subsidiary companies in the L'oréal group and where, if the patentee could recover all of the costs of the infringement action, in circumstances where s 68 required the exclusive licensee to be deprived of certain costs, that section would have no bite. Accordingly, the court held that, as a matter of discretion, both claimants should be deprived of a proportion of their costs.