Sui Generis Database Protection 2.0: Judicial and Legislative Reforms

Abstract

The Database Directive’s sui generis database protection is a unique policy experiment by the EU legislature carried out in the nineties. It aimed to incentivize investment in the making and improvement of databases in order to develop an EU information market. Since the two decades of its operation on the ground have not offered the most encouraging results, the European Commission is keen on reforming the tool within the context of its Data Act. Coincidentally, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has recently issued a seminal judgment, CV Online Latvia v Melons, that also alters the trajectory of the protection. This article looks at various criticisms of the protection, the way they were addressed by the CJEU, and what can be done by the European Commission in its upcoming reform efforts. The article, therefore, offers a glimpse into the next generation of sui generis database protection.