UsedSoft v Oracle: the ECJ quietly reveals a new European property right in “bits & bytes”

With its judgment of 3 July 2012 in UsedSoft v Oracle the Court of Justice of the European Union (“ECJ”) made it clear that exhaustion of intellectual property rights also applies to the sale of intangible goods like a copy of a computer program. However, to achieve the end of the free movement of intangible goods, the Court had to come up with an inventive means: an autonomous European property right in “bits & bytes”.