The UPC is composed of a Court of First Instance and a Court of Appeal. The Court of First Instance has a central division and a number of local and regional divisions. The central division will be seated in Paris with a section in Munich, while a section is being opened in Milan presumably in late June 2024.
The cases of the central division are allocated between the sections as follows: The Milan section will deal with cases concerning human necessities (medicine) as well as chemistry and metallurgy. However, the Milan section will not deal with cases about supplementary protection certificates, as the Paris section will deal with these cases instead. The Munich section deals with cases concerning mechanical engineering, lighting, heating, weapons, and blasting, as well as some cases on pharmaceutical patents, and the Paris section deals with the rest of the cases – e.g. cases concerning fixed constructions. The central division in Paris will also deal with the cases that are supposed to go to the Milan section until this section is up and running.
Local divisions will be set up in a member state on request. If more than 100 patent actions have been brought in a member state per year, it may request an additional local division for each one hundred such actions, subject to a maximum of four divisions.
Two or more member states may join forces to set up a regional division. At present, only Sweden and the Baltic countries have set up a regional division. Denmark has set up a local division.
The Court of Appeal is seated in Luxembourg.
The proceedings before the UPC will be presided over by three legally qualified judges. All panels will be multinational, and there will thus be no all-Danish bench in the Danish division.
As a general rule, only one judge from the country where the local division is established may participate. If so requested by the parties, a technically qualified judge may be allocated to the case. In revocation actions, a technically qualified judge will always participate. In the Court of Appeal, there will be three legally qualified judges and two technically qualified judges.
The UPC has the legal status of an international organisation, but in the individual countries it will have the status of an ordinary legal person, see article 4 of the UPC Agreement. However, the UPC will benefit from certain privileges and immunities. The UPC's budget is financed by court fees and member state contributions, see article 36 of the UPC Agreement.