Inadmissibility of late incidental appeal in PI proceedings

25 Jan 2026

Court of Venice, 18 September 2025

With this order, the Court of Venice coherently joins the lively jurisprudential and doctrinal debate regarding the admissibility of the late incidental appeal in uniform PI proceedings. The Court confirms the rigorous and restrictive stance that characterizes, in particular, the rulings of IP Courts, which are called upon to balance the right of defence with the requirement of speed and the summary nature typical of this type of protection.
The decision of the Court of Venice- sharing the arguments of the respondent – has indeed reaffirmed the mandatory nature of the peremptory deadlines established by Art. 669-terdecies of the Italian Code of Civil Procedure (c.p.c.) and the impossibility of remedying one’s own procedural inertia by exploiting the initiative of other parties.

In the case at hand, the Panel – after having reclassified the appellee’s appearance brief, formally presented as a “statement of defence”, as a true and proper appeal because it contained specific and autonomous grievances and requests for the revocation of the first instance ruling – ascertained the untimeliness of the filing. Thus, it reiterated the inapplicability by analogy of the general rules on appeals (Arts. 333–335 c.p.c.) to urgent proceedings.

This exclusion is based on the provisional and instrumental nature of urgent relief, incompatible with the rationale of the late incidental appeal – a mechanism conceived solely for rulings destined to become final. Thus, the interest in appealing in PI proceedings must be exercised on time and with an autonomous appeal; any acquiescence (i.e.by letting the deadline to appeal expire), permanently eliminates the right to appeal, which cannot revive merely because another party has proposed a principal appeal.

Maria Vittoria Cardin