Questão jurídica principal
Whether the annual license fee due under the 1909 agreement is a periodic claim subject to the five-year limitation period of Art. 128(1) OR
Decisão extraída
Yes. The yearly license fee is a periodically recurring performance based on the same debt ground and is therefore subject to the five-year limitation period.
Fundamentação extraída
The court agreed with the cantonal instances that the contractual license fees were regularly recurring, periodical payments and that the relationship was similar to a lease of a usable right. As the fee for 1910 fell due on 1911-03-31 and the action was filed only on 1917-03-19, the claim was time-barred absent any substantiated interruption of limitation.