Donate to Science & Enterprise

S&E on Mastodon

S&E on LinkedIn

S&E on Flipboard

Please share Science & Enterprise

U.S., China Patent Offices to Begin Reciprocity Tests

USPTO building (USPTO.gov)

(USPTO.gov)

The patent offices of the U.S. and China are set to begin today pilot programs of reciprocity agreements to reduce the duplication of patent examinations between the two countries. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and China’s State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) agreed last month to hold these one-year pilot tests.

Under the agreement the two agencies will test the Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH), a provision of the Patent Cooperation Treaty, that permits each office to benefit from work previously done by the other office, which reduces examination workloads. The expedited examination in each office is expected to allow applicants to obtain corresponding patents faster and more efficiently in each country.

USPTO and SIPO will also test a variation of the PPH called the Paris Route — named after a process from an 1883 intellectual property agreement signed in Paris — where the office making the second filing of a patent already granted by the other office, can use the search and examination findings from the first office.

These programs are expected to use work products, such as written opinions and preliminary examination reports, developed under the framework of the Patent Cooperation Treaty. The trials are expected to gauge the interest of applicants and evaluate the programs for patent quality, efficiency, and the reduction of the workload at both agencies.

Read more: USPTO, Taiwan to Pilot Test Reciprocal Patent Reviews

*     *     *

Comments are closed.