1.PCT (Patent Cooperation Treaty) is an international treaty with more than 150 States parties. Through PCT, applicants can apply for patent protection for their inventions in a large number of countries at the same time only by submitting an "international" patent application (instead of submitting patent applications from different countries or regions).
Second, the PCT program includes:
1. application submission: the applicant submits an international application that meets the requirements of PCT form to the national or regional patent office or WIPO in one language and pays a set of fees; International search: The "international search unit" (one of the world's major patent offices) searches published patent documents and technical documents that may affect the patentability of inventions and puts forward written opinions on the patentability of inventions.
2. International publication: the contents of the international application will be published as soon as possible after the earliest application date 18 months expires; Supplementary international retrieval (optional): At the request of the applicant, the second international retrieval unit searches the published documents that the first international retrieval unit that conducted the main retrieval failed to retrieve due to the diversity of existing technologies in the fields of language and technology.
3. International preliminary examination (optional): according to your request, one of the international retrieval units will conduct additional patent analysis on your application, usually for the application version modified according to your written opinions; National stage: after the completion of the PCT procedure, it is usually 30 months from the earliest application date of the first application of the applicant for priority.