There are two main situations in which rights need to be restored during patent reexamination proceedings: First, the deadline for filing a reexamination is delayed due to justifiable reasons (within 3 months from the date of receipt of the rejection decision), resulting in a reexamination. The second is the loss of the right to apply for a patent due to the delay in responding to the designated time limit for the reexamination notice (within one month from the date of receipt of the reexamination notice) due to justifiable reasons. There are differences in the specific handling of rights restoration in these two situations.
1. Restoration of the right to request reexamination
According to the provisions of my country’s Patent Law, the time limit for a patent applicant to request reexamination is 3 months from the date of receipt of the rejection decision. The time limit is a legal time limit. When the time limit expires, if the patent applicant does not file a request for reexamination, the rejection decision will take effect, and the State Intellectual Property Office will not issue a disciplinary decision regarding the loss of rights. Based on this, the time limit for restoration of the right to request for reexamination should be calculated from the first day after the expiration of the aforementioned three-month period and calculated backward by two months.
2. Restoration of patent application rights
According to the Implementing Rules of the Patent Law, the patent applicant shall respond to the reexamination notice within the time limit specified by the Patent Reexamination Board. If the request for reexamination is not answered, the request for reexamination will be deemed to be withdrawn, and the deemed withdrawal will cause the patent applicant to lose the right to apply for a patent. According to the provisions of Section 5.2 of Chapter 7 of Part Five of the Patent Examination Guidelines, the decision to lose the right to apply for a patent (i.e., the notice of withdrawal of the right to apply for a patent) shall be made one month after the expiration of the time limit. In other words, even if the sanction decision is issued one month after the expiration of the time limit, the patent applicant will not receive the notice of withdrawal earlier than 1.5 months after the expiration of the specified time limit. Based on this, the restoration period of the patent application right should be calculated from the first day after the expiration of the "specified period + 1.5 months" and calculated backwards for 2 months. For example, if the Patent Reexamination Board specifies a reply period of one month and the expiration date is December 5, 2013, then the rights restoration period is from January 20 to March 20, 2014, and from December 5 to The rights have not been lost between January 20, 2014 and do not need to be restored. They can be handled according to normal procedures.