In modern times, patents are generally documents issued by government agencies or regional organizations representing several countries according to their applications. This kind of document records the contents of the invention and creation, and in a certain period of time, it has produced such a legal state that the patented invention and creation can only be implemented by others with the permission of the patentee. In China, there are three kinds of patents: inventions, utility models and designs.
The types of patents have different regulations in different countries. In China's patent law, there are: invention patent, utility model patent and design patent; In Hongkong patent law, there are: standard patent (equivalent to Chinese mainland's invention patent), short-term patent (equivalent to Chinese mainland's utility model patent) and design patent; In some developed countries, it is divided into invention patents and design patents.
Patents are divided into valid patents and invalid patents according to the ownership of the owner.
Effective patent
Generally speaking, a valid patent refers to a patent that is still in a valid state after the patent application is authorized. In order to make the patent in a valid state, the patent right is still within the legal protection period, and the patentee also needs to pay the annual fee according to the regulations.
Invalid patent
After an application for a patent is authorized, it is called an invalid patent because it exceeds the statutory protection period, or because the patentee fails to pay the annual patent fee in time, or any individual or unit requests to declare the patent invalid, and it is determined by the Patent Reexamination Board and declared invalid. Invalid patents are no longer binding on the use of the technology involved.