All intellectual property rights have the concept of state. At the same time, a product, a brand and a technology will only have its commercial value in a specific region, and so will foreign-related patent protection. We suggest that enterprises must have a certain understanding of the technical situation and market situation that need to be protected before applying for foreign-related patents, so as to determine the possible market value and rights protection cost after obtaining this right in China. At present, China applicants can apply for foreign patents through the Paris Convention or PCT:
1, Apply through the Paris Convention: An important principle of the Paris Convention is the "priority principle", that is, the applicant applies for an invention-creation for the first time in a member country of the Convention. Within a specific period (i.e. the priority period: 6 months for design and 12 months for invention or utility model), the same applicant may also file applications in other member States, and these subsequent applications are deemed to be the same as the first application. The establishment of the priority principle has brought great convenience to the applicant. The applicant may have 6 months or 12 months to decide whether to apply for a foreign patent after the application is filed by a member state. Once the applicant decides to apply for a foreign patent, he may file an application within the above-mentioned time limit and claim priority.
2. Apply for PCT: The Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) is a special treaty under the Paris Convention, and it has now reached 178 member countries. According to a patent application filed by a PCT member country, it can be regarded as an application filed at the same time in other designated member countries. It has realized the application in one country and is effective in many countries. The examination and approval procedure of PCT application is divided into international stage and national stage. In the international stage, acceptance, publication, retrieval and preliminary examination are carried out, and in the national stage, examination and authorization are carried out by specific national bureaus. The time for PCT application to enter a specific national phase is within 30 months from the date of application. In this way, when the applicant wants an invention to be protected by more than five countries (generally more than five), it is very suitable to use the PCT approach. Because only one international application needs to be submitted to the Chinese Patent Office through PCT, it saves the trouble of submitting national applications to each country separately, and has more time to consider which countries to enter eventually. PCT method is not suitable for design.