The Patent Office of the Intellectual Property Office of China is the competent acceptance bureau for nationals or residents of China, and it is also an international retrieval unit and an international preliminary examination unit. Where an applicant from China files an international patent application, it shall be approved by the relevant departments of People's Republic of China (PRC) and the State Council, and entrusted by a foreign-related patent agency. China applicants may file an international patent application with the China Patent Office or the International Bureau of the World Intellectual Property Organization.
According to the provisions of China's Patent Law, China Minsheng Investment Co., Ltd. must entrust a patent agency legally established in China to submit an international application for PCT patent in China, and no other unit or individual can complete this process.
It should be noted that the patent applicant can only apply for a patent through PCT, and cannot directly obtain a patent through PCT. In order to obtain a patent in a certain country, the patent applicant must also go through the formalities of entering the country, and the patent office of that country will examine the patent application. If it meets the requirements of the patent law of the country, a patent right shall be granted. 1, which simplifies the application procedures and provides a more convenient way for applicants to apply for patents abroad;
2. Postpone the decision time: When filing an ordinary patent application abroad, the patent applicant must submit the patent application to the patent offices of various countries within 12 months after the first filing of the patent application. Through the PCT patent application, you can go through the formalities of international patent application entering each country within 30 months from the date of the first patent application.
3. Accurate investment: Because it can delay the decision-making time, it can make accurate investment in the funds entering the national stage;
4. Improve the application documents: through the PCT international application procedure, you can have two opportunities to modify the PCT international application documents, thus achieving the effect of improving the patent application documents;
5. Obtain the PCT international search report and preliminarily evaluate the novelty and creativity of the patent application. The main purpose of PCT is to simplify the previously established method of applying for invention patent protection in several countries, make it more effective and economical, and benefit the users of the patent system and the patent office that has the right to manage the system.
Before the introduction of the PCT system, the only way for several countries to protect inventions was to submit applications to each country separately; Since these applications must be processed separately, the application and review of each country must be repeated. In order to achieve its due purpose, PCT suggests:
-Establish an international system to make a patent application (international application) submitted in one language at the Patent Office (receiving office) valid for every PCT member country (designated by the applicant) in its application;
-The Patent Office, that is, the receiving office, can conduct formal examination of international applications;
-Conduct an international search for international applications, and issue a search report explaining relevant existing technologies (published patent documents related to past inventions), which can be used as a reference when deciding whether an invention can be patented; The search report should be delivered to the applicant first, and then published;
-make a unified international announcement on the international application and its related international search report and send it to the designated bureau.
-To provide the Patent Office with the option of international preliminary examination of international applications to decide whether to grant a patent right, and to provide the applicant with a report, which includes the viewpoint of whether the claimed invention meets the international standard of patentability.
It is usually called the "international phase" of the PCT procedure, and the "national phase" refers to the last part of the patent granting procedure. It is the national bureau of the country designated in the international application or the institution that performs the functions of the national bureau, collectively referred to as the designated bureau. The first chapter provides for international application, international retrieval and international publication; Chapter II provides for international preliminary examination. (In the PCT professional word "national" bureau, "national" stage, or national charges, please refer to the relevant procedures of the regional patent office).
In most countries, patent offices have been trying to solve how to better allocate resources and make the patent system get the maximum return within the existing human resources. In a country with economic growth and technological progress to a certain extent, the National Bureau is faced with an increase in the number of patent applications. In this case, if the country is a member of PCT, the PCT system can help it better handle the increase in workload. According to the PCT system, when an international application arrives at the National Bureau, it has been formally examined by the acceptance bureau and conducted by the international retrieval unit. In addition, in most cases, the international preliminary examination unit has conducted a possible review. In this way, it is beneficial for the State Patent Office to use existing resources (including human resources) to handle more patent applications, because it has gone through unified procedures in the international stage, thus simplifying the processing procedures in the national stage.
Other purposes of PCT are to promote and accelerate the use of technical information related to inventions by industries and other relevant departments, and to help developing countries acquire these technologies. 1. You can apply for a patent in many countries only by submitting an international patent application, instead of submitting a patent application to each country separately, which provides convenience for patent applicants to apply for a patent in foreign countries;
2. When a foreign country files an ordinary patent application, through PCT, the patent applicant can go through the formalities for the international patent application to enter various countries within 20 months after the first patent application is filed; If it is necessary to conduct international preliminary examination, you can also go through the formalities for international patent application to enter various countries within 30 months from the date of filing the patent application for the first time. This has prolonged the time to enter the national stage. During this period, the patent applicant can investigate the market, the commercial prospect of the invention and other factors, and decide whether to continue to apply for foreign patents, and then spend a lot of money to enter the national stage. You can save money if you decide not to apply for a patent abroad after investigation.
Three, the international patent application shall go through the international search of international search units, and obtain high-quality international search reports. The international search report gives one or more existing technical documents, so that the patent applicant can not only know the status of the existing technology, but also preliminarily judge whether the invention has the prospect of granting a patent. If the international application passes the international preliminary examination, the patent applicant can also get a high-standard international preliminary examination report made by the international preliminary examination unit. If the international preliminary examination report shows that the invention does not have novelty, creativity and industrial practicability, the patent applicant may consider not entering the national phase again in order to save costs; If the international preliminary examination report shows that the invention is novel. Creativity and industrial practicality, patent applicants may obtain strong patents, so as to consider entering the national stage.
4. Only the patent application fee needs to be paid to the acceptance bureau, not to the patent offices of all countries that require patent protection, which simplifies the payment procedures.
In some countries, the national cost of international patent application is lower than that of ordinary application.
Six, the language of the international patent application can be Chinese, English, French, German, Japanese, Russian, Spanish, etc.
China applicants can apply for international patents in both Chinese and English, which provides convenience for foreign-funded enterprises in China to apply for patents.