According to the Patent Law, the examination and approval procedure of an application for a patent for invention includes five stages: acceptance, preliminary examination, publication, actual examination and authorization. The application for a patent for utility model or design does not undergo early publication and substantive examination in the examination and approval, and there are only three stages: acceptance, preliminary examination and authorization.
Extended data
Patents are divided into "valid patents" and "invalid patents" according to the ownership of the owner:
1, valid 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.
2. 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.
China National Intellectual Property Administration-Patent Application Approval Process