1. application
The applicant submits the application documents to the German Patent Office. After accepting the application, the Patent Office will first conduct a formal review to confirm that the application documents are complete and qualified, and will give the application number and application date. Generally, it can be completed within 2 months, and the applicant needs to get an official receipt.
2. Search If the applicant needs it, he can file an independent search request with the German Patent Office. Examiners need to search the existing technology related to patents to confirm which public documents can be cited. So as to determine whether the invention applied by the applicant can be granted a patent right. After the retrieval, the applicant can get a retrieval report with a copy of the cited literature. At this point, the retrieval process is over.
3. From the date of filing 18 months later, the Patent Office will publish it.
4. The substantive examination is mainly aimed at the novelty of the invention. According to Article 3 of the German Patent Law, when an invention does not belong to the existing technology, it is novel. The existing technology includes all the knowledge that the public can obtain publicly through written records, oral descriptions, use or any other means before the filing date.
5. Authorization, refusal and opposition
If the applicant's application documents pass the preliminary examination and substantive examination, the German Patent Office will grant him the invention patent authorization. If there are sufficient reasons to refuse, a rejection opinion will be sent to the applicant. If the applicant refuses to accept the rejection decision, he may lodge a complaint with the National Data Processing Management Association within 1 month after the decision is issued. If the applicant thinks that the appeal can't solve the problem, he can appeal to the German Federal Patent Court.