The Protection abroad
Patent protection is territorial, protection will depend on the type of patent application.
The Paris Convention which, dated 2nd May 2008, includes 173 member states, facilitates extensions giving the holder of an initial patent application a priority period of one year from the date of filing of the first application to file patent in each of these states. Moreover, the WTO members, even if they are not members of the Paris Convention, have the same obligation to accept a right of priority in respect of other members.
Thus, other early first filings of patent applications made by third parties and disclosures made during this period are not applicable. If, in the light of the research report provided by the INPI, requests for extension have been completed compared ??
Filing of applications for extension can be made either directly to national administrations who issue certificates for their state (such as the Offices in United States of America, Japan, China, Germany, Australia ...), or to regional administrations (such as the European Patent Office) to issue certificates that can be effective in several states through national validation procedures specific to the issue of issue.
The international application
The extension can also be carried out indirectly, by filing an international application under the Cooperation Treaty (PCT). Given the brevity of the priority period and costs associated with deposits of foreign applications in each potential country, it may be useful in the uncertainty of the relevance of such an extension to file within this period of priority, a single international application conferring temporary protection in the 139 member states (as of 15 April 2008) of the PCT.
The owner of the international application is then given a period of 30 months from the filing of the first application to validate the international application in each State where protection is envisaged. This procedure makes it possible to delay up to 18 months after the priority period, the actual filing of applications with different national and regional administrations, and therefore, optimizing the selection of countries and thus creating a better market and more interest in the invention and thus spread the costs involved.
European Patent
The European patent is a title awarded by the European Patent Office, which is designed to have effect in the 34 Member States (as of 1 January 2008) of the European Patent Convention. It comes from either a European patent application or a validated application with the EPO (Euro-PCT application).
The issue of a patent takes place after the publication of the application to 18 months and a full review of it where the invention is described in terms of all criteria for patentability and validity including the inventive activity??? , which gives some force to the European patent.
Once the European patent is published, it is produced in each State and has the same effect as a national patent, provided the required translations of the description and / or claims of the patent (in accordance with London Treaty entered into force on 01/05/08) in an official language of the State concerned.
Within 9 months from its issue, any person may file an opposition before the OEB in order to obtain a revocation or limitation of the patent.