Patent Examination And Approval Procedures

According to the patent law, the examination and approval procedures for application for invention patents include five stages: acceptance, preliminary examination, publication, real trial and authorization. The application of utility model or design patent application shall not be published in advance and substantially reviewed, so there are only three stages. The following is a flow chart of the approval process of patent application (see page below).

      1. patent application stage

The work in this chapter has been explained in detail in the last chapter.

      2. initial review phase

Where the application fee is paid according to the regulations, the patent application shall automatically enter the preliminary stage. The application for patent for invention must be kept confidential before the first trial. The patent application for utility models and designs should also be retained for 3 months before the initial examination.

In the first instance, we should examine whether there are obvious defects in the application. It mainly includes the contents of the examination application: whether it is a clear violation of national laws, social ethics or obstruction of public interests; whether it is obviously a topic not granted to the patent right; whether there is a clear lack of technical content and can not constitute a technical proposal; The patent application of utility models and designs should also examine whether the patent is obviously the same as the approved patent, and whether it is obviously not a new technical plan or a new design.

In the first instance, it is necessary to examine the application documents and their format whether they meet the requirements. For example, whether the documents should be uniformly formatting by the patent office, whether the writing of the application, the completion of the form or the drawing of the drawings conform to the requirements of the detailed rules for implementation and the requirements of the review guidelines; whether the certificates or attachments that should be submitted are all available and whether they have legal effect; (3) whether the specifications, claims, drawings or designs or photographs conform to the publication requirements. In addition, the qualifications and application procedures for foreign applicants should be examined. If the patent office fails, the patent office will notify the applicant to make up or state the opinions within the prescribed time limit. Overdue applications will be deemed to be withdrawn. If the applicant fails to remove any defects after the reply, he shall be dismissed. If a patent for invention is first qualified, it will issue a notice of first instance qualification. The patent application of utility model and design patent is not directly found in the first instance, but will be directly entered into the authorization process. Since the invention has follow-up procedures, the examination of the application should be relatively relaxed in the first instance.

     3. invention patent application stage

The application for invention patent enters the waiting stage of publication from the issue of the notice of first instance qualification. If the applicant requests an announcement in advance, he shall apply for immediate access to the announcement preparation procedure. After reviewing format, editing, proofreading, computer processing and typesetting, it will be published and published in the Patent Gazette about 3 months later. If the application is not announced in advance, it will be 15 months before the application date comes into the announcement preparation procedure, and the application for priority (including foreign priority and national priority) shall be entered into the preparatory process from the expiration date of the priority date for 15 months. If the applicant requests the withdrawal of the patent application after the application is put into the announcement preparation procedure, the application will still be publicized in the Patent Gazette.

After the application is announced, the applicant has the right to provisional protection, that is, from the date of application, the applicant may request the unit or individual of the invention to pay the fee. After the application is announced, the contents of the application record become part of the existing technology.

The applicant must pay attention to the number of applications and the number of applications for patent applications in the Patent Gazette, which are two different series.

When applying for various procedures to the patent office in the process of patent examination and approval, the applicant shall use the application number and do not use the publication number, because all the application documents of the patent office are arranged and managed according to the application number. The application number is helpful for finding the application to be processed quickly, and at the same time, because the application number has a parity bit, it is easy to detect and deal with it in case of the wrong number provided by the applicant. If the applicant provides the publication number, the patent office must check through the check list to find the application to be processed. Especially when the publication number of the applicant is wrong, it is difficult to find the result before the consequences are generally found.

     4. substantive examination stage of invention patent application

After the patent application is announced, the applicant will have to go through the real trial procedure if the applicant has completed the procedure of the substantive request (the substantive examination request has been paid and the substantive examination fee has been paid); otherwise, the applicant shall wait for the applicant to go through the request for a real trial. The application is deemed to be withdrawn from the application period three years after the applicant fails to make a request for a real trial or the request for a real trial is not effective.

The application for entering the real trial procedure will be queued up in real time according to the procedure of entering the real trial procedure. In the actual trial, the examiner will conduct a comprehensive review of whether the patent application has novelty, creativity, practicality and other substantive conditions stipulated in the Patent Law on the basis of retrieval. If a person considers that he or she does not comply with the conditions of authorization or if there are any defects, he shall notify the applicant to make representations or make amendments within the prescribed time (the first time limit is generally 4 months). If the applicant fails to reply, the application is deemed to be withdrawn.

After at least one reply or amendment, the application still fails to meet the requirements, and shall be rejected. Due to the complexity of the actual trial, the review cycle usually takes 1 years or longer. If the authority has not been authorized for 2 years from the date of application, the application fee should be paid annually from third years. If the payment is not paid or the fee is insufficient, the application will be deemed to be withdrawn.

If a patent for invention does not find a reason for rejecting the substance in the substantive examination, or the defect is eliminated after the applicant has modified or stated the opinion, the examiner will make the notice of authorization and apply for the authorization stage.

     5. licensing phase

After a preliminary examination of the application for a patent for utility models and designs, where the reasons for rejecting the invention patent have not been found after substantive examination, the authorized notice shall be made by the examiner and applied for permission to enter the authorized registration. The authorized examiner shall review the validity and integrity of the authorized text, and check and correct the description items of the patent application. After that, the patent office will issue the notice of authorization and the notice of registration.

After receiving the notice of authorization and registration, the applicant shall complete the registration formalities and pay the prescribed fee within 2 months according to the requirements of the notice. If the registration procedures are paid within the time limit and the prescribed fee is paid, the patent office shall grant the patent right, issue a patent certificate, record it on the patent register, and report it in the Patent Gazette after 2 months. The patent right shall come into force on the date of issuance of the patent certificate.

Those who fail to go through the registration procedures according to the regulations or fail to handle them within the time limit shall be deemed to give up the right to obtain the patent.

Editor: vivi