Global patent prosecution highway (GPPH) pilot
On 1 November 2014, two new Offices – the Austrian Patent Office and the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore - signed up to the global patent prosecution highway (GPPH) Pilot Programme, bringing the total number of participating offices to 19.
The 19 participating offices include:
- Austrian Patent Office
- Canadian Intellectual Property Office
- Danish Patent and Trademark Office
- Federal Service for Intellectual Property (ROSPATENT)(Russian Federation
- Hungarian Intellectual Property Office
- Icelandic Patent Office
- Intellectual Property Office of Singapore
- Intellectual Property Office (United Kingdom) (an operating name of the Patent Office)
- IP Australia
- Israel Patent Office
- Japan Patent Office
- Korean Intellectual Property Office
- National Board of Patents and Registration of Finland
- National Institute of Industrial Property (Portugal)
- Nordic Patent Institute
- Norwegian Industrial Property Office
- Spanish Patent and Trademark Office
- Swedish Patent and Registration Office
- United States Patent and Trademark Office
The GPPH pilot programme enables a request for accelerated processing of an application to be made at a participating office based on work products from the office of earlier examination (including PCT work products, ie, a PCT Written Opinion from either the International Searching Authority or the International Preliminary Examination Authority, or an International Preliminary Report on Patentability), provided that at least one claim has been found to be patentable by the office of earlier examination, and subject to other eligibility criteria where applicable are met.
The European Patent Office and the State Intellectual Property Office of China remain notably absent from the list of participating offices.
Useful link
Further information on the GPPH pilot as well as eligibility criteria can be found at: http://www.jpo.go.jp/ppph-portal/globalpph.htm