Gør idéer til aktiver

One way to speed up innovation

Patent offices worldwide are facing serious troubles with increasing backlogs, thus slowing down innovation. A new project shortens the examination of patents with up to 22 months in Denmark and the US.

By Peter Melgaard and Anders Due, The Danish Patent and Trademark Office

A patent is a contract between the inventor and society. The inventor is granted the exclusive right to exploit his invention commercially for a limited period of time. He is, however, obliged to make a detailed description of the invention available to the public, so that other inventors can build upon his work. This is the philosophy behind the patent system, which is designed to stimulate innovation.

And the patent system is, in many ways, a success. Patent activity is increasing – in recent years particularly in Asia. Today most innovative companies do not only need patent protection locally but in many parts of the world. But the success also results in increasing backlogs in patent offices all over the world. This is a serious challenge to the knowledge economy.

Patent offices are trying to solve this problem in several ways. One of these is a new bilateral initiative, the Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) between Denmark and the US, that came into force on November 3, 2008. The project seeks to offer fast-track examination of patents in one of the countries when already granted in the other. This ultimately means that the examination workload will be reduced, patent quality will be improved and patent applicants will have their intellectual rights protected against misuse and piracy much faster – an important factor in terms of pushing technological innovation forward.

At present, the PPH pilot is to be effective for a year with the possibility of extending the period for another year. The US Patent Office (USPTO) and the Danish Patent Office (DKPTO) will evaluate the results of the pilot program to determine if and how the program should be fully implemented after the trial period. Depending on the applicant demand for the PPH, the DKPTO and the USPTO will decide whether there is a basis for making the PPH agreement permanent. Approximately 1.000 patents are applied for by Danish companies in the US every year – a number that should increase with this agreement.

The Danish Patent and Trademark Office becomes the seventh patent office to join a PPH agreement with the US (the others being Europe, UK, Korea, Japan, Canada and Australia), while Denmark has a PPH with Japan and from March 1, 2009 also with Korea. The exclusive company that Denmark joins through the PPH with the US bears witness to the enormous effort and focus on quality that the patent office stands for but also to the amiable relationship between the two offices.

A warm welcome for the PPH

When the PPH was launched, both the Danish Minister of Economic and Business Affairs, Lene Espersen, and the Director General of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, Jon Dudas, expressed their satisfaction with expanding the PPH with. the two countries.

Espersen stated: “In Denmark we live off our good ideas. So it is important that Danish companies have the best opportunities to protect their ideas around the world. With the agreement we can now offer bright Danish individuals and entrepreneurial companies a short-cut to the important American market.”

Dudas stressed the higher quality and more efficient examination processes ahead: “We are very pleased to be working in partnership with our Danish colleagues on this pilot. PPH is an integral part of our cooperation efforts to combat the growing global backlog of applications. By leveraging the work previously done by another office, we will be able to expedite the patent examination process and ensure higher patent quality.”

As Director Dudas explains, the initiative allows you to choose a much speedier processing of your patent application if another patent office has already performed a search and examination for the same invention. It will thereby permit each office to exploit the work previously done by the other office and reduce duplication, since the examination processes begins at a more informed level. It is not a prerequisite to using the PPH that the search and examination of the first patent office has reached the grant-of-patent stage. However, it is a prerequisite that the first patent office has found at least one of the corresponding patent claims to be patentable.

Furthermore, the patent office of the second filing is not compelled to accept the opinion of the patent office of the first filing, and the patent office of the second filing is always solely responsible for its granting of patent rights. This is the best way to secure the quality of the search process during the examination, but the correspondence between the offices should also be reduced through the PPH.

The background for the PPH

Besides the obvious problems with backlogs, piracy is another issue that has made patent offices around the globe keen on optimizing the patent system, which the PPH is an example of. The growing number of pirated products threatens the hardworking Danes and Americans, who export their products without the necessary protection of their intellectual property. The only way to secure it is by patenting the inventions in the relevant markets as quickly as possible in order to be able to prosecute infringers. For Danish entrepreneurs, both SME and larger companies, the US market is of great interest, but even in the US, it is of utmost importance to prevent products from being pirated in order to maintain control over the companies’ respective and future profit.

The underlying purpose of the PPH as a way to optimize the patent process is also to encourage inventors and entrepreneurs to think more strategically in terms of intellectual property rights (IPR). Unfortunately, there is still a tendency in some companies not to integrate IPR in the business strategy from early on as the assets they essentially are. Hopefully, the Patent Prosecution Highway can help correct this mistake by showing how intellectual property rights work as the very foundation for innovation and growth in a globalized world.

 

Bragt i Danish-American Business Forum Newsletter, december 2008.



Sidst ændret: 3. marts 2009
Har du kommentarer til indholdet?