Effective , the Canadian Intellectual Property Office (CIPO) will begin a Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) bilateral pilot agreement with the Brazil Instituto Nacional da Propriedade Industrial (INPI-Brazil).
The PPH enables applicants filing a patent at either CIPO or INPI-Brazil to have their application processed faster at the other office. This helps increase the efficiency and quality of the patent-granting process by enabling the offices to benefit from each other's work.
PPH requests made to CIPO will be based on the earlier national or international (PCT) search and examination work done by INPI, and PPH requests made before INPI-Brazil will be based on the earlier national or international (PCT) search and examination work done by CIPO.
CIPO's Performance Targets for all PPH requests is to provide a first office action (allowance, conditional notice of allowance, first report or examiner initiated interview) within 3 months of a compliant request for an application to be considered for the PPH.
CIPO has noted that approximately 28% of PPH patent applications based on national work products and 17% of PPH patent applications based on international (PCT) work products are allowed without an examination report, which is significantly higher than for non-PPH national patent applications (approximately 5%). This represents a savings of time, cost and effort, for both CIPO and our clients.
For more information, visit CIPO's PPH webpage, or contact the PPH coordinator.