December 29, 2020
The BRPTO published on December 29, 2020, four new patent application-related ordinances:
As Phase I of the PPH program reached its limit on December 2020 and the new phase was scheduled to be released only on 2022, the BRPTO decided to antecipate Phase II and made many changes to the program to accept more applications at a higher frequency. Among the changes are i) the number of applications that will be accepted in the program (600 applications per year); ii) the number of applications per applicant (one per week), and iii) the number of applications per IPC Section (150 applications per section per year). This new Ordinance comes into force on January 1, 2021. Ordinance #404/2020 is available at the BRPTO’s website, and its original version (in Portuguese) can be downloaded here.
The examination guidelines for Computer Implemented Inventions (CII) have been revised and updated. The BRPTO issued its new version under Ordinance #411/2020. The CII guidelines are better structured, providing easier reading and understanding for users of the patent system. It also includes many examples of what would or would not be accepted by the BRPTO. The mentioned Ordinance comes into force on January 1, 2021. The new Guidelines are available at the BRPTO’s website, and the original version of Ordinance #411/2020 (in Portuguese) can be downloaded here.
As of January 1, 2022, the Sequence Listing must be submitted following the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) ST.26 Standard (.XML format). According to Ordinance #405/2020, during 2021, the Sequence Listing can be submitted before the BRPTO either following the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) ST.25 Standard (.TXT format) or the ST.26 Standard (.XML format). This new Ordinance comes into force on January 4, 2021. Ordinance #405/2020 is available at the BRPTO’s website, and its original version (in Portuguese) can be downloaded here.
As a continuation of the Plan to Combat the Patent Backlog, new Ordinance #412/2020 brings a change to the examination of pending patent applications without prior art search reports issued by foreign patent offices, International or Regional Organizations under the preliminary OA program. The main change concerns the possibility of a supplementary prior art search to be carried out by the examiner after the preliminary OA issuance, in case the search report issued with the preliminary OA has been performed by an automatic tool that uses a prior art survey algorithm. This new Ordinance comes into force today, December 29, 2020. Ordinance #412/2020 is available at the BRPTO’s website, and its original version (in Portuguese) can be downloaded here.
We will provide you with further information on each Ordinance in due course. For the English version of the new ordinances or more information on them, please contact us at patents@lickslegal.com. We will be glad to assist you.
