Unitary patent for 17 European countries
Yes, it's coming on June 1, 2023 - the long-awaited unitary patent!
From June 1, 2023, the Unitary Patent will be valid in 17 European countries, including Germany, France, Italy, and the Netherlands. Additional countries will follow after negotiations are completed, and the Unitary Patent will be valid in a total of 25 countries in the future.
The solution of the unitary patent in Continux
To obtain a Unitary Patent, an EP application must first be filed with the European Patent Office until it is upgraded to the status “Issuance intended” Once this status is reached, the so-called Application for uniform effect in Continux. This is a request in the official language of the respective country, which ensures that the patent is effective in all participating countries. The request must be submitted within one month of the "intended grant" date. Here has the European Patent Office an informative Video If you want to watch the video directly on YouTube, just click on this Link.
Continux will be enhanced with the Unitary Patent feature, providing all the information required for the application for unitary effect. Once the application is filed and the necessary conditions are met, the Unitary Patent will automatically become valid in all participating countries.
The annual fees are paid to the European Patent Office and no longer to the validations of the individual countries
It is important to note that the Annual fees for the Unitary Patent must be paid to the European Patent Office and no longer in the validations of the individual countries.
What happens in Continux with the workflow "Validation from a granted European patent"?
The workflow for the Unitary Patent will be expanded and new fields will be added to ensure that all necessary steps are covered.
The benefits of the unitary patent
The Unitary Patent offers an effective way to obtain patent protection in several European countries and can be particularly beneficial for companies that operate internationally.
Support from our staff with (software) questions regarding the Unitary Patent
If you have any further questions about integrating the Unitary Patent into Continux, we recommend that you contact your Continux consultant.
Continux IP Management Software and the Unitary Patent
As an IP management software provider, we will ensure that our customers can easily map the Unitary Patent in Continux. We will ensure that all relevant fields and workflows are set up correctly and that our customers don't miss any important deadlines. With our support, you can be confident that you can leverage the full potential of the Unitary Patent and benefit from the numerous advantages this new form of patent protection offers.
UPDATE - UPDATE - UPDATE - UPDATE - UPDATE - UPDATE
UPDATE to this blog post from May 24, 2023
We're shipping the version with the unitary patent this week. For this special case, we've also included our release notes, which you can normally find in the Support section of this website, in this blog post as follows:
This release will be available no later than June 1.6.2023, XNUMX!
Dear customers!
As you know, the Unitary Patent (EP) will soon be valid for 17 European countries (number of countries as of May 24, 2023). Please note that the number of participating countries will be increased to 25 after the negotiations are concluded. This is not yet reflected in Continux, but is being monitored and adjusted in a timely manner. Back to the current status. We have currently integrated the following countries into the Unitary Patent:
- Österreich,
- Belgium
- Bulgaria,
- Dänemark,
- Estonia,
- Finland,
- Frankreich,
- Germany,
- Italy,
- Latvia,
- Lithuania,
- Luxemburg
- Malta,
- the Netherlands,
- Portugal
- Slovenia,
- Sweden.
In Continux this is now implemented as follows.
In a European patent:
If the status "grant intended" is set, an application for a unitary patent can be filed.
Here we have an illustration of a published EP patent application:
Figure 1 EP application with status published
If you now enter the date of the 71(3) notification (intended grant), Continux automatically adds the option to enter the REQUEST FOR UNIFORM EFFECT date field:
Figure 2: The “Request for unitary effect” field was automatically displayed after entering the date of the 71(3) notification
This means that we do not represent the European Unitary Patent in Continux with a separate new file type. Instead, for the creation of a Unitary Patent, only the field "Request for Unitary Effect" is entered. However, the condition for the Unitary Patent is that the EP application has been set to Grant Intended.
If field 71(3) is set to Grant Intended (Date), a deadline will be generated to "Submit Request for Unitary Effect." The deadline is calculated as 1 month from the Grant Intended Date:
Figure 3: Here the deadline has now been automatically generated to submit an application for unitary effect.
The date field was called
German "Application for uniform effect"
English "Request for unitary effect"
Figure 4: In English, the date field was called “Request for unitary effect”
If the "Application for Uniform Effect" date is entered, "children" must now be created in Continux using the "Extend Family" workflow. A new entry has been added to the workflow for this purpose:
New workflow Unitary Patent
Facility of 17 children, countries are listed above
The additional entry is only available for selection if the date of the application for uniform effect has been entered!
Figure 4: The “Extend Family” workflow in a European patent application offers the usual selection for creating additional family members, but without the Unitary Patent option if the request for unitary effect has not yet been entered as a date
Figure 5 After entering the date Request for unitary effect, the option to select the workflow “Unitary patent” now appears in the workflow Expand family
If you now run the Unitary Patent workflow, Continux automatically creates the 17 countries listed above as individual family members. The user does not need to enter the 17 countries individually.
Figure 6 For the Unitary Patent workflow, you can enter a desired internal file number as usual, or leave it blank to use the Continux file number assignment feature automatically. Entering the countries of the Unitary Patent is not required.
If national phases (validations) have already been created in the European patent, these will be retained. We leave the correction to our clients if previously created validations are to be transferred to a unitary patent. The workflow creates the current 17 countries of the unitary patent and simply creates a unitary patent for existing validations with the extension of the internal file number _1.
Figure 7: The Expand Unitary Patent Family workflow created 17 country files for the Unitary Patent. Existing validations were retained. Any new national countries added to the Unitary Patent, if already present, were created as validations with _1 at the end of the internal file number (Note: the file EP9922002_GB in the figure already existed and was not created by the workflow because GB is not part of the Unitary Patent (as of April 2023).
The workflow links the family members and uses the following File relations
In the case of “child to EP father”: EP origin
In the case of “EP father to child”: Unitary patent
In Addition:
If the field is filled with a date (the field Application for unitary effect), the following field is displayed as a subsequent field:
German: Registration of unitary patent protection (date)
English: Grant of unitary patent protection (date)
Figure 8: Display of the field “Registration of unitary patent protection” after the date “Request for unitary effect” has been entered
Figure 9: Display of the field “Grant of unitary patent protection” as soon as the date field “Request for unitary effect” has been filled (English version of the masks)
The renewal fees for a Unitary Patent are generated and paid to the EPO in the Unitary Patent File, and no longer in the "validations." This means that no time limits may be generated in the 17 validations.
Figure 10: The renewal fee periods are generated in the Unitary Patent and not in the validations of the Unitary Patent
ATTENTION: Please note: With the Continux version released on June 1, 2023, the status of the unitary patent file will NOT be changed from "intended to grant" to "registered," although the "registration of unitary patent protection" date field will contain a date. For the unitary patent to receive the "registered" status, the registration date must also be entered! No changes are currently planned here.
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