EPO Seeking Participants For UPP

by Ulrika Lomas, for LawAndTax-News.com, Brussels

24 July 2007

The European Patent Office (EPO) on Monday announced the launch of a new patent processing project to test a potential efficiency improvement.

The initiative is known as the Utilisation Pilot Project, or UPP.

The UPP is scheduled to run during 2007. Its purpose is to test the premiss that work carried out on a first filing at a national patent office can be further utilised for a subsequent filing by the applicant and the EPO. It is expected that this will benefit all participants by streamlining the patent system within Europe.

The European Patent Office explained that:

"The EPO is looking for applicants who are willing to participate in the pilot. Eligible applicants should be submitting an application for a European patent as well as claiming priority at one of the national offices participating in the UPP (UK, Austria, Germany, and Denmark)."

It continued:

"The UPP offers participants fast track handling of the search application. The extended European search report (EESR) will be issued within a maximum of six months; Currently, UPP participants are receiving search reports within 2 months!"

"The only requirement is that UPP applicants send along with their EP application copies of the national office products from the national filing, e.g. national search report and national written opinion. These additional documents will be used for the purposes of the UPP only. They will not be published or made publicly available via file inspection."

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