The Portuguese and Brazilian Patent and Trademark Offices informed last Thursday (December 16th) that they had concluded a memorandum of understanding to institute a pilot project of Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) for patent applications filed in both Offices.
The PPH is a bilateral agreement having operational nature that encourages work-sharing and grants the benefit of early examination of patent applications between two Patent and Trademark Offices. In this sense, it helps to reduce the backlog by allowing for faster administrative processing of patent applications as a result of collaboration in search and examination. Shared information reduces the time for patent analysis.
Through the use of all research or examination-related information from the Offices of Earlier Examination (OEE), the PPH assists applicants in their efforts to obtain patent rights with greater legal certainty and efficiency.
The memorandum of understanding was signed between the president of the Brazilian Office, Cláudio Vilar Furtado, and his counterpart at the Portuguese Office, Ana Margarida Bandeira, and provides for the operation of the PPH for a period of five years, until December 16, 2026. At the end of this period, each PTO will evaluate the pilot project’s results to determine if there should be an extension.
Brazil currently has 11 PPH agreements in force, with the following Patent Offices:
It is worth remembering that the annual cycle for submitting requests for participation in the PPH is now closed, since the limit of 600 requests established by Ordinance 404/2020 has been reached. A new cycle will start on January 1, 2022.
For more information on this subject, please contact our Patents team (patents@lickslegal.com). We will be glad to assist you.