Patent registration in Honk Kong can be done from a European Patent application. From a commercial point of view this is an interesting option so we are going to briefly describe the procedure for the patent registration in Honk Kong based on a patent application filed with the European Patent Office.
Extension of european patents to hong kong: administrative procedure.
This registration procedure can differentiate two stages:
1. Application stage. The application may be filed within 6 months from the date of publication of:
- A European Patent application.
- An international application (PCT) designating the European Patent Office.
An international search conducted after these applications shall be transferred to Hong Kong office and will serve as a basis for processing the registration in this territory.
2. Granting stage. This second step consists in the registration and formalization within 6 months of the granting of the corresponding European Patent, which gives rise to a patent granting in Honk Kong.
Under the London agreement on the conditions of European Patents validation, patents in Hong Kong have the same treatment as those processed in the UK and is therefore not necessary to submit a Chinese translation of the publication of the patent European whose granting will already have been processed in English and the claims translated to French and German. This is because the London agreement establish that countries whose official language is also one of the three official languages of the European Patent Office (French, German or English) completely renounce the requirement for translation.
If the conditions described are met, the patent is granted in Hong Kong in about 3 months, and published.
It is worth noting that if you cannot proceed to the second stage, the granting, within 5 years after publication an annual maintenance fee must be paid. If this maintenance is not paid the patent application shall be considered withdrawn.
Regarding the impact that objections or appeals to European Patent has on Hong Kong, must be known that resolution of amendment or rejection (due to opposition proceeding before the European patent office), shall be registered and published on the Hong Kong Patent Office under explicit request of the interested parties.
Filing a patent in several countries is as complex procedure, as complex as the development of the specification of the patent itself, that is why it is essential to have the support of a professional team with extensive legal expertise such as Protectia Patentes y Marcas for this task.
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