Indonesia’s Directorate General of Intellectual Property (DGIP) and Thailand’s Department of Intellectual Property in Thailand (DIP) are extending their Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) trial arrangements with the Japan Patent Office 3 years and 2 years, respectively, from the start of…
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1. What is a “Multi-Multi Claim”? “Multi-multi claim” means “any dependent claim that refers to more than one other claim in the alternative (‘multiple dependent claim’) which depends from any other multiple dependent claim”.[1] A multi-multi claim hence exponentially increases…
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Japan’s famous monster “Godzilla,” that is, its trademark, rampages again. On July 19, 2023, Japan’s IP High Court judged in favor of the Japan Patent Office (JPO) Invalidation of Registration for another trademark, “GUZZILLA.” What’s GUZZILLA? GUZZILLA is the name…
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Japan’s IP High Court (IPHC) is setting a trend to deny patented programs even if sent from servers outside of Japan, with its May 26, 2023 case DWANGO v. FC2. The IPHC rejects immunity to FC2 simply on grounds that…
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This is our latest update from April 21, 2023 (Japan time). We regularly check for substantial changes to JPO policy regarding COVID-19 and let you know here if there are such. The most recent major policy changes as far as…
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Worried what to do about a divisional patent application while the parent application appeal is pending in Japan? How to handle the fork in the road? Starting from April 1, 2023, for divisional applications filed in conjunction with a Request…
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April 1, 2023 marks an important shift for those who might realize, with dread, that a key patent deadline in Japan has been missed. The standard for Reinstatement (Revival with a late filing) is softening from “Justifiable” to “Unintentional” Delay….
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I want to know when a Japanese translation needs to be filed. Should it be filed with or without a PCT application at the time of the Japanese national phase entry? Do not miss the deadline to file! According to…
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According to the Japan Patent Office (JPO), methods for treatment of the human body by surgery or therapy and diagnostic methods practiced on the human body fall outside the scope of “industrially applicable inventions” and are, therefore, unpatentable. In only…
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The US-JP Collaborative Search Pilot Program (CSP), started in 2015, enables patent applicants for the United States and Japan to seek synchronized and speedier search and office action results. The USPTO and JPO recently announced their continuation of the program…
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