India has resolved to standardise its IPR procedures. The year 2015 ends marking the year of patent owners in India. As the world welcomes New Year, Indian Patent Office has made a welcoming change in its unique numbering system for Patent Application.
In an effort to attain uniformity in accessibility and processing of patent applications by all Patent Offices in India, it has streamlined and standardised the numbering system for Patent Application and Request for Examination filled in Indian Patent Office. Accordingly, a new format of numbering will be implemented with effect from 1st January, 2016.
An overview of previous numbering system in Indian Patent Office:
Patent Application Number | PCT Application Number | Patent Number |
nnnnn/LLL/yyyy
(since 1972) |
IN/PCT/yyyy/nnnnn/LLL
(before 2003)
|
nnnnnn
(since 1912)
|
nnnnn/LLLNP*/yyyy
(since 2003) |
||
|
|
no year |
* NP for national phase
** Filling offices: Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) = KOL (CAL) Mumbai (formerly Bombay) = MUM (BOM) Chennai (formerly Madras) = CHE (MAS) Delhi (Not Changed) = DEL |
The new numbering system for patent applications shall have 12 characters fixed length numeric standard Patent Application Format, applicable to all the Patent Offices in India and shall include identifiers of Year of filing, Jurisdiction, type of application and application number.
Revised Numbering system format as effect from 1st January 2016:
Patent Application Number: YYYYJTNNNNNN |
|
* Jurisdiction
|
**Type of Application
|
The “NNNNNN” series of applications shall be unique and sequentially incremented for all the four patent offices in the order of their filing.
Similarly, the numbering system of Request for Examination shall also be unified and standardized. A normal Request for Examination of patent can be filled as per rule 24(1)(i) of Patent Rules 2003 and an express patent examination request for PCT application can be filled as per rule 20(4)(ii) of Patent Rules 2003.
Request for Examination u/r 24B (1) (i) (Normal): | Request for Examination u/r 20 (4) (ii) (Express): |
RYYYYJNNNNNN | XYYYYJNNNNNN |
|
|
*Both the serial numbers u/r 24B (1) (i) and u/r 20 (4) (ii) shall be common |
Date of Application shall accompany the Patent application number and Request for Examination application in the following format: YYYY/MM/DD
Where,
“YYYY” denotes year of filing, “MM” denotes Month and “DD” denotes Day of filing.
The streamlining of type of patent application will be very helpful in reducing the time required for examination of patents and prosecution of patent application in India.
Note: Your comment is visible on website after startjuris team will aprroved it.