Encouraging Developments at the Registry
In October 2019, Adams & Adams partners, Nicky Garnett,
Stephen Hollis and Elio Teixeira travelled to Luanda for a meeting
with Anna Paula Bolivar, the Director General of the Instituto
Angolana Propriedade Industrial (IAPI) as well as other senior
registry officials. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss with
IAPI concerns regarding the delays in processing patent
applications in Angola and to obtain clarification on IAPI's
plans for legislative amendments and capacity building.
The visit was extremely useful and has already proved beneficial
as we have seen a number of patents proceeding to grant. This is a
significant step forward as not a single patent was granted by IAPI
in the period 2010-2018. In addition, there have been definite
improvements in the frequency of publication of patent applications
in the months following our visit and some patents (which has been
previously been overlooked) have now been published