Applications Invited For Remaining 9 Slots Under PPH

The Indian Patent Office (IPO) has recently notified that the process of accepting the applications as per the Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) Guidelines for the remaining 9 requests slots will commence from 10 August 2020.

In 2019, a Bilateral PPH pilot program was initiated between the IPO and the Patent Office of Japan (JPO) for a period of 3 years, and necessary procedure Guidelines were issued in this regard. In the said program each patent office has limited the number of requests to 100 cases per year.

The PPH pilot program allows applicants to request an expedited examination process by submitting requests along with the relevant documents with the Office of the Later Examination (OLE) based on the application which is determined to be patentable by the Office of Earlier Examination (OEE).