The Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) is a set of procedures
intended to provide an accelerated patent prosecution. It involves
speeding up the examination process for applications filed in a
participating Patent Office by sharing information between the
Office of Earlier Examination (OEE) and the Office of Latter
Examination (OLE). It allows participating offices to benefit from
previous examination work done by other patent offices, which would
reduce the examination workload. Moreover, it is supposed to
improve patent quality.
As the USPTO explains in its website "under PPH,
participating patent offices have agreed that when an applicant
receives a final ruling from a first patent office that at least
one claim is allowed, the applicant may request fast track
examination of corresponding claim(s) in a corresponding patent
application that is pending in a second patent office. PPH
leverages fast-track examination procedures already in place among
participating
