BACKLOG COMBAT PROJECT

By Pedro Blanco / February 15, 2024

The Brazilian National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI) has recently unveiled the Backlog Combat Project, which brings about significant advancements in the Brazilian patent prosecution procedure. The primary objective of this initiative is to decrease substantially the number of patent applications awaiting examination and decision within a period of 2 years.

Overview of changes:

Office Action 6.22: It focuses on patent applications pending examination that have not undergone prior art searches in foreign offices. In these cases, a preliminary office action including a search report conducted by an automatic tool that employs a similarity algorithm will be issued.

Office Action 6.21: It focuses on patent applications that have already been examined by foreign offices. In these cases, the Brazilian examining authority will issue a preliminary office action based on the prior art documents cited in searches and/or technical examinations conducted by those foreign offices.

Upon issuance of these preliminary office actions, applicants will have a 90-day deadline to submit a response. This response must include a technical discussion of the documents presented in the search report. If necessary, a new set of claims may be presented. Once the preliminary report is responded, the authority will continue the technical examination.

Date of examination request: Finally, it is important to emphasize that the distribution of patent examination requests, as well as the subsequent execution of the examination process, will now be organized based on the date of the examination request. This marks a departure from the previous arrangement, which was based on the date of the patent application.

Bibliographic reference:

https://www.gov.br/inpi/pt-br/servicos/patentes/plano-de-combate-ao-backlog

https://www.gov.br/inpi/pt-br/servicos/patentes/legislacao/legislacao/Resoluo2412019publicada.pdf

https://www.gov.br/inpi/pt-br/servicos/patentes/legislacao/legislacao/PortariaINPIPR4122020_DIRPAExamepedidospatentesembusca_05012021.pdf

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