On 9 November 2021, the president of the Brazilian Patent and Trademark Office (BPTO), Cláudio Furtado, and the commissioner of the Japan Patent Office, Mori Kiyoshi, signed a memorandum of cooperation for the renewal of the patent prosecution highway (PPH) between Brazil and Japan.
Through the PPH, the result of the Brazilian patent examination can be used to speed up the analysis in Japan, and vice versa. The new agreement started on 1 December 2021 and will last for five years.
The Brazilian PPH programmes are currently ruled by a single resolution, and up to 600 PPH requests per year can be accepted in any technical field. This annual limit has been reached, but more 600 applications will be able to participate in the programme as of 2022.
Since the beginning of the PPH programme, 310 requests have been made in Brazil as a result of the agreement with Japan, and more than 80% of these have been granted.
PPH programmes are an excellent opportunity to speed up the prosecution of an application: considering all PPH requests since 2020, the average time between the request and the final technical decision is 200 days. In addition, the numbers show that most of the applications examined in the programme are granted.
For further information on this topic please contact Mônica Gurvitz at Montaury Pimenta, Machado & Vieira de Mello by telephone (+55 21 2524 0510) or email ([email protected]). The Montaury Pimenta, Machado & Vieira de Mello website can be accessed at www.montaury.com.br.