Earlier this week, CIPO and the European Patent Office announced a memorandum of understanding to establish a Patent Prosecution Highway between the two offices to expedite patent applications. In other European news, the text of CETA, the Canada/Europe Trade Agreement was officially published.

EPO PPH

Once the memorandum comes into force in January 2015, claims found patentable by either CIPO or the EPO can accelerate processing before the other office.

CIPO already has Patent Prosecution Highway agreements with Australia, Denmark, Finland, Hungary, Iceland, Israel, Japan, Korea, the Nordic Patent Institute, Norway, Portugal, UK, Russia, Spain, Sweden, the United States, China, Germany and Mexico (see list and details).

The European Patent Office is the fifth biggest recipient of patent applications in the world (after China, the United States, Japan and Korea) so the announcement means CIPO now has PPH agreements with the top five patent offices by volume.

Approximately 30% of the patent applications filed with CIPO originate from member countries of the European Patent Office (based on 2012 statistics published by CIPO).

CETA

After many announcements, and leaked versions, the negotiated text of agreement has been published by the Canadian government.  Section 22 of the text deals with intellectual property, including:

• copyright technological measures, rights management and ISP liability
• trademarks including geographic indicators
• patents including sui generis protection for pharmaceuticals, data protection
• enforcement including provisional measures and border measures