About 50,400 trademark applications were filed in Canada in 2013. Of these, about 20% were filed in-house or without an agent (about the same as in the last couple of years). Gowlings, Smart & Biggar and Bereskin & Parr were the firms that filed the most trademark applications. Check out my list of the 50 firms/agents that filed the most applications in 2013. Continue reading Canadian Trademark Firms in 2013
Tag Archives: Canadian Intellectual Property Office
Examinations
Changes have been made to the Patent Rules and Trade-marks Regulations governing the Patent Agent and Trade-mark Agent exams. The changes include more flexibility for scheduling the exams and requiring all new Trade-Mark Agents to have written the Trade-Mark Agent exam.
Final Action Regulations
Amendment to the Patent Rules were registered last week directed primarily to final action practice. These amendments follow from the consultations that took place 2012 and relate to amendments and practice after a final action and the Patent Appeal Board.
Patent Life Cycles
I’ve prepared a chart showing the twenty year ‘life cycle’ of the approximately 30,000 patent applications filed in 1992 and expired in 2012 from filing and examination to grant and abandonment. While approximately 13,000 applications (about 45%) resulted in issued patents, only about 4,000 were still in force after 20 years.
Patent Volume in 2012
The number of patent applications published in 2012 or that entered national phase in Canada in 2012 was down slightly from 2011 at about 33,874. Smart & Biggar, Gowlings and BLG top the list of firms by volume of applications for 2012.
Old Act Patents
I’ve updated my list of recently issued “Old Act” patents – three issued so far in 2013. These were filed prior to October 1989 but can expire 17 years from this year’s issue date.
Website Outages
Both the Federal Court and CIPO websites have scheduled outages this weekend. The Federal Court and Federal Court of Appeal announced that their website, email and e-filing will be unavailable from Friday night to Sunday morning. CIPO’s deposit accounts and some e-commerce services will be unavailable from Friday afternoon to Monday morning.
Do you have a “computer problem”?
CIPO has issued practice guidance to patent examiners on patentable subject matter (PN2013-02) and the examination of computer-implemented inventions (PN2013-03) following the November 2011 decision in Canada (Attorney General) v. Amazon.com Inc. 2011 FCA 328.
Top Canadian Patentees for 2012
Research In Motion tops the list of owners receiving the most Canadian patents during 2012. The others in the top five were Qualcomm, P&G, Schlumberger and LG Electronics. Approximately 20,000 Canadian patents were granted last year.
Canadian Trademark Firms for 2012
As mentioned earlier this month, about 50,000 trademark applications were filed in Canada in 2012. Of these, about 20% were filed in-house or without an agent (about the same as in 2011). Gowlings, Smart & Biggar and Bereskin & Parr were the firms that filed the most trademark applications. Check out my list of the 50 firms/agents that filed the most applications in 2012.