On January 6, 2017, a new Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) pilot program between the National Institute of Industrial Property of Chile (INAPI) and the Canadian Intellectual Property Office (CIPO) commenced.
The PPH program enables an applicant whose claims have been determined to be patentable/allowable to have a corresponding application filed with a PPH partner office processed in a faster, more efficient manner. The PPH program also allows the offices to benefit from work previously done by each other's patent offices, reducing examination workload.
Requests for accelerated examination under this PPH program can be made based on either national work products or Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) work products by the INAPI and CIPO, such as the Written Opinion of the International Searching Authority (WO-ISA), the Written Opinion of the International Preliminary Examination Authority (WO-IPEA) and the International Preliminary Report on Patentability (IPRP).
The pilot program will have a duration of three years, and may be extendable with previous agreement between the parties. The INAPI may suspend its participation in the pilot program at any stage, if the volume of participation exceeds a manageable level.
The guidelines of this new PPH program are available on the websites of the INAPI and CIPO.
Since 2016, Chile also has running PPH agreements with Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, México, Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay, which were signed under the framework of the Pacific Alliance, an initiative for regional integration developed by Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru, and the regional collaborative project on Industrial Property PROSUR.
Source:
http://www.inapi.cl
http://www.ic.gc.ca
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.