Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) between China and Germany Further Extended
The China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) and German Patent and Trade Mark Office (DPMA) have recently reached the agreement to extend the CNIPA-DPMA Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) pilot project, which will end on 22 January 2021, for three years until 22 January 2024. The relevant requirements and procedures for filing PPH requests with the two offices remain unchanged.
This PPH program commenced in 2012 and has been extended in 2014, 2016, and 2018 respectively. It is a bilateral work-sharing initiative between CNIPA and DPMA for the purpose of accelerating patent examination. An applicant who has filed a patent application with one office (first office) under the program may file a request for the expedited examination of the application with the partner office (second office) on condition that the application has at least one claim allowed by the first office.
