Biggest patent offices in work-sharing drive The world's five largest patent offices have revealed a plan to cut patent pendency by increasing work sharing. Jung-Sik Koh, head of the Korean IP Office (KIPO) chaired a meeting held in Jeju, Korea from October 27 to 28. It was attended by the heads of the EPO, JPO, SIPO and USPTO. A vision statement published after the meeting says that the offices aim to: eliminate unnecessary duplication of work among the offices; enhance patent examination efficiency and quality; and guarantee of the stability of international patent rights. To reduce the problem of redundant search and examination work increasing pendency, each of the five offices has committed to lead two foundation projects. These aim to increase harmonisation and enable greater work sharing and are distributed around the offices. The only deadline contained in the statement is that the offices will exchange "detailed proposals" on each project identifying areas of agreement and details of implementation by the end of April next year.
