The Intellectual Property Office (IPOPhil) and the EC-ASEAN Cooperation Programme (ECAP II) held a five-day Patent Application Drafting and Prosecution seminar from October 10 to 15, which was conducted by Karl Rackette, a European and German patent attorney. At the seminar, IPOPhil distributed a draft regulation aimed at introducing a qualifying examination for patent agents. At the moment, there is no formal patent attorney or patent agent profession in the Philippines. Patent applications are handled by lawyers with assistance from people with technical knowledge, many of whom are former IPOPhil patent examiners. The objective of the proposed regulation is to develop a patent agent profession in the country. The main points of the proposal are as follows:
Examinations will be held when IPOPhil considers it convenient, but the period between two examinations should not exceed 36 months;
The examination will be organized and conducted by a board made up of three members who will appoint an examination committee;
Candidates must hold a bachelor's degree or post graduate degree in either chemistry, electronics and communication, mechanics, civil or genetic engineering, biology, biochemistry, microbiology, molecular biology, medicine or any allied medical course, pharmacy, physics, or any other existing or emerging technical field approved by the director-general;
The examination will establish whether a candidate is able to write a patent application and to amend it under the law of the Philippines, the PCT rules and the IPOPhil manual of substantive examination;
The examination will be in English;
The first examination will be administered by two experts from the European Patent Office who will conduct a five-day seminar beforehand.
The seminar and the examination will be open to IPOPhil patent examiners and former patent examiners who have at least four years of substantive examining work experience. Candidates that hold one of the degrees listed above will also be eligible to take it.
The regulation does not address whether qualifying lawyers that have been handling patent applications will be eligible to sit the examination. This issue is likely to be raised with the authorities.
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| Editha R Hechanova |
