The Convention on the Grant of European Patents of 5 October 1973, commonly known as the European Patent Convention (EPC), is a multilateral treaty instituting the European Patent Organisation and providing an autonomous legal system according to which European patents are granted. The term European patent is used to refer to patents granted under the European Patent Convention. However, after grant a European patent is not a unitary right, but a group of essentially independent nationally-enforceable, nationally-revocable patents, subject to central revocation or narrowing as a group pursuant to two types of unified, post-grant procedures: a time-limited opposition procedure, which can be initiated by any person except the patent proprietor, and limitation and revocation procedures, which can be initiated by the patent proprietor only.
The EPC provides a legal framework for the granting of European patents, via a single, harmonized procedure before the European Patent Office. A single patent application, in one language, may be filed at the European Patent Office at Munich, at its branches at The Hague or Berlin or at a national patent office of a Contracting State, if the national law of the State so permits.
Read more about European Patent Convention: Background and Rationale, History, Legal Nature and Content, Substantive Patent Law, Unified Prosecution Phase, Opposition, Grant, Effect and Need For Translations, Enforcement and Validity, Term (duration) of A European Patent, Relation With The Patent Cooperation Treaty
Other articles related to "european patent convention, convention, european patent, patent, european":
... more precisely recognise priority rights for first filings in or for States party to the Paris Convention or any Member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) Any person who ... shall have the effect that the date of priority shall count as the date of filing of the European patent application for the purposes of Article 54, paragraphs 2 and 3, and Article 60 ... As explained by the Enlarged Board of Appeal of the European Patent Office (EPO) in its decision G 3/93 of August 16, 1994 (Reasons 4) Articles 87 to 89 EPC provide a complete, self-containe ...
... Article 83 of the European Patent Convention (EPC) relates to the disclosure of the invention under the European Patent Convention ... It prescribes that a European patent application must disclose the invention (which is the subject of the European patent application) in a manner sufficiently ... to meet the requirements of Article 83 EPC, a European patent application must therefore contain sufficient information to allow a person skilled in the art, using his common general knowledge, to perceive the ...
... A European patent application may result from the filing of an international application under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) and the entry into "European regional phase" ... The European patent application is therefore said to be a "Euro-PCT application" and the EPO is said to act as a designated or elected Office ... no longer possible to obtain a national patent protection through the international (PCT) phase without entering into the regional European phase and obtaining a European patent ...
... Article 84 of the European Patent Convention (EPC) defines the function of the claims under the European Patent Convention, the function being to define the matter, i.e ... the invention, for which patent protection is sought ... imposes that the claims must be clear, concise as well as supported by the description of the European patent application or patent ...
Famous quotes containing the words convention, european and/or patent:
“By convention there is color, by convention sweetness, by
convention bitterness, but in reality there are atoms and space.”
—Democritus (c. 460–400 B.C.)
“Americans want action for their money. They are fascinated by its self-reproducing qualities if it’s put to work.... Gold-hoarding goes against the American grain; it fits in better with European pessimism than with America’s traditional optimism.”
—Paula Nelson (b. 1945)
“There is a patent office at the seat of government of the universe, whose managers are as much interested in the dispersion of seeds as anybody at Washington can be, and their operations are infinitely more extensive and regular.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)