Search Phase
If, when carrying out a search, the search division considers that the application lacks unity (i.e., if the provisions of Article 82 are considered not to be met), a partial search report is established. One or more further search fees are then requested by the EPO for the other identified inventions, or groups of inventions, to be covered by the search.
The former time limit for paying the further search fees was a period specified by the EPO, which had to be between two weeks and six weeks. Under new Rule 64 EPC, which entered into force on April 1, 2010, the time limit for paying the further search fees is now a period of two months.
Read more about this topic: Unity Of Invention Under The European Patent Convention
Famous quotes containing the words search and/or phase:
“The philosophic spirit of inquiry may be traced to brute curiosity, and that to the habit of examining all things in search of food.”
—W. Winwood Reade (1838–1875)
“The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line—the relation of the darker to the lighter races of men in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea. It was a phase of this problem that caused the Civil War.”
—W.E.B. (William Edward Burghardt)