The Patent Cooperation Treaty 1970: What an International Application Is

In one line

The Patent Cooperation Treaty does not grant a patent: it lets an inventor file once, in one language, at one office, and be treated as having filed in every country designated, while deciding for another eighteen months which of them are worth the money.

In exam wording: the Patent Cooperation Treaty, concluded at Washington on 19 June 1970 and as amended on 3 October 2001, establishes a Union for cooperation in the filing, searching and examination of applications for the protection of inventions, an international application filed under it having, from the international filing date, the effect of a regular national application in each designated State, all substantive decisions on patentability remaining with the national offices.

Articles 1 and 2: the Union and the vocabulary

Article 1(1): the States party to this Treaty constitute a Union for cooperation in the filing, searching, and examination of applications for the protection of inventions, and for rendering special technical services. The Union is called the International Patent Cooperation Union.

Article 1(2) is the safeguard: no provision of this Treaty shall be interpreted as diminishing the rights under the Paris Convention of any national of, or resident in, a country party to that Convention.

Article 2 defines the terms. An application means an application for the protection of an invention. International application means an application filed under this Treaty. National application means an application filed with a national Office. Designated State means a State designated in an international application. Receiving Office means the national Office or the intergovernmental organisation with which the international application has been filed. Elected State means a State elected for the purposes of international preliminary examination.

Articles 3 to 8: what an international application is

Article 3(1): applications for the protection of inventions in any of the contracting States may be filed as international applications under this Treaty.

Article 3(2): an international application shall contain, as specified in this Treaty and the Regulations, a request, a description, one or more claims, one or more drawings where required, and an abstract.

Article 3(4) requires the application to be in a prescribed language, to comply with the prescribed physical requirements, to comply with the prescribed requirement of unity of invention, and to be subject to the payment of the prescribed fees.

Article 4, the request. It shall contain a petition that the international application be processed according to this Treaty, the designation of the contracting State or States in which protection is sought, the name of and other prescribed data concerning the applicant and the agent if any, the title of the invention, and the name of and other prescribed data concerning the inventor where national law so requires.