Law on preliminary information search and preliminary assessment of patentability was signed
Federal Law No. 262-FZ of July 31, 2020 adopted amendments to the Civil Code of the Russian Federation, providing for the involvement of accredited organizations in conducting an information search and preliminary assessment of patentability as part of the examination of applications for inventions and utility models in essence.
The document introduces a procedure for preliminary information search and preliminary assessment of patentability for applications for inventions and utility models with the involvement of specialized Russian scientific and educational organizations, which will be accredited by Rospatent.
Russian organizations operating in specific areas of technology in the staff of which there are specialists with competencies in the field of information retrieval and assessment of the patentability of technical solutions will be involved as accredited organizations. In particular, such organizations can be institutions of the Russian Academy of Sciences, research institutes, leading universities. Their accreditation will be carried out by Rospatent free of charge.
The preliminary information search service will be provided to applicants on a voluntary basis. However, the cost of assessing patentability will be determined by scientific and educational institutions, based on the complexity, volume and duration of each information search in contracts concluded between the applicant and organizations.
In June 2019, the Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation, the Federal Service for Intellectual Property (Rospatent) and the Government of the Republic of Tatarstan signed a tripartite agreement on cooperation in support of development of the intellectual property sphere.
The Agreement provides for the creation of a competence center under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Economy of the Republic of Tatarstan, State Unitary Institution of the RT “Tatarstan CSTI”, the functional purpose of which will include, among other things, conducting preliminary information search and assessing patentability.
The adoption of the bill will make it possible to officially approve the powers of the CSTI to carry out the functions of an accredited organization.
The text of the adopted document can be found here https://rospatent.gov.ru/ru/documents/fed-zakon-262-31072020/download