The European Patent Office (EPO) is one of the two organs of the European Patent Organisation (EPOrg), the other being the Administrative Council. The EPO acts as executive body for the organisation while the Administrative Council acts as its supervisory body as well as, to a limited extent, its legislative body. The actual legislative power to revise the European Patent Convention lies with the Contracting States themselves when meeting at a Conference of the Contracting States.
The European Patent Organisation is a public international organisation created in 1977 by its contracting states to grant patents in Europe under the European Patent Convention (EPC) of 1973. The European Patent Organisation has its seat at Munich, Germany, and has administrative and financial autonomy. The organisation is independent from the European Union, and has as member states all 27 EU member states along with 12 other European states.
The European Patent Convention (EPC), also known as the Convention on the Grant of European Patents of 5 October 1973, 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, 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 2000 or European Patent Convention 2000 is the version of the European Patent Convention (EPC) as revised by the Act Revising the Convention on the Grant of European Patents signed in Munich on November 29, 2000. On June 28, 2001, the Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation adopted the final new text of the EPC 2000. The EPC 2000 entered into force on December 13, 2007.
The London Agreement, formally the Agreement on the application of Article 65 of the Convention on the Grant of European Patents and sometimes referred to as the London Protocol, is a patent law agreement concluded in London on 17 October 2000 and aimed at reducing the translation costs of European patents granted under the European Patent Convention (EPC). The London Agreement is an agreement between some member states of the European Patent Organisation, and has not altered other language requirements applying to European patent applications prior to grant.
Alison Jane Brimelow CBE is a British civil servant and former chief executive and Comptroller General of the UK Patent Office, now known as the Intellectual Property Office. She was the fifth President of the European Patent Office, a position she held from 1 July 2007 to 30 June 2010.
epoline is a set of web-based computer programs and services enabling applicants, patentees and their representatives to file patent applications online before the European Patent Office (EPO), as well as to monitor the status of patent applications during their prosecution and patents during an opposition. The epoline products and services have been implemented and are maintained by the EPO, according to the Decision of the President of the EPO dated 29 October 2002.
Roland Edouard Grossenbacher is a Swiss lawyer, who served as chairman of the Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation from 5 March 2000 to 4 March 2009. He was appointed at this post for a first three-year term on 5 March 2000. He was then reelected in 2002 for a second term, beginning on 5 March 2003. In December 2005, he was again re-elected as Chairman of the Council from a third term from 5 March 2006 to 4 March 2009. After he stepped down in March 2009, he was made "Honorary Chairman" of the Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation.
The Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation is one of the two organs of the European Patent Organisation (EPOrg), the other being the European Patent Office (EPO). The Administrative Council acts as the Organisation's supervisory body as well as, to a limited extent, its legislative body. The actual legislative power to revise the European Patent Convention (EPC) lies with the Contracting States themselves when meeting at a Conference of the Contracting States. In contrast, the EPO acts as executive body of the Organisation.
The European Round Table on Patent Practice (EUROTAB) is described as "a pan-European group consisting of lawyers in the patent field", or a body where the national patent offices of the Contracting States of the European Patent Convention (EPC) and the European Patent Office come together to discuss differences in practice and see whether a harmonized approach is possible.
Benoît Battistelli is a French civil servant, former president of the European Patent Office (EPO) (2010-2018), and former head of the French National Industrial Property Institute (INPI).
Susanne Birgitta Ås Sivborg is the Director of Lantmäteriet since 1 January 2018. Before that, she was Director General of the Swedish Patent and Registration Office. She was candidate for the position of President of the European Patent Office, which was to be filled on 1 July 2010, but was not elected to the position.
During the grant procedure before the European Patent Office (EPO), divisional applications can be filed under Article 76 EPC out of pending earlier European patent applications. A divisional application, sometimes called European divisional application, is a new patent application which is separate and independent from the earlier application, unless specific provisions in the European Patent Convention (EPC) require something different. A divisional application, which is divided from an earlier application, cannot be broader than the earlier application, neither in terms of subject-matter nor in terms of geographical cover.
Alberto Casado Cerviño is a former Director General of the Spanish Patent and Trademark Office. He was appointed to this position on May 24, 2008. From July 1, 2009 to June 30, 2010, he also acted as Chairman ad interim of the Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation. Previously, from 1994 to 2004, he served as Vice-President of the Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market (OHIM).
The Danish Patent and Trademark Office (DKPTO) is the patent office of Denmark. As of 2013, its director general was Jesper Kongstad. Sune Stampe Sørensen succeeded Jesper Kongstad in October 2017.
Art. 23 1/15, Art. 23 2/15 and Art. 23 1/16 are three related cases decided by the Enlarged Board of Appeal of the European Patent Office concerning the removal from office of Patrick Corcoran, a member of the Boards of Appeal, who had been previously suspended by the Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation. According to Article 23(1) EPC, members of the Boards of Appeal may only be removed from office by the Administrative Council on a proposal from the Enlarged Board of Appeal. Two cases were successively initiated by the Administrative Council, but the Enlarged Board eventually dismissed both of them. In the third case initiated by the Administrative Council, the Enlarged Board decided not to propose the removal from office of Corcoran.
Carl Josefsson is a former Swedish Judge at the Svea Court of Appeal in Stockholm, and currently President of the Boards of Appeal of the European Patent Office (EPO), a new position created within the EPO. He took up his new position on 1 March 2017 for a period of five years. As President of the Boards of Appeal of the EPO, Josefsson also acts as President of the Enlarged Board of Appeal.
António Campinos is a Portuguese civil servant. He is the seventh and current president of the European Patent Office (EPO), a post he took up on 1 July 2018 for a five-year term. He was re-elected in 2022 for a second five-year term, which started on 1 July 2023. Before heading the EPO, he was executive director of the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) from 1 October 2010 to 2018. Before 2010, he was in charge of Portugal's National Institute of Industrial Property. He is also a French citizen.
Christoph Ernst is a German civil servant, who was Chairman of the Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation from 1 October 2017 until October 2018. In October 2018, he was appointed Vice-President of the European Patent Office's (EPO) Directorate-General Legal and International Affairs, starting on 1 January 2019, and he then resigned from his position as Chairman of the Administrative Council.
G 2/19 is a decision issued by the Enlarged Board of Appeal of the European Patent Office (EPO) on 16 July 2019, which deals with three legal questions, the third relating to whether oral proceedings before the EPO Boards of Appeal may be held in Haar in the Munich district rather than in Munich per se, when a party objects to the oral proceedings being held in Haar. In July 2019, the Enlarged Board of Appeal decided that oral proceedings before the Boards of Appeal may be held in Haar without infringing Article 113(1) EPC and Article 116(1) EPC.
