Revision of the European Patent Convention

A revision conference for the European Patent Convention (EPC) was held in Munich from November 20 to 29, 2000. The delegates from the 20 member states of the European Patent Organisation considered a catalogue of nearly 100 proposals for revising provisions of the present Convention.

This revision is the first comprehensive review of the European Patent Convention which has been signed in 1973. The aim of the revision was to subject the European patent system to a cautious modernization in the light of technical and legal developments and in the light of practical experience.

Among others the conference approved the following amendments:

The EPC is brought into line with the provisions of the forthcoming Patent Law Treaty (PLT). In future, it will be possible to file patent applications in any language to obtain a filing date. However, a translation into one of the official languages of the EPO will be required within three months after the filing date. Thus, applicants, also from non-EPC countries, will be able to make a last minute filing without a translation of the application documents into one of the official EPO languages, presently only possible by filing a PCT application.

During the application procedure before the European Patent Office, applicants will benefit from improved protection against inadvertent legal consequences arising from the non-observance of time limits. The scope for applying further processing has been broadened and made the standard legal remedy in cases of failure to observe time limits in the grant procedure or in related ex-parte appeal proceedings. Hence, in contrast to the current provisions, further processing may for instance be applied to the time limits for filing documents during the examination as to formal requirements, e.g. priority documents, declaration of inventorship. In addition, re-establishment of the priority period in accordance with Article 87 (1) will be possible within two months after expiry of the priority period.

A central limitation procedure has been introduced before the EPO. Patent proprietors may request at any time a limitation of the protection afforded by their patents. The procedure to be followed will be very similar to the existing limitation procedure for limiting German Patents before the German Patent and Trademark Office.

The Enlarged Board of Appeal is given the additional competence to decide on petitions for a limited judicial review of decisions of the Boards of Appeal. Such petitions may be filed by any party of the proceedings before a Board of Appeal but may only be based on fundamental procedural defects occurred during the appeal proceedings or a criminal act that may have had an impact on the decision of the boards of appeal, e.g. false testimony.

Not all amendments, which were presented to the revision conference in the proposal [see proposal] prepared by the Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation, have been approved. In particular, the provision of Article 52 (2) relating to the protection of computer programs has been left unchanged. In view of the ongoing consultations on the future of the legal protection in this field, especially as initiated by the European Commission in order to harmonize legislation within the European Union, the conference agreed to not yet delete computer programs from the list of non-patentable inventions. Thus, the existing legal situation for patenting software related inventions remains unchanged.

The revised text of the EPC will not enter into force before being ratified by the parliaments of at least 15 EPC member states which is expected not before the year 2004 or 2005.

Full details on the Act of November 29, 2000 revising the European Patent Convention are available [see Act].