Programme

EPO guided tour
Registration & meeting point: EPO PschorrHöfe building VIII

The European Patent Register is the official platform for legal and procedural information on patent applications filed at the European Patent Office up to the moment of grant, and including any oppositions or appeals. Moreover, via the online file inspection, users can obtain the procedural correspondence between the EPO and the parties to the proceedings. Register Alert: is a module now integrated into the European Patent Register. It notifies you when specific changes in selected files occur. Users can select which changes trigger a notification and can monitor up to 1000 cases per account.

This training course is an introduction to the European Patent Office's online patent register and Register Alert service. You will learn how to retrieve data and view files and moreover, how to set alerts for your specific requirements. The workshop will also concentrate on how to interpret the information delivered via these products. On top of this, the participants will learn how to find the legal status of a European patent in the national phase, i.e. after grant, when it becomes the responsibility of the various national patent offices in Europe. Hands-on exercises will be set for the participants to practise. This will allow them to better understand the possibilities and limitations of the service.

1. How to interpret search reports produced by national patent offices:
   1. Run the prior art search.
   2. Look at the search reports.
   3. Look at how to interpret the search reports, what do the findings mean for the client and how best to act on the findings of the search report. What should be our advice to the client as to the next step, etc.
2. How to create professional search reports for clients:
   1. What does the client want, what are they hoping for?
      - Deciding the search type.
      - Confidentiality before starting search.
   2. What knowledge of IP and IP documentation does the client have?
      - Getting the essential information about inventions for the search.
   3. What information must a search report contain?
   4. What you can and cannot safely say (opinions, etc.).
      - Technical opinions and legal opinions.
   5. What is a good layout for the search report?
   6. Annexes and appendices.

Level: all
Maria Lampert, British Library (PATLIB Centre), UK
Mustafa Çakir, EBILTEM PATLIB Centre, Turkey
Björn Jürgens, CITPIA PATLIB Centre, Spain

14.00 - 17.30 Training course 10:
Competitive intelligence and technology watch

Patent analysis for policy-making: a case study
The session will demonstrate how to collect, analyse and present patent data in a meaningful way to support the business decision-making process. Participants will use the principles presented in case studies and present the findings to the group.

Level: advanced
Johannes Schaaf, EPO

14.00 - 17.30 Training course 11:
Technology transfer in universities: a case study
Level: Intermediate to advanced
John McManus, Intellectual Property Specialist, Ireland
Matthias Knöbel, PATLIB Centre Dresden, Germany

14.00 - 15.30 Training course 12:
Working with the new online tools and databases from OHIM
Level: all
Nicolas Vigneron, OHIM

16.00-17.30 Training course 13:
Searching Asian patents: China
China has witnessed a remarkable increase in patent filings over the last decade: currently a new application is filed at the Chinese Patent Office almost every minute. Consequently, prior art from the "Middle Kingdom" cannot be neglected in any professional patent search. This training will provide an overview of the most important features of the Chinese patent system and free databases offered by the Chinese Patent Office (SIPO).

Learning objectives

• Understand distinctive features of the granting procedure in China
• Obtain an overview of patent documentation (document types, numbers and kind codes)
• Learn how to perform prior art or freedom to operate searches in SIPO's databases
• Learn how to retrieve machine translations and original documents

Level: all
Jürgen Mühl, EPO

14.00 - 17.30 Training course 14:
A beginner’s guide to patent information
Learn some basic 'need-to-knows' for searching patent databases. If you are new to the patent world, this session will familiarise you with the key concepts of searching patents. Typical questions addressed in this seminar include:

• What are the different parts and types of information contained in a patent document?
• What do the various terms in a patent document mean?
• What are patent families, document kind codes, etc.?
• What are some basic rules for searching?
• How can I use classification systems for searching?
• How can I use Boolean operators and truncations?
• How can I construct logical expressions as search terms?