Search services
If you have reached your limits with English-language searching, why not contact us for assistance? The experts at the EPO's Asian Patent Information Services are skilled in the languages and can provide you with the following services:
Korean subject-matter searches
Korean patent monitoring
Chinese patent monitoring
Legal status information
Japanese file wrappers
Japanese subject-matter searches
Korean subject-matter searches
Professional prior-art searches are now available for Korean documents in original-language databases. Your search profile in English will be passed on to the Korean Patent Information Promotion Center (PIPC), which is a specialised search institute in charge of prior-art searches for the Korean Patent Office (KIPO). The PIPC will translate your English keywords into Korean and perform searches in the complete documents, including the description.
A number of test runs will be conducted with your profile free of charge. You will then receive a sample of the test results to help you optimise your search profile. Once you have finalised your profile, you simply confirm your final order. After paying the fees (see below), you will receive the complete list of results, an overview of the search history and - upon request - Korean full texts for all results. The results will be delivered to you within a few working days.
Prices
Two different delivery options are available depending on your particular requirements:
- Result list with publication numbers and English titles: EUR 128
- Result list with publication numbers and English titles and Korean full texts for all results: EUR 180
Please contact us for further details and a free test run of your profile.
Korean patent monitoring
We can monitor new Korean patent and utility model publications (laid-open publications, granted patents, registered utility models) at regular intervals according to your needs. The first run will be performed by the Korean Patent Information Promotion Center (PIPC) in the same way as a single state-of-the-art search (see above). Afterwards, the PIPC will conduct the same search at your preferred frequency - either fortnightly, monthly, quarterly or half-yearly. The results will be delivered to you within a few working days.
Prices
Two different options are available depending on your particular requirements:
- Result list with publication numbers and English titles: EUR 128 for the first search and EUR 29 for each additional search
- Result list with publication numbers and English titles and Korean full texts for all results: EUR 180 for the first search and EUR 39 for each additional search
Please contact us for further details and a free test run of your profile.
Chinese patent monitoring
We can monitor new Chinese patent and utility model publications (laid-open publications, granted patents, registered utility models) according to your needs. Your existing watch profiles (e.g. with IPC classes, names and/or keywords) will be passed on to the Chinese Patent Office's "Intellectual Property Publishing House" (IPPH) and translated into Chinese. Keyword searches will be conducted in the title, abstract and claims. A first test run of your new profile will be provided free of charge and sample data will be supplied to help create your final search profile. Alternatively, the IPPH can create a tailor-made monitoring profile for you, based on your particular search requirements.
In addition to a regular monitoring, the IPPH can also conduct other types of patent searches on your behalf. For further details, please contact us.
The IPPH will monitor your profile at your preferred frequency, e.g. fortnightly, monthly, quarterly or half-yearly.
The results will be delivered to you within a few working days. Depending on your particular interests, the results will include
- a database printout, showing the monitored profile
- human-aided machine translations of the bibliography and/or abstract and/or main claim and/or all claims of the documents which were found based on the profile
- a representative drawing
Prices
We will charge a flat fee of EUR 112 for the initial creation of your watch profile. This fee only applies once the watch profile has been created and the final order has been placed.
In addition, the following charges apply, depending on the number of results and the output format:
- results list (document numbers, English titles): EUR 52/flat fee
(note: fee also applies in cases where the monitoring run gives no results) - bibliographic data: EUR 7/per document
- title, abstract: EUR 7/per document
- title, abstract, main claim (<1000 Chinese characters): EUR 23/per document
- title, abstract, main claim (>1000 Chinese characters): EUR 31/per document
Human-aided translations of full documents (bibliography, claims, specification, drawings) can be supplied upon request. As the costs for this service depend on the length of the original Chinese document, please contact us for a cost estimate.
Please contact us if you have any further questions.
Legal status information
The EPO's Asian Patent Information Services offer legal status searches for documents from Japan, China, Chinese Taipei and Korea. According to your requirements, we can provide you with annotated reports in English or German which are based on legal status information relating to the periods during and after the grant procedure, and during legal proceedings (partially provided).
For up-to-date legal status information on Japanese industrial property rights (patents, utility models, trade marks and designs), we use the Japanese-language database provided by the Japan Patent Office (JPO) via its Japan Platform for Patent Information (J-PlatPat), the most comprehensive source of legal status information on Japanese industrial property rights. We can also provide additional information such as citations (partially provided), domestic priorities, data on divisionals, and the names of the parties to various proceedings.
For Chinese, Taiwanese and Korean documents, legal status information is available in free databases hosted by the State Intellectual Property Office of China (SIPO), the Taiwan Patent Office (TIPO) and the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO). As part of the information is currently only available in the original languages, we will search in these sources on your behalf and provide you with annotated reports.
We will usually answer your requests for legal status information within one or two working days, in urgent cases within a few hours. The results of our legal status searches can be sent to you by letter, fax or e-mail depending on the urgency. Preliminary information can be supplied by telephone.
Prices
- Annotated legal status reports for Japanese documents: EUR 30 per query and document
- Annotated legal status reports for Chinese/Taiwanese/Korean documents: EUR 27 per query and document
Ordering
Submit your order for a legal status search for a Japanese, Chinese, Taiwanese or Korean document.
Legal status watches
We can monitor changes in the legal status of documents from Japan, China, Chinese Taipei and Korea. With every legal status watch run, you will receive a printout of the legal status of the documents that are being watched. Any new information is highlighted and explained.
Legal status watches take place on a two-weekly, monthly, quarterly, half-yearly or annual basis, in line with the updates to the databases.
Prices
- Legal status watch for Japanese documents: EUR 24 per document/watch run
- Simultaneous monitoring of >10 Japanese documents: EUR 21 per document/watch run
- Legal status watch for Chinese/Taiwanese/Korean documents: EUR 21 per document/watch run
For bulk orders please contact us for information on our special conditions.
Ordering
Please contact us to order legal status watches.
Japanese file wrappers
We can order electronic copies of full or partial Japanese file wrappers via the "Japan Patent Information Organisation" (Japio) from the Japan Patent Office on your behalf. If the copies are available in electronic form (PDF format), e-mail delivery is usually possible within a few working days. Older paper files need to be processed first in order to be delivered electronically.
Please contact us for further details on this service.
Japanese subject-matter searches
The EPO’s Asian Patent Information Services carry out subject-matter searches in Japanese on behalf of clients. Search profiles are prepared jointly with our clients. Results and output formats can be discussed in detail and copies of documents can be supplied. We can also provide a translation of the search result.
Please contact us for further details and a free test run of your profile.
European Patent Office
Product Distribution and Specialised Services
Asian Patent Information Services
Rennweg 12
1030 Vienna
Austria
Tel.: +43 1 52126 4545
Fax: +43 1 52126 4197
e-mail: asiainfo@epo.org