Search Matters 2022

WS01

Retrieving efficiently valuable information from international patent office cooperation using Global Dossier and Common Citation Document

This interactive online workshop focuses on efficiently retrieving documents and information that have been cited by other intellectual property offices (e.g. IP5) for patent family members or similar applications. This information can be helpful in searches done in order to prepare the filing of an opposition or a new patent application, for example. To this end, the possibilities of Global Dossier and Common Citation Document will be explored together with the audience. The audience will be shown using practical examples how and what kind of valuable (sometimes hidden) information can be retrieved and how this information should then be understood. This source of information is of high interest for search professionals, because it can deliver further relevant documents for the underlying case and allows the search professional, for instance, to fine-tune their search and focus on other key features. Selected examples will be given from the field of green technologies.

WS02

Search! Ansera presentation

Are you a Searcher or a Finder? Find out in this workshop.

SEARCH is a patent prior art search tool aimed at patent search professionals. SEARCH is the result of the EPO’s technology jump to a state-of-the-art patent search platform for patent examiners at the EPO and national patent offices. Currently being piloted by over 100 examiners in 10 EPC patent offices, the tool leverages the scalability of the cloud in future to deliver a service to around 2000 patent examiners.

At Search Matters 2021 we presented a first version of SEARCH. In the past year we have ported the software to the high availability Google Cloud Platform and upgraded it to incorporate the latest user interface developments.

At Search Matters we will present the current version of the SEARCH, show how the project has developed in the last 12 months and provide a glimpse of where we plan to go with this powerful tool.

WS03

Use of design patents as prior art

Design Patents and Industrial Designs, hereinafter referred as Designs, are intended to protect the appearance, the aesthetic of products. In accordance to the European Patent Convention patents are granted to inventions in all field of technology and we do not consider as inventions, among other things, aesthetic creations and presentation of information. This may suggest that Designs are not suitable to be considered as a prior art document to challenge novelty and inventive step during the patent grant process. The analysis of EP searches revealed that examiners actively cite Designs as prior art as anticipating novelty and inventive step. Remarkable is the use of Designs as part of the “Problem Solution Approach” methodology to prove the obviousness of an invention. Designs are also used in Opposition Procedures.

The analysis of these cases showed that Designs are used to protect objects which one would not classify as having a high degree of “aesthetic”, e.g. rivet, hinge, brake disc but rather sheer mechanical. It seems also that Designs are not simply used as complementary to patents but it appears that they are used as a substitutive.

All this point out that a comprehensive patent prior art search must include also Designs but to do that one needs at least basic information about Design publications, classifications, databases and techniques to search them.

WS04

Searchers and finders

In this presentation two extreme mindsets of a search examiner are worked out: the Searcher and the Finder. The approaches, advantages and disadvantages of each mindset will be discussed. Finally a way for obtaining the advantages of both mindsets within the same search is proposed.

The primary aim of the presentation is to make examiners aware of their own mindset, so that they don’t subconsciously mix both mindsets. The secondary aim is to encourage examiners to actively control their own mindset, resulting in an improved quality and efficiency of the search.

WS05

Searching Chinese non-patent literature

Searching non-patent literature (NPL) is indispensable for questions of freedom-to-operate, patentability, opposition or validity. Not only do the majority of patent applications come from China, Japan and Korea (CKJ) but also a huge amount of NPL, most of which do not have full text in English , although more and more journals provide English abstracts. For this reason, there is no way around searching Asian NPL databases. This may seem like a very challenging task, as one has to find out which Asian language databases exist. There is also the concern that Asian NPL databases can only be efficiently searched using these Asian languages.

The aim of this presentation is to show how to lower the threshold for searching Chinese NPL for non-CJK speakers. Chinese NPL is taken as an example since it is a one of the major sources of Asian language NPL. We will show where to find information about NPL publishing activities for specific fields in Asia. The most important free-of-charge NPL Chinese databases will be presented, and we will give a short overview how to use them.

In addition, it is briefly shown how efficient and high quality search in Asian NPL at the EPO is achieved by cooperation between various experts in Asian documentation. Finally, you will learn how the EPO can support external researchers in their NPL searches.

WS06

Finding relevant prior art in 30 minutes

The presentation will start with a discussion on participants favourite (different) public search tools and why it helps them find prior art quickly. Then the importance of being able to build up search strategies that effectively narrow down the search result will be shown, starting from an example. TFinally the workshop will comprise a guided group exercise in doing a search.

WS07

Prior art cited from the internet

Over the last years, the number of citations relating to internet e.g. YouTube videos, Wikipedia and archive websites has significantly increased. Searching on the internet is often an efficient way for examiners and patent information professionals to find relevant prior art in the form of a pdf, a website, a video, and so on. In this workshop, general guidance will be provided as to the applicable legal framework regarding standard and burden of proof according to EPO practice. We will analyse the conditions under which these different kinds of prior art may be relevant and how to search each of them efficiently. We will explore ways of citing YouTube videos. A number of practical methods and computer tools for determining the publication date of an internet disclosure will be presented. The information and practical tips provided in this workshop will make you better equipped to meet the challenges posed by this particular type of prior art.

WS08

Searching AI-related application in clean and green IP

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) have re-gained enormous importance in the last decade. Applications involving AI and ML algorithms are mushrooming, with examples in clean and green IP ranging from understanding and tackling environmental challenges, over emission monitoring and classification, to immensely improving energy efficiency by optimising electric devices and operational processes in a vast variety of areas.

Searching such applications is challenging:

Firstly, AI/ML algorithms are essentially mathematical and computational methods. The patent classification system, being technology-based on the other hand, is difficult to use for mathematical methods per se. Secondly, a particular AI/ML algorithm may find applications in diverse technical areas ranging from chemistry to aerospace, which often necessitates an extensive search effort.Thirdly, when searching AI/ML methods, one is often confronted with the additional problem of how to search mathematical formulae or numerical algorithms. Finally, a major part of the prior art clearly resides in non-patent literature, which renders a systematic search difficult.

It is therefore essential to develop efficient search strategies using the World Wide Web, which are particularly adapted to such computer-implemented inventions (CII).

In an interactive presentation, with examples and case studies focusing on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML), we will develop search strategies tailored to deal with these challenges.

WS09

Inventor teams and their interrelated patents

Beyond patent families, there are other closely interrelated patents and patent applications. Firms who wish to be active in a particular area of technology need to ensure that their products will not infringe existing patents or existing patent applications which might later be granted. This requires an adequate patent search to uncover all interrelated patents and applications. Frequently, these are from a single applicant, but often with multiple inventors, or networks of inventors, and concern similar, but not identical subject-matter. This workshop presents simple-to-use but effective techniques which anyone can apply, using inventor names to retrieve such related applications. Since for prior art searches, the inventor names can also be used to search for academic literature by the inventors as authors, techniques for finding related scientific articles will also be demonstrated. These techniques are based on ones used at the EPO to find similar applications at the pre-search stage, which have proven their value in widespread systematic use for over twenty years using tools the Office has developed. Examples from various fields of technology, including green technologies, will be presented using Espacenet. A novel use of figures in determining relationships will also be shown.

WS10

Search matters? Search matters!

Applicants are not required to search the prior art before filing a patent application with the European Patent Office. However, knowledge of the literature and the market that exists in a field can help you understand the strength or weakness of an invention. A thorough search improves the credibility rating afforded to the patent application by investors and thus the chances of receiving funding. It gives you information about market potential by revealing other ideas. More generally, it can help you to determine whether or not to spend further time and money on an idea.

In this interactive workshop we will discuss the general importance of the search based on real cases, including an example from the area of low carbon energy technology.

You will discover that a good search does indeed matter!

WS11

Access to clean and green IP in Japanese patent documentation, using classification and indexing

The purpose of this workshop is to optimise prior art retrieval of clean and green IP technology in Japanese patent documentation, via Japanese Fl classes and F-term indexing terms, alone and combined with keyword searches. Strategies are presented for efficient and complete searches in Japanese documentation using publicly available sources and search tools. The philosophy behind FI and F-term classification is explained.

The workshop is suitable for those who already have a basic understanding of classification, finding appropriate codes and using them in simple search strategies.

The workshop will include the following topics:

the underlying "philosophy" of the Japanese Fl classification and F-term indexing systems, and their concordance with the IPC the dynamics of Japanese Fl and F-term systems relating to clean and green IP: amended and new schemes, reorganisation of existing classes/terms publicly available sources for Japanese patent and non-patent documentation, with a focus on J-PlatPat search engines, search syntax and search strategy for examples taken from clean and green IP.

WS12

Non-patent literature searches

On average, one in every five EPO search reports contains a non-patent literature (NPL) document citation, mainly from academic papers, while more than half of all search reports in chemistry and biotechnology cite non-patent literature. Hence, non-patent literature is essential for ensuring the quality of the EPO searches.

NPL is all the more important in high-tech areas such as genetic engineering and smart materials which are often incubated in academia and for which the “spin-offs” rely on our search report for securing further financing.

In this workshop, we will demonstrate searching dedicated internet search engines for academic publications and retrieving the full-text of the search results. Two detailed examples will be presented: one concerning genetically engineered microorganisms for waste disposal and one about smart skins for reducing the fuel consumption of aircraft.

The workshop will conclude with a discussion of additional subject-specific resources, recent developments in scientific publishing and a brief discussion on dates and public availability.

Plenary 1:

Approaching 10 years of the Cooperative patent classification: where do we stand?

In this presentation we will give you an update on the Cooperative Patent Classification as well as some advance information on the new features we are currently working on. The focus will be on the services and products which are already or will soon become available to users. EPO’s external classification portal, AI-supported classification and classification for green technologies will also be covered.

Plenary 2:

Clean and Green IP and how to find it

Green tech is a top priority across the globe, and innovation in green tech is key to achieving ambitious goals, such as zero carbon emissions in the medium term. Patenting in green tech has increased much more than in many other technical fields and is the subject of scrutiny for a variety of players, from governments looking for data to stimulate and steer innovation, to companies, inventors and investors. Green technologies get special attention at the EPO too.

In this presentation you will be guided along some of the things the EPO is doing to help you to navigate your way to relevant patent info in green tech, including some practical examples.

Plenary 3:

Artificial intelligence for automatically assigning Y02/Y04

The inventories of the Y tags of the Cooperative Patent Classification scheme are more relevant than ever: Climate change mitigation technologies are paramount in tackling human CO2 emissions and climate change in general. Y02 tags represent EPO’s commitment to identify and accurately tag these technologies for internal and most importantly external usage. Until now Y symbols have been assigned with intellectually curated expert queries which have been run in certain intervals. In the future Y tags will be assigned using EPO’s language model EP-BERT which was fine tuned to identify patents that cover technologies from the Y inventories. In this presentation we showcase the approach in selecting training data, how we incorporated the whole organisation in a potential solution and how the final model’s performance is evaluated. The new model can assign Y tags in real-time for each application and prior art. We also show the increased efforts in quality checks that will ensure high consistency and quality of the future AI assigned Y tags.

Plenary 4:

IP5 offices achievements supporting search

Since its inception, the EPO has major cooperations with other patent offices worldwide. A large part of those activities are dedicated to patent information exchanges and the creation of common tools aimed at examiners and external users. This presentation will highlight recent IP5 achievements that benefit all patent information users (IP5 is a forum of the five largest intellectual property offices in the world). It will also explore what further contributions cooperation activities will deliver in a near future.