Who can participate in an information consultation using the shared area?

The participant must be a person entitled to act for the applicant before the EPO. See Guidelines C-VII, 2.2 for full details of what this means.    

On request of the person entitled to act, other persons may be allowed to take part in the consultation if their participation is relevant to the proceedings, such as the inventor, a non-European representative or an employee of the applicant. 

Where the consultation is held as a videoconference, these persons may connect from a different location than the person entitled to act before the EPO.  The examiner will check the identity of participants if there is any doubt as to their identity. 

For the examining division, only the examiner dealing with the case will normally be present.  However other members of the examining division may participate.