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PREPARATION OF LEGISLATION
The HPO performed its responsible task of intellectual property-related legislation and analysis of legal practice in a comprehensive, efficient and initiative manner. The majority of tasks concerning the preparation of legislation focussed mainly on codification and supplementary works related to Hungary’s membership of the European Union as well as the preparation of amendments to legislation affecting the HPO and connected with the restructuring of governmental organisations.
Decree 18/2006. (IV. 12.) IM of the Minister of Justice on the detailed rules of the voluntary register of works kept at the Hungarian Patent Office was adopted, the setting up of the register was professionally prepared and the personal conditions were created. Registration started on 15 April 2006.
A working group set up under point 1 of Government decision 1104/2005. (X. 27.) Korm. on certain tasks concerning the enforcement of intellectual property rights and working with the support of the HPO surveyed the relationship between the domestic system of domain name registration and intellectual property rights, having particular regard to dispute settlement. In order to fulfil this task successfully, a separate page and forum were created on the HPO’s website. The result of the survey was reported to the Government.
On the basis of Decree 17/2005. (III. 26.) GKM of the Minister of Economy and Transport on the Hungarian Design Award the HPO established the rules of procedure of the selection committee.
The HPO gave its opinion on, and contributed to the elaboration of, the HPO-related parts of Act CIX of 2006 on amendments to legislation connected with the restructuring of governmental organisations. In this context it also prepared the draft of Government decree 300/2006. (XII. 23.) Korm. amending Decree 86/2000. (VI. 15.) Korm. on the Hungarian Patent Office. Article 1(5) of Act CIX of 2006 on amendments to legislation connected with the restructuring of governmental organisations – supplementing Article 1(4) of Act LVII of 2006 on central state administrative organs and on the legal status of Government members and state secretaries – classed the HPO as a government office.
The HPO prepared the government proposal on the amendment of industrial property legislation aiming at legal harmonisation; the proposal modifies the Patent Act, the Trademark Act and the Design Act, having regard to Regulation 816/2006/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 May 2006 on compulsory licensing of patents relating to the manufacture of pharmaceutical products for export to countries with public health problems and Council Regulation 510/2006/EC of 20 March 2006 on the protection of geographical indications and designations of origin for agricultural products and foodstuffs. The proposal was supplemented with the provisions regulating the legal status of the HPO as a government office. (The proposal was adopted by the Government in 2007 that submitted the draft law as a bill to the Parliament.)
The HPO prepared Decree 29/2006. (V. 19.) GKM of the Minister of Economy and Transport amending Decree 19/2005. (IV. 12.) GKM on the fees for administrative services in industrial property procedures before the Hungarian Patent Office, which entered into force on 27 May 2006.
Continuous professional support was given by the HPO to the Ministry of Economy and Transport and the National Office for Research and Technology in the preparation of the draft Government decree on the financing research, development and technological innovation projects from public funds (so-called deregulation decree) as well as in the revision of regulations relating to government property.
Hungarian Design Council
The body of the Hungarian Design Council (HDC) having a three-year mandate was renewed in 2005. Its task is to establish and direct a comprehensive work programme in order to develop the domestic design culture in harmony with the aims of economic, innovation, environment and education policies, on the basis of Government decree 266/2001. (XII. 21.) Korm. As an advisory body for the coordination of interests and opinions, the HDC follows with attention and helps with its proposals the legal situation of design profession, with particular regard to the safeguarding of interests and the issues of intellectual property and innovation. The HDC is of the view that one of the main elements of design development is the cooperation among economic, artistic and technical educational institutions concerned also with design, that is the creation of interdisciplinarity.
The HDC manages the Hungarian Design Award and the Moholy-Nagy László design grants. As to the Hungarian Design Award, 254 applications were received, which surpassed the number of the previous year. The selection committee proposed that 11 works be awarded and 45 exhibited. Works competed in four categories: product, visual communication, concept and student. A bilingual catalogue was published about the winning and exhibited works.
The 3rd Design Week was organised by the Design Terminál Kht under the patronage of the HDC; by this the range of traditional cultural festivals was enriched with design. The series of programmes launched in 2004 under the aegis of the Autumn Festival of Budapest is already an independent event. Between 25 September and 2 October it offered 52 programmes under the title “Design in motion”, on 19 venues; more than 22 thousand visitors took part in the event.
The HDC took an active part in the work of international organisations. It is important from the point of view of international relations that the director of the Office of the HDC was elected in 2005 member of the Executive Board of the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design (ICSID), her appointment is effective until October 2007. The membership means recognition of the work made so far on the one hand, and on the other hand provides opportunities and a background for the further activity of the HDC. Similar possibilities are provided by the accession in 2005 to BEDA (Bureau of European Design Associations) established in 1969 and rallying professional designers. The HDC and BEDA took part jointly in the elaboration of the design-related part of the new NACE (statistical classification) codes.
OFFICIAL EXAMINATION AND PROCEDURES IN INDUSTRIAL PROPERTY MATTERS
TENDENCIES IN OFFICIAL ACTIVITY
As a result of Hungary’s accession to Community and European protection systems, the total number of industrial property applications filed in national way – from the country and directly with the HPO from abroad – decreased proportionally as expected. The number of design applications filed in national way remained stagnant.
Table 1.: Breakdown of national industrial property applications – filed directly with the HPO from Hungary and from abroad – by titles of protection (2002–2006)
Similarly to the previous years, the industrial property activity of domestic applicants remained at a low level. This was in close connection with the weakness of the Hungarian activity with respect to innovation and research and development as well as with the backwardness in the entrepreneurs’ awareness of the industrial property system. Design applications slightly decreased.
Although the number of applications filed by Hungarian enterprises abroad was extremely low, there was a promising increase in the case of certain titles of protection. However, international patent (PCT) applications and Community design applications with the Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market (OHIM), filed by domestic applicants decreased.
Table 2.: Main figures of the industrial property activity of domestic applicants in Hungary and abroad (2002–2006)
In the past year industrial property matters received within the framework of international cooperation worked out differently depending on the title of protection and the type of international cooperation system.
Table 3.: Main figures of industrial property matters aimed at Hungary under international treaties (2002–2006)
The number of design applications filed under the Hague Agreement designating Hungary rose by 5.1%. At the same time the number of designs included in the applications increased by more than 30% compared with the previous year.
The figures of the industrial property activity of foreign applicants in Hungary indicate the international interest in the Hungarian market and the international competitiveness of Hungarian economy. The increasing number of requests for the validation of European patents in Hungary shows that in the past few years foreign applicants have given a lot of attention to our country.
As a consequence of foreign applicants’ activity in Hungary, competition in the domestic market becomes keener. After our accession to the Community protection systems even Hungarian enterprises producing only for the domestic market have to respect Community protection effective in Hungary as well. Successful participation in such competition also calls for the raising of Hungarian enterprises’ awareness of the industrial property system.
As a result of Hungary’s accession to the European Patent Convention on 1 January 2003 and to the Community protection systems as from 1 May 2004, a decreasing tendency could be noticed in the number of foreign applications filed directly with the Hungarian Patent Office. In spite of this, foreign applicants claim protection for the territory of Hungary to an increasing extent – in their European or Community applications. Accession to European protection systems has generated new official tasks.
DESIGNS
The HPO received 260 new design applications filed in national way, which included 730 designs. The number of applications was similar to that of the previous year, but that of designs included therein dropped. The number of designs included in the applications was 2.8 on average. 92.7% of the applications and 95.6% of the included designs were of Hungarian origin. 77.6% of domestic applicants were individuals, while all foreign applications came from enterprises. Only 19 foreign applications were received, which is due to the fact that Community protection can also be acquired. In the light of the success of the Community system and similar national systems based on registration instead of examination, in which protection can be obtained more simply and quickly, it is worth considering a possible switchover and its returns on innovation.
352 cases were completed, which concerned 1173 designs. The number of processed applications was up by 2.3%, and the number of included designs also increased. Of the 352 measures terminating the procedure 250 concerned registration, 8 applications were rejected, 16 withdrawn and 78 considered withdrawn. The average pendency time decreased to 10 months.
In 2006, the HPO received 7 requests for invalidity; 3 invalidity procedures and 1 non-infringement procedure were terminated. At the end of the year 6 invalidity procedures were pending.
The number of international design applications under the Hague Agreement was up by 5.1% on the previous year, and that of the included designs by 30.1%, which means that the HPO received 371 international design applications including 1522 designs.
At the end of the year, there were 2204 valid design registrations in Hungary, which means that their number decreased by 211. 60% of the valid designs were owned by Hungarian, 20.5% by US and 11.7% by German rightholders. The majority of valid designs, 86%, were “young”, i.e. 1-2 years old.
Table 4.: Design applications filed in national way and under international treaties (2002–2006)
Figure 1.: National design applicatons and number of designs included in the applications (2002–2006)
Table 5.: Figures of design procedures (2002–2006)
Table 6.: Figures of international (Hague) procedures (2002–2006)
Table 7.: Valid designs (2002–2006)
Figure 2.: Breakdown of valid designs by lifetime
COURT REVIEW OF THE DECISIONS OF THE HUNGARIAN PATENT OFFICE
In the case of designs, a continuous decrease has been experienced since 2001.
The number of cases for the revocation of design protection has increased.
Table 8.: Requests for review
Table 9.: Requests returned by the Metropolitan Court with a final decision
Table 10.: Requests filed for settlement by a board
D_Table_2006.doc
II. Matters concerning the generation, reproduction, and distribution of industrial design documents and of secondary sources of industrial design information, i.e., official gazettes
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INFORMATION PRODUCTS AND SERVICES
In spite of compulsory payments into the central budget that affected IT investments as well, the HPO could still ensure the information technology background necessary for the official activity and fulfilled the tasks laid down in legislation on the introduction of electronic administration.
In compliance with the legal provisions, the HPO’s middle-term information technology strategy was prepared. The strategy was aimed first of all at identifying the goals and directions, by means of which information technology can best serve the HPO’s objectives.
The maintenance, operation and development of the HPO’s information technology systems and stock of tools were carried out in the interest of professional aims, taking into account the provisions on safety, property management and public procurement. The number of tools was only augmented with the servers and storage devices supplied by the European Patent Office.
The uniform record system set up for the support of the industrial property office management activity was also instrumental in performing the tasks relating to the national official activity and to Hungary’s membership of the EPC and the European Union. After developments, the uniform record system has become suitable to fulfil the new requirements of the Administrative Act. The office management processes were modified in the system in accordance with the Administrative Act’s provisions, the uniform record system was prepared to perform the tasks relating to the registration of works launched on 15 April 2006 as a new service.
The electronic recording and the e-register were renewed in their appearance and content. The patent data were supplemented with European patents, plant variety rights and supplementary protection certificates, thus they encompass the data of all titles of protection relating to the patent field. The data of trademark applications filed since 1 May 2004 are also included. The user surface of the e-register was extended by the preselection possibilities that have already become usual in the case of PIPACS, the range of searchable data increased. The display of hit list is complemented with the possibility of narrowing filtering relating to the forms of protection.
As regards the further development of services against payment, the HPO introduced a registration system for the use of databases available on the website (PIPACS and electronic recording).
The HPO achieved considerable results in carrying out the objectives of the electronic governmental strategy connected with the establishment of information society. During the development of the office’s homepage, every effort was made that not only the narrow professional circles be addressed, but the awareness of the intellectual property system be raised and the strengthening of innovation processes be promoted as well. As a result of the development, the users can meet a renewed content and image by clicking www.mszh.hu.
The new portal fully complies with the prescriptions mandatory for government organisations (creation of functional e-mail addresses, publication of data of public interest, French and German informative pages in addition to the English ones, forms for user satisfaction survey, short summary of the tasks of the organisational units connected with the organigram of the office, pages introducing the top management of the HPO).
Compared with the homepage last renewed in 2004, the new portal is enriched with several new services. New or restructured or updated material was prepared for 84 menu points. A version of Hungarian pages from which obstacles were removed was prepared for the blind and persons of impaired vision. A scientific calendar paying tribute to the intellectual heritage of Hungarian scientists and inventors was launched on 1 September (it was integrated into the successful website of Neumann House entitled “Outstanding days”).
The homepage was attended by 257 450 individually identifiable visitors on 370 969 occasions. The number of visitors was up by 15% and that of visits by 10% compared with the previous year. The downloaded data volume has more than doubled, and this figure does not contain the so-called robot-generated downloads. 55% of the visitors viewed the homepage from Hungarian (.hu) domain name and 45% from other (.com, .net or foreign) domain names. 64% of the total data volume were downloaded on Hungarian computers. These figures do not include the data of queries from the databases (PIPACS, e-register).
Table 11.: Attendance of the HPO’s website (1 January – 31 December 2006)
Table11_D.doc
V. Activities in the field of computerized search systems for industrial designs
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COMMUNICATION AND PRESS ACTIVITY
The fundamental principle of the HPO concerning its public appearance is the effective and open informative behaviour. In this spirit, regular relations were maintained with the representatives of the media, mutually informing each other of the possibilities of cooperation. In several cases working relations were established with the persons responsible for communication in partner institutions cooperating in certain events, in particular with those of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Ministry of Economy and Transport, Ministry of Education and Culture, the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, and the Hungarian Innovation Association.
The HPO organised an information conference for the press on the occasion of the publication of the latest volume of the series “White paper on the protection of intellectual property”, in which the authors of the book also participated.
. The economic weekly “Figyelő”, in its 50th issue’s supplement entitled “Design – experience and awareness” dealt on 5 pages with the economic aspects of design, the role of design increasing competitiveness, the European design industry, the role of Design Terminál to be opened soon as well as the Government’s possibilities of promoting the development of design on the basis of international examples.
On 28 November 2006, a communication conference “Scientific communication – Seeking ways to the public” was organised with the professional support of the National Office for Research and Technology, the National Club of Scientific Journalists, the HEURÉKA-Solart Film, the Hungarian Innovation Association and the HPO.
INDUSTRIAL PROPERTY EDUCATION
The long-standing conscious educational activity of the HPO contributes to a great extent to the development of Hungarian industrial property culture and to the enrichment of intellectual property knowledge. Due to the selective educational activity, there was an ever increasing interest in the intermediate and advanced level industrial property courses, industrial property training programmes were present in the higher education institutes and several specialised courses were held at the request of various professional, entrepreneurial and non-profit organisations. In 2006, 1481 students received industrial property education in 947 hours, which represented a 9.1% increase in the students’ number compared with the previous year.
Figure 3.: Number of students receiving industrial property education (2002-2006)
The two-year advanced level industrial property course is an important pillar of the development of domestic industrial property culture and of the bringing-up of new generation of the profession. The course launched last year continued with 30 persons. The students came from the circles of entrepreneurs, lawyers and attorneys and members of the HPO’s staff in an equal proportion. In order to improve the level of diploma works, 17 tutors from the HPO helped the students.
The intermediate industrial property education is sought for, in addition to higher education institutes, by undertakings. Successful intermediate training has been provided for fifteen years at the Faculty of Agriculture of Tessedik Sámuel College. 21 persons passed the exam. 26 students received intermediate education at the Károly Róbert College of Gyöngyös. The intermediate course organised in cooperation with the Hungarian Association for the Protection of Industrial Property and Copyright was attended by the employees of the Gedeon Richter pharmaceutical company; 22 persons passed the exam.
On the basis of cooperation agreements concluded in the past few years with the most important universities of Hungary, the students of higher education institutes could acquire up-to-date intellectual property knowledge within the framework of graduate and post-graduate training, distance learning and specialised courses. In 2006, 1198 students of higher education institutes took part in such forms of training.
The competition launched by the HPO for the preparation of diploma works has been successful for years. In 2006, 14 works were received from the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, 13 from the University of Miskolc, 4 from the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design, 4 from the University of West Hungary and 8 from the University of Szeged. The diploma works sent for the competition form frequently the basis of industrial property applications.
The HPO organised specialised courses for the leading researchers of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and for the staff members of the Hungarian Police Headquarters on the basis of cooperation agreements concluded with these institutions; as a result, 50 persons received industrial property training.
The modern distance learning methods also contributed to the development of intellectual property culture. The patent module of the renewed e-learning curriculum was introduced at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics in the semesters of 2005/2006.
Table 12.: Industrial property training in higher education institutions in 2006
COOPERATIVE RELATIONS
The HPO established or strengthened professional, educational and other contractual cooperation. The most important were:
Professional cooperation
Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Hungarian Association for the Protection of Industrial Property and Copyright, Hungarian Trademark Association, Association of Hungarian Inventors, Hungarian Innovation Association, Jedlik Ányos Society, Hungarian Academy of Engineering, Federation of Technical and Scientific Societies, Hungarian Research Student Foundation, NOVOFER Foundation, Hungarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Society of Young Hungarian Scientists, Hungarian Scientific Society, Hungarian Police Headquarters, Decor Association.
Educational cooperation
Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Corvinus University, University of Debrecen, Eötvös Loránd University, Harsányi János College, Károly Róbert College, Academy of Fine Arts, University of Miskolc, Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design, University of West Hungary, Pázmány Péter Catholic University, University of Pécs, Tessedik Sámuel College, Semmelweis University, University of Szeged, Szent István University.
Cooperation in knowledge dissemination
National Club of Scientific Journalists, Palace of Miracles.
Cooperation in professional communication
Magyar Televízió – Delta, Duna Televízió – Magyar Csillagok, HEURÉKA-Solart Film, Élet és Tudomány, Jogtudományi Közlöny, De jure jogászmagazin, Napi Gazdaság, Világgazdaság, Gazdasági Rádió, Figyelő, Mezőgazdasági lapok, Természettudományi Társulat, Természet Világa.
Among professional cooperation agreements, it is worth mentioning – by reason of its timeliness and importance – the agreement signed by the president of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and the president of the HPO on 31 May 2006, the main objective of which is to promote intellectual property protection in research institutes of the Academy, the enforcement of rights and the utilisation of intellectual creations.
The HPO and the law enforcement agencies are important partners in the fight against counterfeiting. In this spirit was signed in January 2006 a cooperation agreement between the National Police Headquarters and the HPO, the main element of which is the intellectual property training of police officers.
Tab_fig_12_3_D.doc
IX.Other general information related to the Office that is available on the Internet -- URLs of web pages of the Office’s website that:
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