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New projects launched or resumed this year in the context of the policies and plans mentioned above, short description: aims, partners, tasks
The IPO SR co-operated cooperated with the European Patent Office (EPO) particularly on projects realised within the Co-operation Cooperation Plan for 2016 – 2020. The main priorities of cooperation within the EPO were the implementation of projects Federative European Patent Register and Quality at Source. The aim of both projects is to establish a common European web register containing data on European patents granted by EPO and their status in the national phases of maintaining the European patent by the national offices of the EPO Member States. Register is focused on legal information (e.g. legal status of a patent). Within the cooperation with the EPO, the Office continued in implementation implementating tools for ensuring data conversion according to WIPO standards for purpose the project “Quality at source”. By accession to the FePR service in 2018, the Office continued to provide data on the legal status of the EP with the designation of the Slovak Republic.
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The projects and activities mentioned in the item above were realised in the co-operation cooperation with the EPO.
Statistics: changes in terms of application filings and grants with respect to previous year; trends or areas experiencing rapid changes
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Totally 231 patent applications were filed with the IPO SR during 2018; It was almost 12 % more than in previous year. The share of PCT applications is 1.3 % (3 applications) of the total applications filed.
The number of applications filed by domestic applicants (216) increased by 18 % and the number of foreign applicants (14) decreased by 39.1 %. The most Most foreign applicants of the total number 14 were from the Czech Republic (10).
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In the period from January 1, 2018, until December 31, 2018, 41 applications for supplementary protection certificate were filed. All of them were filed by foreign applicants; most of applications were from the USA – 14, Switzerland – 9 and Japan – 5.
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In 2018, 388 utility model applications were filed with the IPO SR. This is a decrease by 5.8 % compared to previous year. The number of applications filed by Slovak applicants decreased by 6.7 % (320). The share of domestic applicants is 82.5 % of the total number 388 filed applications.
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By December 31, 2018, there were 1,872 utility models valid in the territory of the Slovak Republic.
The most Most registered utility models are from: Transport (12.46 %), Consumer Goods and Equipment (10.68 %), Civil Engineering, Construction, Mining (10.09 %).
For comparison there , here are statistics on filed patent applications and granted patents, on filed utility model applications and registered utility models and on translations of European patent specifications in the years 2014 – 2018:
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Basic information for applicants related to IP subject matters applications are available on the website of the Office at www.upv.sk. These are mainly application forms of particular type of industrial property right, legislation, instructions of the IPO SR and information for applicant, administrative fees, contact to expert assistance, etc. Below there are the individual areas of IP subject matters and relevant information sources with links to website of the Office, where they are available:
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Contacts
http://www.upv.sk/?contacts
In the past, the Office in the cooperation with the EPO implemented the system EPTOS enabling to file with the Office:
- European patent applications
- National patent applications
- National utility model applications
- Applications for granting supplementary protection certificates
- Translations of patent claims of published European patent applications with designation for the Slovak Republic into the Slovak language
- Translations of European patent files with designation for the Slovak Republic into the Slovak language
- Subsequently filed documents to:
national patent applications
national utility model applications
translations of patent claims of published European patent applications into the Slovak language
translations of European patent files into the Slovak language
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The Office offers a customer service for electronic filing issues. The users may find the help desk contact information at the following link: http://www.upv.sk/?uzivatelsky-servis-a-helpdesk. At the help desk they may get general information on electronic filing via the EPTOS system and troubleshoot potential problems. In this part of the website can also be found user manuals and FAQs, which are available at the following link: http://www.upv.sk/?elektronicke-podavanie-prihlasok-faq.
Since 1 February 2014, the Central Public Administration Portal offers a form to serve the general agenda. By means of this form it is possible to make electronic filings to every public institution in the Slovak Republic, thus also to the IPO SR. From the 1st quarter of 2017, the Office also made specific electronic forms for patents, utility models and supplementary protection certificates available to users within the deployment of the IPO Electronic Services Project. The Office continues in operating the system EPTOS, which was implemented in the cooperation with the EPO.
In 2018, there were filed 232 national patent applications were filed, 119 of them were filed electronically (51 % of the total); 388 national utility model applications, 203 of them were filed electronically (52 % of the total); 41 applications for supplementary protection certificates, 20 of them were filed electronically (49 % of the total).
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The Office conducts the application file only in the paper form. An overview of items of proceedings for each application is available in Webregisters in the record detail in the Protocol tab without possibility to read individual items contents.
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In cooperation with the WIPO, the IPCPUB software tool has been used since 2009 for operating the Slovak and English versions of the IPC in a standardized electronic form on the Internet. Slovak editions of the IPC in the electronic form are made accessible to public and the Office employees on the site site http://ipc.indprop.gov.sk.
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An abstract is an obligatory part of a patent application and a utility model application (Article 37(4) (b) of the Act No 435/2001 Coll. and Article 32(4)(b) of the Act No 517/2007 Coll.); i.e. an applicant is obliged to file an abstract together with an application. The Office may amend an abstract ex officio (Article 7(2) of the Decree No 223/2002 Coll. and Article 5(2) of the Decree No 1/2008 Coll.), but in the case of of abstracts to utility model applications their content can not be amended (Article 5(2) of the Decree No 1/2008 Coll.).
When publishing applications, the Office shall translate the names of patent and utility model applications into English. When granting a patent and entering a utility model into the Register, the Office shall translate also an abstract into English. Translations of these abstracts and names into into English are being sent to the EPO regularly to publish them in the Espacenet database, in which their machine translations are available in 31 other languages.
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The Information Centre provided the clients of the Office with general information on IP protection for individual subject matters, on filing applications and related administration fees. Within the consultations also information on IP protection in the Slovak Republic and also abroad were was provided (European patent, international application filed under PCT).
The information were was provided personally, by phone (+421 48 4300 131), by post and e-mail address infocentrum@indprop.gov.sk.
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Pre-diagnostics of industrial property rights
http://www.upv.sk/?prediagnostika-priemyselnych-prav
To increase the IP awareness, to support innovations, creativity and competitiveness of small and middle-sized enterprises is a primary goal of the IP pre-diagnostics, which have been provided by the IPO SR experts since 2008.
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Patent documents (codes of documents according to the WIPO ST.16):
- Published patent applications (A3)
- Patent specifications (B6)
- Supplementary protection certificates (without code)
- Translations of patent claims of European patent applications with designation for SK (T1)
- Corrected translations of patent claims of European patent applications with designation for SK (T2)
- Translations of European patent specifications with designation for SK (T3)
- Corrected translations of European patent specifications with designation for SK (T4)
- Translations of amended European patent specifications with designation for SK (T5)
- Published utility model applications (U1)
- Registered utility models without change (Y1)
- Registered utility models with change (Y2)
- Corrections of patent documents (A8, A9, B8, B9, U8, U9, Y8, Y9, T8, T9)
Patent documents are available in the paper form in the study room of the IPO SR. Moreover, all kinds of patent specifications published in the Official Gazette regularly in the PDF format are available in the Office´s web databases at https://wbr.indprop.gov.sk/webregistre/, in the system at http://sk.espacenet.com/ and also at http://worldwide.espacenet.com/?locale=en_EP.
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345 published utility model applications applications
343 registered utility models
53 applications for granting SPC's s
19 granted SPC's
3 translations of patent claims of European patent applications with designation for SK
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The Gazette contains announcements on granted patents and patent applications, including translations of European patents and patent claims of European patent applications with designation for SK, announcements on applications for supplementary protection certificates and granted supplementary protection certificates and announcements on utility model applications and registered utility models, arranged in following main chapters:
PATENTS
- published patent applications (list of published patent applications, bibliographic data and abstracts of published patent applications with an image, where available, arranged according to the International Patent Classification)
- granted patents (list of granted patents, bibliographic data of granted patents arranged according to the International Patent Classification)
- suspended patent application procedures
- lapsed patents due to abandonment
- lapsed patents due to expiration of the validity term
- lapsed patents due to non-payment of maintenance fees
- refused patent applications
- revocations of patents
- partial revocations of patents
- assignments and transfers of rights to patents and patent applications
- changes of rights of disposal to patents and patent applications (lien)
- changes of rights of disposal to patents and patent applications (termination of lien)
- license offers to patent applications and granted patents
- withdrawals of license offers to patent applications and granted patents
- license contracts registered or granted to patents
- the termination of force of license contracts to patents
- patents registered in the register after declassification
- corrections and changes of names, addresses, dates and mistakes
UTILITY MODELS
- published utility model applications (list of published utility model applications, bibliographic data and abstracts of published utility model applications with an image, where available, arranged according to the International Patent Classification)
- registered utility models (list of registered utility models, bibliographic data of registered utility models arranged according to the International Patent Classification)
- extension of an utility model validity (list of utility models with the extended validity term and their bibliographic data arranged according to the International Patent Classification)
- suspended proceedings on utility model applications on the applicant´s request
- suspended proceedings on utility model applications
- refused utility model applications
- lapsed utility models due to abandonment
- lapsed utility models due to expiration of the validity term
- cancelled utility models
- partially cancelled utility models
- assignments and transfers of rights to utility models and utility model applications
- changes of the rights of disposal to utility models (lien) and utility model applications
- changes of the rights of disposal to utility models (termination of lien) and utility model applications
- license contracts registered or granted
- termination of force of license contracts
- registered utility models in the register after declassification
- forfeitures of protection and transfers of an applicant or owner (based on the court decision)
- corrections and changes of names, addresses, dates and mistakes
EUROPEAN PATENTS
- available translations and available corrected translations of patent claims of European patent applications (list of available translations and available corrected translations of patent claims of European patent applications with designation for SK and their bibliographic data arranged according to the International Patent Classification)
- available translations and available corrected translations of European patent specifications (list of available translations and available corrected translations of European patent specifications with designation for SK and their bibliographic data arranged arranged according to the International Patent Classification)
- available translations of amended European patent specifications (list of available translations of amended European patent specifications with designation for SK and their bibliographic data arranged according to the International Patent Classification)
- suspended procedures on European patent applications by reason of withdrawal
- conversions of the European patent applications to national applications
- lapsed European patents due to abandonment
- lapsed European patents due to expiration of the validity term
- lapsed European patents lapsed due to non-payment of maintenance fees
- revocations of European patents
- partial revocations of European patents
- revoked European patent after the opposition proceedings before the EPO
- assignment and transfer of the rights to European patents and European patent applications
- European patents amended after the opposition proceedings before the EPO
- changes of the rights of disposal to European patents and European patent applications (lien)
- changes of the rights of disposal to European patents and European patent applications (termination of lien)
- license offers to European patents and European patent applications
- withdrawals of license offers to European patents and European patent applications
- license contracts registered or granted
- termination of force of license contracts
- European patents registered after declassification
- Corrections and changes of names, addresses, dates and mistakes
SUPPLEMENTARY PROTECTION CERTIFICATES
- published requests for granting the supplementary protection certificates (their bibliographic data arranged according to document numbers)
- published requests for granting the supplementary protection certificates containing requests for validity extension
- granted supplementary protection certificates (their bibliographic data arranged according to document numbers)
- suspended proceedings on requests for granting the supplementary protection certificate on the applicant´s request
- suspended proceedings on granting the supplementary protection certificate on the applicant´s request
- refused requests for granting a supplementary protection certificate
- published requests for extension of validity term of supplementary protection certificates
- extension of a supplementary protection certificates validity
- revocations of extended terms of validity of supplementary protection certificates
- suspended procedures and refused applications for extension of validity term of supplementary protection certificates
- declaration of invalidity of supplementary protection certificates by reason of granting contrary to Article 3 of the European Parliament and Council Regulation (EC) No. 469/2009, respectively No. 1610/96
- declaration of invalidity of supplementary protection certificates by reason of lapse of basic patent before expire of validity term
- declaration of invalidity of supplementary protection certificates by reason of revocation or limitation of basic patent
- change of validity term of supplementary protection certificate for medicinal product or plant protection product
- assignments and transfers of rights for requests for granting the supplementary protection certificate and the supplementary protection certificate
- lapsed supplementary protection certificates due to abandonment
- lapsed supplementary protection certificates due to expiration of the validity term
- lapsed supplementary protection certificates due to non-payment of maintenance fees
- lapsed supplementary protection certificates due to withdrawal of of the authorisation to place the medicinal product or plant protection product on the market in the Slovak Republic
- license offers to requests for granting the supplementary protection certificate and the supplementary protection certificate
- withdrawals of license offers to requests for granting the supplementary protection certificate and the supplementary protection certificate
- license contracts registered or granted to supplementary protection certificate
- changes of the rights of disposal to requests for granting the supplementary protection certificate and the supplementary protection certificate (lien)
- changes of the rights of disposal to requests for granting the supplementary protection certificate and the supplementary protection certificate (termination of lien)
- corrections and changes of names, addresses, dates and mistakes
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- IPO SR Official Gazette http://www.upv.sk/?vestnik-uradu-priemyselneho-vlastnictva-slovenskej-republiky
- Extracted data from register https://wbr.indprop.gov.sk/webregistre/
- Patent documents in the system Espacenet Level I I http://sk.espacenet.com/
- Internal database system „INVENTIO“ for managing the industrial property subjects
- Freely accessible foreign databases https://www.upv.sk/?zahranicne-online-databazy#patenty
External databases
- STN Global Value Pricing (patent and non-patent literature), coverage: worldwide
- access to EPOQUE (search database system EPO), coverage: worldwide
- Database Derwent World Patents Index® (DWPI) available within the EPOQUE, coverage: worldwide
- Database EPO Global Patent Index, coverage: worldwide
- Database EPO Espacenet
- European Patent Register (with links to national registry data, deep linking )
- other free available databases of national offices, e.g.. Czech patent and utility models databases, coverage: CZ, USPTO national database, coverage: US, IPOUK national database, coverage GB
- WIPO PATENTSCOPE (collections of international and national applications), coverage: PCT applications and national collections in the limited scope.
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Information products and patent document collections (coverage, medium, etc.) available to external users, conditions of access (e.g., free of charge, subscription, etc.)
ON-LINE ONLINE DATABASES http://www.upv.sk/?databases-and-registers
IPO SR makes accessible various databases on its web sitewebsite.
Freely accessible national databases are:
- "Data extracted from Registers" https://wbr.indprop.gov.sk/webregistre/
also called called "Webregisters" give public access to data extracted from patent, utility models, European patents with designation for SK, supplementary protection certificates (SPCs) registers, which are kept by the Office with the possibility of simple and advanced search or browsing results. Data concerning in particular pending patent, utility model and SPC applications, all filed applications or granted patents, SPCs and registered utility models in the register are daily updated. Full texts of all kinds of patent documents in the PDF format are available in the Office´s Webregisters.
- Patent Patent documents in the system Espacenet Level I http://sk.espacenet.com/
- “Classification Systems” http://www.upv.sk/?systemy-triedenia contains patent classifications used in Slovakia and abroad http://www.upv.sk/?systemy-triedenia-patenty
including various additional information.
- Official Gazette "Vestník ÚPV SR" may be viewed on the address http://www.upv.sk/?official-gazette - each issue is available as a one PDF file containing the whole issue. In the archive on this webpage are available the previous volumes also in PDF format. The older volumes are gradually being added.
In the part ”International and EU databases” there are links to the most frequently used on-line online databases at http://www.upv.sk/?zahranicne-online-databazy#patenty.
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- IPC 2018.01 in standardized electronic form https://ipc.indprop.gov.sk/classifications/ipc/ipcpub
- on-line online order forms http://www.upv.sk/?online-orders
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- searches on state of the art, international patent search, searches on patent families, bibliographic data upon request in written or on-line form
- on-line online searches in Office’s databases for patents, European patents with designation for SK, utility models and supplementary protection certificates and self-service during a personal visit
- monitoring of the state of of selected technical fields upon request (permanent sending of documents)
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Information on the legal status is in the internal register of patents, utility models and supplementary protection certificates. The Office provides information on the request in the form of an extract from the Register. In addition, data of this type are also published in the IPO SR database on the internet https://wbr.indprop.gov.sk/webregistre/ but have only informative character and do not not substitute the extract from the Register; similar to the system Espacenet where the data are mentioned by the EPO based on the information from the IPO SR Official Gazette.
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The IPO SR maintains the online database of patents, utility models and supplementary protection certificates necessary for searches and proceedings on patent applications, utility model applications and requests for granting and extension of the validity of supplementary protection certificates. Selected data are available to the public on the internet at https://wbr.indprop.gov.sk/webregistre/.
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The Office builds, keeps and completes regularly the examination file containing national patent applications, utility model applications, requests for granting supplementary protection certificates, granted patents, registered utility models, granted supplementary protection certificates and translations of European patents and patent claims of European patent applications with designation for the Slovak Republic via the internet system INVENTIO II. Selected data are available to the public in Webregisters and are updated daily.
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IPO SR is maintaining the patent documentation collection stored in paper form, which forms, as a part of PCT minimum documentation, the basis of search files within the range:
- from 1950 to 1992: the documentation DD (from 1958), DE (from 1951), CH (from 1944), FR (from 1945), GB (from 1967), PL (from 1963), SU (from 1941), US (from 1960) and the documentation EPO (from 1978) a WIPO (from 1978)
- from 1919 to the present: national documentation SK and formal CS
- from 1993 to the present: national documentation CZ
In the past the Office had received patent documents stored on optical discs from following countries: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Denmark, Germany, France, Georgia, Italy, Japan, Canada, China, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Russia, Switzerland, Slovenia, Spain, Czech Republic, Ukraine, Hungary, United States of America, United Kingdom and from international organisations EPO, OAPI and WIPO. In 2018 the patent documents collection was was supplemented by documents stored on optical discs from these states: Canada, China, Japan and Republic of Korea.
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In 2018, the Office’s reading room has been visited by 102 users. In total there were provided 104 borrowings of patent and other literature made available to the public and 1,380 copies of patent documents and other industrial property documents for the manual and computer search purposes, as well as copies from technical periodicals and other associated and non-patent literature were made. In 2018 there were performed 10 state-of-the-art patent searches, 19 patent searches with commentary and 3 searches on bibliographic data.
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Collecting, acquisitions, preparation
In the last year were processed 965 patent documents in paper form and 311 optical discs containing full texts and bibliographic information relating to patent documents as well to made them available for search purposes. The entire acquisition of patent documents amounted to 1,245,530 documentsdocuments, out of which 1,244,565 entries represented documents in electrical form. The patent literature (patent documentation and official gazettes) were acquired within the frame of mutual exchange and the non-patent literature mostly by purchase or as a gift.
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Since 2003 the Office has cooperated with Contact and Information Points, while some of them are also the Patent Information Centres (PATLIB). They are located in state, regional and district libraries as well as in the Slovak National Library (SNK) in Martin and Centre of Scientific and Technical Information (CVTI) in Bratislava and within the University of Žilina as the Centre for Technology Transfer. Nowadays 11 Contact and Information Points are located in Slovakia and 5 of them are Patent Information Centres. A list of centres and points is available on the Office’s web site website at http://www.upv.sk/?partners.
The main goal of patent information centres is to provide complex information services in the field of patent, trademark and industrial design information, search services, consultation and methodical assistance concerning the searching of information, making copies of required patent documents, printing records from electronic form etc. Every patent information centre serve serves as a contact and information point.
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The Office approached almost all partner organisations and preliminarily agreed on another form of cooperation. On April 5, 2018, the training focused on performing search services was prepared for contact persons and attended by nine participants.
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The Office publishes classifications, miscellanies, expert monographs, acts and related commentaries, promotional and information brochures, leaflets or translations of the WIPO and the EPO original publications providing valuable information on industrial property field to the public.
Publication activities of the Office during 2018 include:
• Annual Report of the Industrial Property Office of SR 2017;
• The magazine Duševné Vlastníctvo - currently is the only Slovak periodical focused on the issue of industrial rights and copyright. In 2018, the Office issued four issues of the magazine in electronic and printed form.
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The website of the Office www.upv.sk is a complex source of information for the public. In addition, it has been becoming the effective means of communication. It allows the public to access quickly to information and databases related to IP. Both Slovak and English versions provide information about upcoming conferences, seminars and other events.
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The IPO SR tries to get closer to the public via several popularisation activities. The most important events are those organised on the occasion of the World IP Day, Researchers´ Night, various exhibitions in the IPO SR premises or educational programme Intellectual Property.
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On the occasion of the World Intellectual Property Day, the Office has prepared several activities. On Tuesday, April 24, 2018, in cooperation with the Financial Directorate of SR and the civic association Scientific Toy, the Office prepared a lecture series with creative workshops for pupils and students. The main themes were creativity and counterfeiting. The accompanying program consisted of an exhibition of counterfeit goods secured by customs authorities and a creative workshop - making scientific toys (C.A. Scientific Toy). On Wednesday, April 25, 2018, the traditional Conference Intellectual Property in Slovakia XVIII, which focused on trade marks this year, followed. On Thursday, April 26, the Office's activities culminated in a seminar prepared by the Office in cooperation with EUIPO – EUIPO Boards of Appeal.
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An Exhibition of works by Július Ciglan Colours and Curves of Poľana was made available in the premises of the Industrial Property Office of SR. The author emphasised the depiction of the colour of the extinct Poľana volcano in its various times and seasons. In April this Exposition was replaced by the Exhibition of paintings ATELIÉR 3G – Art Inspirations. In the end of the year, the premises of the Office were relieved by the presentation of the hand-painted screens by the author, Ing. arch. Ingrid Krajčovičová from graphic studio INAK Banská Bystrica.
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2. Preclassification is allotting an initial broad classification symbol (e.g., IPC class or subclass, or administrative unit) to a patent application, using human or automated means for internal administrative purposes (e.g., routing an application to the appropriate examiner). Usually preclassification is applied by the administration of an office.Anchor f2 f2
3. Reclassification is the reconsideration and usually the replacement of one or more previously allotted classification symbols to a patent document, following a revision and the entry into force of a new version of the Classification system (e.g., the IPC). The new symbols are available on patent databases.Anchor f3 f3