European Patent

Term of the European patent

The term of the European patent shall be 20 years from the date of filing of the application.

Nothing in the preceding paragraph shall limit the right of a Contracting State to extend the term of a European patent, or to grant corresponding protection which follows immediately on expiry of the term of the patent, under the same conditions as those applying to national patents: 

(a) in order to take account of a state of war or similar emergency conditions affecting that State; 

(b) if the subject-matter of the European patent is a product or a process for manufacturing a product or a use of a product which has to undergo an administrative authorisation procedure required by law before it can be put on the market in that State. 

It shall apply mutatis mutandis to European patents granted jointly for a group of Contracting States.

Rights conferred by a European patent

A European patent shall confer on its proprietor from the date on which the mention of its grant is published in the European Patent Bulletin, in each Contracting State in respect of which it is granted, the same rights as would be conferred by a national patent granted in that State.

If the subject-matter of the European patent is a process, the protection conferred by the patent shall extend to the products directly obtained by such process.

Any infringement of a European patent shall be dealt with by national law. 

The European patent application and the resulting European patent shall be deemed not to have had, from the outset to the extent that the patent has been revoked or limited in opposition, limitation or revocation proceedings.

Extent of protection

The extent of the protection conferred by a European patent or a European patent application shall be determined by the claims. Nevertheless, the description and drawings shall be used to interpret the claims.

For the period up to grant of the European patent, the extent of the protection conferred by the European patent application shall be determined by the claims contained in the application as published. However, the European patent as granted or as amended in opposition, limitation or revocation proceedings shall determine retroactively the protection conferred by the application, in so far as such protection is not thereby extended.

In any designated Contracting State a European patent application and a European patent shall have with regard to a national patent application and a national patent the same prior right effect as a national patent application and a national patent. A national patent application and a national patent in a Contracting State shall have with regard to a European patent designating that Contracting State the same prior right effect as if the European patent were a national patent. Any Contracting State may prescribe whether and on what terms an invention disclosed in both a European patent application or patent and a national application or patent having the same date of filing or, where priority is claimed, the same date of priority, may be protected simultaneously by both applications or patents. 

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