On June 28, 2017, the State Intellectual Property Office of China (“SIPO“) published the Administration Regulations on Patent Priority Review, which shall be implemented on August 1, 2017.
According to the Regulations, if the applicants meet the conditions and the SIPO agrees to give priority to review their patent applications:
- For the invention patent applications, the first Notification on Patent Review Opinioins will be issued in 45 days and the application case will be closed in 1 year;
- For the utility model and design patent applications, the application case will be closed in 2 months;
- For the patent re-examination cases, they will be closed in 7 months;
- For the invalidation of invention and utility model patent cases, they will be closed in 5 months;
- For the invalidation of design patent cases, they will be closed in 4 months.