Singapore Intellectual Property Blog

Updated 19 February 2014 to correct Service Bureau surcharge waiver period.

Updated 12 February 2014 to reflect extension of excluded days originally announced by IPOS and information on waiver of Service Bureau Surcharges

A bunch of us patent professionals (including patent attorneys and patent lawyers) were invited to meet representatives of the Intellectual Property Office (IPOS) today.

In the 2.5 hour long meeting, IPOS gave us a briefing and update on the implementation of the amended Singapore Patents Act and Rules.

This post discusses some highlights of the session relating to commencement and electronic filing (e-filing):

We’ve recently had to file voluntary amendments to the patent specifications of a number of Singapore patent applications we are handling for our clients.

In the course of preparing the voluntary amendments, we’ve noticed an interesting anomaly in the patent records as kept by the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore (IPOS, the Singapore Patent Office or Singapore Patent Registry).

Updated 28 April 2014 to include general information on corresponding grace period provisions under Japanese patent law.

Under Singapore law, there is no general “grace period” provision like in for example, the United States of America.

However, there is a specific exclusion for disclosures made to “learned societies” for 12 months prior to the date of filing of the application.

As you may be aware, a number of amendments to the Singapore Patents Act have been passed by Parliament.

These changes, together with amendments to the Patents Rules, will come into force on 14 February 2014.

Following our representations, IPOS has confirmed the new format for application numbers of registrable IP  (e.g., trade marks, patents, registered designs) filed on or after 14 February 2014.

The new application number format will not use alphabetic identifiers, but rather numeric identifiers.

This is the first time that IPOS has released details of the algorithm they use to calculate the check digit. They did so on our representations that the widespread availability of the algorithm is in the public interest.