Intellectual Property Department

An international application under the PCT can be filed either with the China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) or the International Bureau of the World Intellectual Property Organization. If you file an international application seeking a patent for an invention or a patent for a utility model and designating China, you can also seek short-term patent protection in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (the Hong Kong SAR). After the international application has entered its national phase in China, you can file an application for a short-term patent in the Hong Kong SAR. The procedures and documents required are explained below.

Where your international application designating China seeks to protect a utility model, it should be noted that the same criteria for novelty and inventive step apply to both a standard and a short-term patent in the Hong Kong SAR. Short-term patents failing to satisfy the criteria may subsequently be challenged in the courts.

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Application process for short-term patent

1Filing of a short-term patent application

When should you file?

You cannot file a short-term patent application until the international application has entered its national phase in China. But you need to file your short-term patent application within six months after the international application has entered its national phase in China, or within six months after the date of issuance of an official notification by the China National Intellectual Property Administration stating that the international application has entered the national phase in the office.

Documents and information

You need to provide documents and information for your patent application.

Filing fee and advertisement fee

You need to pay a filing fee and an advertisement fee within one month after the earliest filing of any part of your application.

Deferred grant

You can ask the registry to defer the grant of your short-term patent. Deferring grant will give you more time to obtain a search report from a prescribed searching authority. Grant can be deferred for a maximum of twelve months after the filing date of the short-term patent application.

Allot application number

Upon receipt of your request form (Form P6), we will issue a receipt notifying you of the alloted application number.

2Examination for according a date of filing to application

We will give your short-term patent application a filing date when:

your Form P6 contains information identifying the applicant, such as the name and address of the applicant; and
your application contains a description of the invention or a reference to an earlier specified application together with a statement indicating that the description and the drawings (if any) of the invention are completely contained in the earlier specified application.

3Examination on formal requirements of application

4Grant and publication of a short-term patent

Short-term patent application based on an international application under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT)

Application process for short-term patent