Category Archives: Industrial Designs

Today is the day — Colombia joins the WIPO DAS system

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Yes, today is the day that Colombia joins DAS as both an Accessing Office and a Depositing Office.  You can read about this here.

Who is the most trendy, modern and up-to-date Colombian intellectual property firm?  Be the first to provide to me an application number, filing date, and DAS access code for a design application, a patent application, a utility model application, and an RO/CO application, and I will recognize your status as the most trendy, modern and up-to-date in Colombia.  (I will blur part of the application number in the Certificates of Availability that I obtain and post.)

“Captain May I?” in Hague Agreement applications

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The childhood game of “Captain May I?” (Wikipedia article) irritated me greatly as a child.  I had little patience for it.  The premise of the game is that words do not mean what they seem to mean.  In this game, a string of words which on its face is an instruction to take three steps forward does not actually count as an instruction to take three steps forward unless it is followed up by the query “Captain May I?” which is in turn followed by an automatic grant of permission by the “captain”.  The conceit of the game is that any and all requests to the captain for such permission are automatically granted, so that after a few minutes of play one sort of assumes that because the requests are always granted, there should not really be a need to ask.  But the “gotcha” in the game is that you must ask, even though the asking is pointless.

Today I was gobsmacked to learn that the USPTO plays “Captain May I?” with US designations of Hague Agreement applications (international design applications).  If as a child you were to get tricked and forget to ask “Captain May I?” the consequences would merely be that you return to the starting line of the game.  But as a design applicant if you get tricked and forget to ask “USPTO May I?” the consequence is, it seems, that you lose your priority claim.  I am not making this up.  Continue reading →

Two more Offices join the WIPO DAS system

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I am delighted to report that two more Offices have announced their participation in the DAS system.  These are the Italian Patent and Trademark Office and the Superintendence of Industry and Commerce of Colombia (the Colombian patent and trademark office).  Here are details of the Depositing-Office participations:

  Colombia is a Depositing Office? Italy is a Depositing Office?
National industrial design applications yes since August 28, 2020 yes since October 1, 2020
National patent applications yes since August 28, 2020 yes since October 1, 2020
National trademark applications   yes since October 1, 2020
National utility model applications yes since August 28, 2020 yes since October 1, 2020
PCT international applications filed
With the office as a PCT receiving office		 yes since August 28, 2020 yes since October 1, 2020

 

One striking aspect of this is the participation of RO/CO and RO/IT as Depositing Offices.  This reminds us that among the IP5, the straggler Receiving Offices are RO/JP, RO/KR, and RO/US.  

Note, too, the ever-increasing participation of Offices in DAS with respect to trademarks.

This also offers a reminder that these two Offices offer utility model protection.

Here are details of Colombia’s Accessing-Office participation:

  Colombia is an Accessing Office?
Hague international applications yes since August 28, 2020
National industrial design applications yes since August 28, 2020
National patent applications yes since August 28, 2020
National trademark applications yes since August 28, 2020

 

Who is the most trendy, modern and up-to-date Colombian intellectual property firm?  Be the first to provide to me an application number, filing date, and DAS access code for a design application, a patent application, a utility model application, and an RO/CO application, and I will recognize your status as the most trendy, modern and up-to-date in Colombia.  (I will blur part of the application number in the Certificates of Availability that I obtain and post.)

Who is the most trendy, modern and up-to-date Italian intellectual property firm?  Be the first to provide to me an application number, filing date, and DAS access code for a design application, a patent application, a trademark application, a utility model application, and an RO/IT application, and I will recognize your status as the most trendy, modern and up-to-date in Italy.  (I will blur part of the application number in the Certificates of Availability that I obtain and post.)

A Budapest Treaty deposit requirement in an industrial design case!?

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click to enlarge

Here’s a nice thing to smile about over your morning caffeine fix. 

Like many loyal readers of this blog, we at OPLF check the status of our cases in Patentcenter (or, in the old days, in PAIR) every day or so on general principles.  It lets us know for example if an Office Action is imminent or if an Allowance is imminent.  

Just now our daily status check revealed this case in our docket, in which the status is “allowed, Notice of Allowance not yet mailed”.  This means the Examiner has allowed the case, but we have not yet received the Notice of Allowance.  So let’s see how alert you are at this time of the morning.  What’s very much out of the ordinary about this transaction history in this “allowed case”?  Well, the answer is in the title of the blog post, so you probably already knew where I was going with this one.  Continue reading →

EUIPO will join DAS on July 11, 2020

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I am delighted to report that the European Union Intellectual Property Office will begin participating in the DAS system as a Depositing Office for industrial designs starting on July 11, 2020.  This comes after Eighty-four practitioners and applicants asked EUIPO to join DAS.  

For more information see the Notice at the WIPO DAS web site.

By the way, if you are glad to see this result, maybe take a look at the list of the eighty-four signers, and if you know one or more of them, maybe drop them a “thank you”.

 

 

Today is the day for Mexico and the Hague system

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Yes, today is the big day for Mexico and the Hague system.  In my blog article of March 6, 2020 I told you this was imminent.  And now is the day — design filers in Mexico can file international design applications using the Hague system.  And design filers in many countries around the world can designate Mexico in their international design applications.  You can see the announcement on the WIPO web site here.

Mexico joined the Patent Cooperation Treaty on January 1, 1995 and joined the Madrid Protocol on February 19, 2013.  Thus, with today’s participation Mexico achieves the trifecta of participation in all three international e-filing systems (patents, trademarks, and designs).