The Indian Patent office has asked the industry to appoint only sector specialised patent agents for the purpose of patent filings to avoid complications while examining the patent cases filed for examination. This request comes in the wake of increased problems faced by the examiners during patent examination, making the whole process both time consuming and complicated.
The patent office informed that compared to previous years the percentage of patents filings with request for examination by the Indian companies have increased by 18 to 20 per cent over the time. In fact a senior officer from the office informed that there have been a steady rise in the patent filings from the Ayurveda sector as well.
However, with rise in the demand for patent examination, also comes increased work pressure for the patent officers which is further complicated by the unprofessional manner in which the application is filed by the agents.
P H Kurian, Controller General of Patents, Designs & Trademarks pointed out, “We are doing our best to ensure that we can examine the patent applications requested for examination at the earliest without compromising on the level of scrutiny. But, we have noticed that there have been instances where most of our time is spent on understanding the applications which are either filed in an incomplete manner or are not handled professionally, delaying the whole process.”
He further insisted that to hasten the process and to improve the quality of patent filings by the Indian companies it is imperative that patent agents are chosen only after due deliberation, taking into consideration their knowledge and expertise in the filed on which they are filing the patents for.
“Industry should engage agents who are specialised in their sector so that it will become easier for the patent officers to deal with the application. But most importantly having a qualified sector based agent will also ensure the representing companies to present their case in a more credible manner which is not the case today.”
In relation to pharma sector, he suggested that it would be more effective if a pharmacist with requisite knowledge in patents represents a pharma company as an agent as against others having less knowledge of the field.