On June 28, 2024, China’s National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) announced it reached an agreement with the Icelandic Intellectual Property Office and the Egyptian Patent Office on the extension of the Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) pilot projects. Both PPH pilot projects will be extended for another five years from July 1, 2024 to June 30, 2029.

Applicants can request accelerated examination in China when a corresponding Egyptian or Icelandic patent applications has one or more claims that are determined to be patentable by the respective offices. Note that applicants do not need to be Chinese, Egyptian or Icelandic applicants, only that they have an Egyptian or Icelandic patent application.

Other requirements include:

1. The CNIPA application claims priority to a EG or IS application or PCT application via the Paris Convention or is a PCT national phase application without priority claim.
2. All claims in the CNIPA application (for which an accelerated examination under the PPH pilot program is requested), as originally filed or as amended, must sufficiently correspond to one or more of those claims determined to be patentable/allowable in the EG or IS application.
3. The CNIPA application must be published.
4. The CNIPA application must have entered the into substantive examination.
5. Examination of the CNIPA application has not begun at the time of filing the PPH request. 
6. The CNIPA application must be an electronic application.

In order to participate, Applicants must submit:

1. A Request for Participation in the Patent Prosecution
   Highway (PPH) Pilot Program.
2. Copies of all EG or IC office actions relevant to patentability including a translation to English or Chinese (machine translation is acceptable).
3. Copies of all claims determined to be patentable/allowable by EG or IS including translations thereof.
4. Copies of references cited by the EG or IS Examiner.

The original text of the announcement can be found here (Chinese only). More information about the CN-ISIPO PPH program can be found here. More information the CN-EGYPO PPH program can be found here.