Public Observations

Rule 48 of the Implementing Regulations of Chinese Patent Law provides that any person may, from the date of publication of an application for invention until the date announcing the grant of the patent right, submit observations to the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO). Such third party submissions are referred to as “public observations”. Observations can be submitted by any person in its own name or anonymously (such as through a straw man).

Observations can be submitted for invention patents but not for utility model patents.   Any ground of rejection of a patent application can form the basis of an observation. Such grounds can include lack of novelty, lack of inventive step, sufficiency of disclosure, lack of unity, lack of clarity, ineligible subject matter, double patenting, etc.

SIPO has an official form that allows a third party to submit arguments forming the basis of the observations. This form can be submitted electronically, if desired. If a third party wishes to submit documentary evidence (such as evidence of patents, published applications, non-patent literature, etc.) supporting the observations, then the observations and accompanying evidence should be scanned in and submitted electronically. If any evidence is in a language other than Chinese or English, it is recommended that a Chinese translation be provided. There is no official fee for filing observations.

It is recommended that a third party submit observations as early in prosecution as possible (such as prior to issuance of an Office Action) to allow the Examiner sufficient time to consider the observations. A claim chart comparing the features of the claims with the prior art can be submitted to facilitate the Examiner’s understanding of the arguments submitted in the observations.

According to SIPO’s Guidelines for Patent Examination, the public will not be notified of the handling of any observations submitted. In fact, Examiners have discretion to consider observations once received. It is not known what criteria Examiner’s use to determine whether or not to consider observations once received. Additionally, SIPO does not provide any information on the effectiveness or success rate of such observations.

This is Part 7 of an 8-part series examining post-grant review proceedings, oppositions, and third party observations in the U.S., BRIC and several non-BRIC countries. To see Part 1, Post-Grant Oppositions in Japan, click here. To see Part 2, Third Party Submissions in Russia, click here. To see Part 3, Pre- and Post-Grant Oppositions in India, click here; To see Part 4, Third Party Submissions in the U.S., click here. To see Part 5, Third Party Submissions in Europe, click here. To see Part 6, Third Party Submissions in Brazil, click here.

This post was written with contributions from Feynman Z. Liang of the Jiaquan IP Law Firm.