1. Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) will implement an enhancement plan for international competitiveness of Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT). 

In order to increase the amount of PCT international search, the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) will expand the examination request fee exemption benefits from the current 30% to 70% when the PCT application searched by the Korean Intellectual Property Office reaches the domestic stage in Korea, which will make it possible for the application to be applied for a preferential examination thus to be able to provide prompt examination services. The international search fee of PCT international search commissioned by ASEAN countries such as Vietnam and Indonesia will be reduced by 75%. The PCT international search is to select the patent office of the country that the applicant wishes to conduct prior art search work, and to investigate the possibility of patent registration in the country where the patent is sought in advance. Of the 152 PCT contracting countries, five advanced patent offices including USA, Japan, Europe, Korea and China carry 94% of the international search.

2. The Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) will more strictly examine the specification having poor quality of translation.

 The Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) preannounces a strict examination against specifications having poor quality of translation in order to resolve pileup of examination.

The Patent Office held a meeting with many (multi) filing offices, and KIPO said it is pushing for revision of examination standards in order to resolve the problem of examination pileup due to poor translation in the patent application process (hereinafter referred to as "foreign application") coming from abroad through the PCT or Paris Convention.

72.2% of the foreign applications are reported as defective and many of them are due to poor translation. In the meantime, in order to enhance the convenience of the applicant, KIPO has been performing the examination work such as notifying the reason of rejection by specifying the part of the translation that is not good, but the unnecessary examination work has been continuously induced, which made KIPO push for revision of examination standards. 

3. A steep decline of Patent Appeals Regarding Pharmaceuticals

The number of patent appeals filed this year was significantly lower than the same period last year. This seems to bring from the combination of a reduction in the number of "Do not ask appeals" that has been raised for a while, a decrease in large sales items, and an increase in the filing of lawsuits on board the extension of existing judgments.

4. Maximum 5 years can be extended for patent period from 20 years to 25 years in China.

China has extended the patent period of medicine and medical supplies from the current 20 years to 25 years to 5 years to comply the level of developed countries. In addition, 28 medicine and medical supplies, including anti-cancer drugs, also abolished import duties. The goal is to strengthen the protection of patents, thereby boosting the Chinese market. There is also the intention to appeal to the United States to strengthen intellectual property rights in the face of trade friction with the United States.

Medicine and medical supplies spend most of time after clinical applications for clinical trials. Therefore, after the manufacture is approved, the effective patent period until patent expiry is short. For this reason, the US, the European Union, and Japan recognize patent extensions for up to five years. The Chinese government has agreed to extend patents for up to five years, subject to the simultaneous application of manufacturing approval in both overseas and China.