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For purposes of enhancing Taiwan's economic and industrial competitiveness, promoting development of biotechnology, green technology, advanced agriculture industry and other critical technologies, as well as raising the quality of the patent examination process, the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) has started to identify topics to be considered for proposed amendments of the Patent Act. As of 2006, the IPO held 15 public hearings to collect comments and suggestions from the general public. Based on the results of the study and the comments and suggestions provided by the public, the IPO has concluded that there is a need to amend the Patent Act. As of February 2009, the IPO held 8 more public hearings and prepared a draft amendment of the Patent Act, which was submitted to the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) for review on 3 August 2009. After the MOEA's review, the draft amendment was approved by the Executive Yuan on 3 December 2009, and the Execute Yuan further delivered the draft amendment to the Legislative Yuan for review and legislation on 11 December 2009. The major objectives for directing the ongoing amendment are as follows:
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To meet the need for industrial development, such as expanding patent protection to animal and plant per se inventions so as to encourage development of agriculture industry, making act of conducting testing of pharmaceuticals be non-infringing etc.
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To promote the international harmonization, such as adding new provisions regarding public health topics in line with WTO Trips, amending the time period for submitting priority documents, introducing reinstatement procedure to make up un-intentional defaults in meeting the statutory deadlines, expanding the scope of patentability grace period, etc.
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To make changes with respect to patent examination practice so as meet the real needs and upgrade the examination practice.
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To make changes with respect to patent enforcement practice so as to enhance patent protection.
As to details regarding the draft amendment of the Patent Act, please also refer to Lee and Li Bulletin of September 2009 for details.
