China Patent E-filing Sees Rapid Growth

In recent five years, in a bid to make the E-filing service much better and more convenient, so as to provide a strong support for development of Chinese patent examination, SIPO is steadily popularizing and optimizing its E-filing system, and has achieved leapfrog development.

For five years, relying on local IP offices, SIPO has provided training courses for patent agencies, companies, universities and research institutes. By the end of 2014, the relevant departments of SIPO had completed training courses in 30 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities.

"At present, SIPO has developed and utilized the E-filing supporting systems, including client management system of patent E-filing, Chinese patent search system, online payment platform, E- request for invalid patent systems in reexamination, E-filing system on integrated circuits. And other supporting systems such as public service system, payment reduction approval system are being under construction. "the director of the Examination Management Department told the reporter.

For five years, China has achieved rapid growth in E-filing, and the E-filing rate increased from 26%, 67.21%, 81.88% to 86.52% in 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013 respectively. In 2014, there have been 64,170 new users registered in China's E-filing system, 1,103 patent agencies have submitted electronic patent application, 981 of which have E-filing rate of 98%. As of end of 2014, there have 190,000 users registered in the E-filing system, with a annual average E-filing rate of 89.62% in China.