Who can participate in the pilot?

The CNIPA-EPO pilot is open to nationals and residents of P.R. China.

In order to be able to file your international application with the CNIPA as receiving Office (RO/CN), it suffices that at least one of the applicants is a national of or has a place of residence in P.R. China. Where that is the case, your application will be considered a pilot application if you select the EPO as ISA and the other requirements for participation are also fulfilled (English as language of filing; payment of the international search fee to the EPO).

For applications filed with the International Bureau as receiving Office (RO/IB), the competent ISAs are the same as those which would have been competent if the application had been filed with a competent national/regional patent Office (see Rule 35.3 PCT). Since the EPO has universal competence as an ISA, most applicants were already able – independently of the pilot – to select the EPO when filing with RO/IB. Applications filed with RO/IB will therefore be accepted for the pilot only if:

• all applicants are nationals of P.R. China and have a place of residence in P.R. China or in one of the seven countries where the EPO cannot be designated as ISA (United Arab Emirates (AE), Australia (AU), Canada (CA), Dominica (DM), Democratic People's Republic of Korea (KP), Republic of Korea (KR) and Papua New Guinea (PG)) and/or
• all applicants are nationals of one of the seven countries where the EPO cannot be designated as ISA and have a place of residence in P.R. China.