7. No search opinion is issued 

Where applicants have filed the request for examination according to Rule 70(1) before the search report has been communicated to them and they have waived the right to receive the communication under Rule 70(2) (see C‑II, 1(ii)), the despatch of the search report to the applicant causes the application to enter the competence of the examining division (Art. 18(1) and Rule 10(2)).

In this case, where the application contains deficiencies, the examining division will issue a communication according to Art. 94(3) in place of the search opinion. Failure to respond to this communication results in deemed withdrawal of the application according to Art. 94(4) (see C‑III, 4.2).

If the application is ready for grant, the procedure is as follows:

(i)Where the search for conflicting applications according to Art. 54(3) was complete:

The examining division will issue a communication according to Rule 71(3).

(ii)Where the search for conflicting applications according to Art. 54(3) was not complete:

The applicant is informed that the application is in order for grant, on condition that no state of the art according to Art. 54(3) is found to exist when the top-up search is completed (see B‑XI, 3.9). This is purely for information and no response from the applicant is required.