PRIORITY PROCEDURE FOR PATENT REQUESTS DUE TO COVID-19

As a measure of collaboration for fighting the COVID-19 pandemic, on April 7, 2020, the Brazilian Patent and Trademark Office (“BPTO”) published in its Official Bulletin No. 2670 the Act No. 149, which alters Resolution No. 239/19, allowing the priority procedure for patent applications claiming protection for technology related to the treatment against the novel coronavirus. Such a measure implicates streamlining the decision-making process for patent applications, aiming to stimulate the creation of new technologies, which aid in protecting the population against the virus.

The priority procedure shall be given to applications in which the object is a pharmaceutical product or process, besides equipment and/or material useful to the diagnosis, prevention and treatment of the disease. This modality shall remain in force until July 30, 2021, the final deadline for requesting the priority procedure, being the evidence of the object’s utility for challenging COVID-19.

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And for any legal questions related to this pandemic, please contact the authors of this article or Mayer Brown’s COVID-19 Core Response Team at FW-SIG-COVID-19-Core-Response-Team@mayerbrown.com.

For more information about the topics raised in this Legal Update, please contact our Intellectual Property & Data Privacy team.