The Brazilian Patent and Trademark Office (“BPTO”) has extended the suspension of its deadlines until May 31, 2020, by Ordinance No. 179/2020. The deadlines had already been suspended previously through Ordinance No. 166/2020, until May 15, 2020. Such measure was taken as a way of challenging the COVID-19 outbreak. The BPTO's servers and collaborators also had their home office extended for such period.
The ordinance will be in force from May 15, 2020, and it applies to every process and suspends all ongoing deadlines, which shall be counted again from the end of the suspension period, according to its remaining time. Likewise, the deadlines, which would begin during this period, shall be counted only after its end. The users may decide whether they will use the deadlines suspension or not, since it is possible and advisable to anticipate the filing of briefs through the BPTO’s online systems to avoid difficulties or interruption of connection to the BPTO's website.
For more information about the topics raised in this Legal Update, please contact our Intellectual Property & Data Privacy team.
If you wish to receive regular updates on the range of the complex issues confronting businesses in the face of the novel coronavirus, please subscribe to our COVID-19 “Special Interest” mailing list.
And for any legal questions related to this pandemic, please contact the authors of this Legal Update or Mayer Brown’s COVID-19 Core Response Team at FW-SIG-COVID-19-Core-Response-Team@mayerbrown.com.
