Taiwan has its own patent system and patent laws. And the patent application authorized by the China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) does not automatically obtain protection in Taiwan. Therefore, if a person wants to obtain protection in Taiwan, he/she needs to submit a patent application to the Intellectual Property Office (TIPO) of the Ministry of Economic Affairs of Taiwan. Besides, since Taiwan is not a contract zone of the PCT Patent Cooperation Treaty, the applicant can only file a patent application in Taiwan directly or file a patent application claiming priority through the Paris Convention; that is, the application should be filed within 12 months from the earliest priority date (for the invention and utility model) or within 6 months (for design).

1. Patent type and term of protection

According to Taiwan's current patent law, patents are divided into three types: invention, utility model and design patent.

1) The term of the patent right for invention expires 20 years from the filing date;

2) The term of the utility model patent right expires ten years from the filing date;

3) The design patent right expires 15 years from the filing date.

2. Materials required

2.1 For invention:

1) The request form;

2) Application body (Description; Claims; Abstract; Drawings; Abstract drawings);

3) Applicant and inventor's name, address and nationality;

4) Power of attorney;

5) Certified priority documents (if the applicant claim the priority).

2.2 For utility model:

1) The request form;

2) Application body (Description; Claims; Abstract; Drawings; Abstract drawings);

3) Applicant and inventor's name, address and nationality;

4) Power of attorney;

5) Certified priority documents (if the applicant claims the priority).

2.3 For design:

1) The request form;

2) Brief description and drawings;

3) Applicant and inventor's name, address and nationality;

4) Power of attorney;

5) Certified priority documents (if the applicant claims the priority).

Note:

1) The official language of the Taiwan patent is traditional Chinese. But the applicant can file the application with the application body in the designated language first, and then supplementary the application body with the traditional Chinese. The TIPO can accept the application body in simplified Chinese, Arabic, English, German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Japanese and Korean when the applicant files the application body the first time. Besides, the Traditional Chinese must be filed within 4 months from the filing date, and the deadline can be extended two months.

2) If the applicant submits the application that claims the priority, except that the priority is an invention or utility model application in Japan and Korea, which can be exchanged electronically, the applicant must file the certified priority document or its scanned copy within 16 months (invention or utility model patent application) or 10 months (design patent application) from the earliest priority date.

3) The applicant who files an application in Taiwan for the first time, the Power of attorney is required. For invention or design patent, the power of attorney must be submitted within 4 months after the application is filed, and it can be extended once for 2 months; and for utility model patent application, the power of attorney must be submitted within 2 months after the application is filed, and the power of attorney can be extended twice, 2 months each time. The scanned copy of the power of attorney is sufficient, and it doesn’t need to be notarized or legalized.

4) Non-Taiwanese applicants need to entrust a patent agent registered in Taiwan to file a patent application.

3. The procedure for examination

3.1 For the invention patent application, it takes substantive examination to examine the patent. The applicant must file the request for substantive examination within 3 years from the filing date, otherwise the application shall be deemed to have been withdrawn.

3.2 For the utility model patent application, it takes formal examination only; that is, the examination of utility model patent is to judge whether the application body meet the formal requirements, so it can obtain the granted of utility model patent quickly.

3.3 For the design patent application, it takes an ex officio substantive examination system; that is, the design patent application shall be designated to conduct substantive examination by examiner after all documents are ready.

4. Required Official fee

The filing fee for invention, utility model and design patent are 3500 NTD, 3000 NTD, and 3000 NTD respectively. If the applicant files the application online, 600 NTD will be exempted.

Besides, the fee for filing the substantive examination is required when filing the substantive examination request. And the fee will be adjusted according to the total number of pages of the application body and the number of claims. When the total number of pages is less than 50 and the claims is within 10 items, the official fee is 7000 NTD; the extra page fee is 500 NTD for every 50 pages, and the over item fee is 800 NTD per claim.

5. Maintenance

To keep the patent in force after it obtains the patent right, the applicant needs to pay the annual fee to make the patent right survive. And the annual fee after the second year shall be paid before the expiry date. If it is unpaid before the expiry date and within the 6 months after the expiration date, the patent right shall become invalid.

With respect to the official fees for annual fees, please refer to the form below.