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April 28, 2023
88av 888
Administrative Affairs Division
Examination Standards Office

The Ministerial Ordinance Partially Amending the Ordinance for Enforcement of the Patent Act and the Ordinance for Enforcement of the Utility Model Act (Ordinance of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry No. 10 of February 25, 2022) has been promulgated and has come into effect on April 1, 2022.

Please note that, in response to the revision of this Ministerial Ordinance, any Multi-Multi Claim (Note) has no longer be allowed in any patent application and application for utility model registration filed after the enforcement.

• (Note) The term "Multi-Multi Claim" as having been restricted by the revised Ministerial Ordinance means "any dependent claim that refers to more than one other claim in the alternative ("multiple dependent claim") which depends from any other multiple dependent claims."

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For the purpose of promoting international harmonization as well as reducing the workload of examination and the burden of monitoring by third parties, the measures have been taken as follows.

In order to enable the restriction of Multi-Multi Claims, based on Article 36(6)(iv) of the Patent Act, which stipulates the description format of patent claims as specified by the Ordinance of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, item 5 was newly established in Rule 24ter of the Ordinance for Enforcement of the Patent Act, which is delegated by the said Item of the Patent Act, and it stipulates that any Multi-Multi Claim shall not be stated in the patent claims. In addition, Rule 4 of the Ordinance for Enforcement of the Utility Model Act has been revised to the same effect.

The revised Rule 24ter(v) of the Ordinance for Enforcement of the Patent Act applies to patent applications filed after the enforcement and does not apply to patent applications filed before the enforcement.

*It does not apply to divisional applications, etc. whose filing dates are retroactive to before the enforcement date. In addition, it does not apply to PCT applications whose international filing dates are before the enforcement date and which are transferred into the national phase in Japan after the enforcement.

*On the other hand, please note that even if the priority date is before the enforcement date, applications with the priority claim whose filing dates are after the enforcement date are subject to the restriction of Multi-Multi Claims.

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The following is an outline of the proposed revision of the Examination Guidelines for Patent and Utility Model in accordance with the restriction of Multi-Multi Claims.

• If a patent application filed after the enforcement of the Ministerial Ordinance contains any Multi-Multi claim, it falls under a reason for refusal for violation of Article 36(6)(iv) (Ministerial Ordinance Requirement on Statement of Claims.)
• Any Multi-Multi Claim and claim referring to that is not subject to the examination for requirements other than the Ministerial Ordinance Requirement on Statement of Claims pertinent to Multi-Multi Claims.
• If, in response to a notice of reasons for refusal for violation of the above Ministerial Ordinance Requirement on Statement of Claims, Multi-Multi claims are amended in proper form, and, as a result of which it becomes necessary to examine the amended claims and to be notified only the reasons for refusal that becomes necessary to notify due to the amendment, this shall be the final notice of reasons for refusal.
• If an application for a utility model registration filed after the enforcement contains any Multi-Multi Claim, it shall not satisfy the requirements (Basic Requirements) provided in Article 6bis of the Utility Model Act.

*As for the international phase of PCT applications, Multi-Multi claims are also subject to International Search and International Preliminary Examination same as before the enforcement.

• Revision of Examination Guidelines related to Multi-Multi Claim Restriction

88av 888最新网址

For the convenience of applicants and patent agents, we have provided a “Multi-Multi Claim Checker”, which is a Multi-Multi Claim detection tool to enable them to more appropriately comply with the restriction of Multi-Multi Claims. This checker is only available in Japanese.

Since it is expected that large amount of pre-filing unpublished information is handled, please download the checker directly from the link below and put it to practical use. This checker can be used in an offline environment because it operates without communicating externally.

Regarding the Checker Update (Ver. 1.1) (March 23, 2022)

Detection accuracy has been improved in response to the Multi-Multi Claims that could not be detected in some cases.

*After downloading the compressed file, unzip it and run it from the "multimultichecker_ver_1_1.html" file.

Points to note

• This checker detects Multi-Multi Claims and claims that refer to the said claims.
• Please be aware that some Multi-Multi Claims may not be detected or may be detected incorrectly.
• If you find any incorrect detection and the like, we would appreciate it if you could inform them to us by using the contact information below. We will use this information to improve the checker in the future.

88av 888最新网址

The status of applications filed after the restriction of Multi-Multi Claims is as follows.

The ratio of applications containing any Multi-Multi Claim to the total patent applications was about 65% before the restriction of Multi-Multi Claims, while it decreased to about 5% immediately after the restriction (6.0% for applications filed in April,2022 and 4.5% for those filed in May,2022), and decreased to about 3% after one year of the restriction (2.9% for application filed in February, 2023 and 3.1% for those filed in March, 2023) *1. In addition, the ratio of applications containing any Multi-Multi Claim to the total applications for utility model registration also decreased from about 25% before the restriction of Multi-Multi Claims to about 3% after one year of the restriction (1.9% for applications filed in February,2023 and 4.0% for those filed in March,2023) *1.

As you can see from the above data, in many cases, the applicants have taken action prior to filing the application. However, if you find that your patent application contains any Multi-Multi Claim after filing the application, please consider making a voluntary amendment, for example, by the time of filing a request for examination. This will avoid the possibility of receiving a notice of reasons for refusal for violation of the Ministerial Ordinance Requirement on Statement of Claims pertaining to Multi-Multi Claims*2.

Notably, applications of other countries entitled to serve as a basis for priority under the Paris Convention or PCT applications may contain Multi-Multi Claims. Please consider whether it is necessary to change the citation relations between claims so as not to include Multi-Multi Claims when filing an application with a claim of priority under the Paris Convention or when transferring a PCT application into national phase.

In addition, please ensure that Multi-Multi Claims are not included, not only when filing an application or requesting an examination, but also when responding to a notice of reasons for refusal, for example.

Thank you for your cooperation in responding to the restriction of Multi-Multi Claims.

*1 The above percentages are provisional figures. The figures assume that all divisional applications, etc., whose original filing dates are before the enforcement date are retroactively before the enforcement date.
*2 If a reason for refusal in violation of the above-mentioned Ministerial Ordinance Requirement on Statement of Claims is notified, the final notice of reason for refusal may be rendered and the scope in which an amendment can be made may be limited in the case where the invention in the amended claims for which the violation of the restriction of Multi-Multi Claims has been resolved by the response has other reasons for refusal (see "88av173 88av1043 cc亚洲日韩" above).

[Last updated 28 April 2023]

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Administrative Affairs Division Examination Standards Office, 88av 888 E-mail: [email protected]