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UK Green Inventions Get Patent Fast Track

The UK Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) has introduced a “Green Channel” for patent applications relating to “green” or environmentally friendly inventions. This new initiative is intended to enable inventions with an environmental benefit to be given priority within the UK patent system, and forms part of the UK Government’s measures to tackle climate change.

Entry into the Green Channel is a relatively straightforward process, and simply requires a written request to be made to the UKIPO including a reasonable assertion that the invention is one which has some environmental benefit. No additional fees are payable to the UKIPO to gain entry to the Green Channel. Within the Green Channel a patent application can be fast-tracked by requesting any of accelerated search, accelerated combined search and examination, early publication, and accelerated examination. By fast-tracking a patent application the time taken to obtain a granted patent can be reduced from the usual 3-4 years, to a little as 18-24 months.

The Green Channel is accessible to all UK patent applications, including those which are already pending. This therefore provides a useful additional route to accelerating the examination of existing applications, which can otherwise only be accelerated on the grounds that there is a potential infringer that action needs to be taken against or that accelerated grant of a patent is required in order to secure investment.

If you would like any further information about the UKIPO Green Channel, or if you would like any of your existing applications to be entered into the Green Channel, please contact Dr Anna Molony (anna@chapmanmolony.com), or the Chapman Molony attorney dealing with your application, who will be pleased to assist you.