Procedure and requirements for receiving patents and utility model registration in Bulgaria: The Bulgarian patent /utility model/ legislation is harmonized with the European patent legislation /of other European countries/, incl. European Patent Convention.
The application for receiving patents and utility model /UM/ registrations in Bulgaria should be filed with the Patent Office of Bulgaria /BPO/ according to the Act on patents and registration of utility models /APRUM/, last amended and supplemented October 2020 /up to now, this amended version is not translated. There is an English version only of previous amendments and supplements, of December 2019, on the BPO site/. Furthermore, during the application and examination procedure, an important and relevant document is the Regulation about preparing, filing, and examination of patent /UM/ applications /Regulation/ (there is no English version on the BPO site).
Representation /Art. 3 of APRUM/
- (amend. 2020) Any person, who under this act has the right to undertake actions before the Patent Office, may do so in person, through attorney-at-law or an industrial property rights representative.
- (amend. 2020) Any person according to (1), who does not have settlement in the Republic of Bulgaria or in other member state of the European Union, in a state party of Agreement about European Economic Area, or in the Swiss Confederation, shall act before the Patent Office through attorney-at-law or an industrial property rights representative.
Rules for presenting the documents and for correspondence /new Art. 4a/
Art. 4a. (1) All documents in the procedures before the BPO are presented in Bulgarian or with translation in Bulgarian.
Fees /Art. 5 of APRUM/
There are no amendments in Art. 5 concerning fees for patents and UM and in the respective Tariff of fees, collected by the BPO.
Fees of Art. 1 (1), pages 1-2, concern national patents, point 16 (page 2) concerns maintenance of patents, and Art. 1 (3) (pages 4-5) concern UM.
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Drawings /Figures/
The technical requirements for the drawings of the invention and UM are defined in the Regulation, above mentioned:
Art. 16. The drawings for explanation of the invention should be designed as follows:
- They are performed with dense black lines on the sheet of white paper in A4 format (210 x 297 mm), wherein the minimum margins are:
Top – 2.5 cm
Left – 2.5 cm
Right – 1.5 cm
Bottom – 1.0 cm
- When on one and same sheet of paper more than one figure are placed, they are placed on a distance at least 3 cm, wherein every figure is separate numbered, the number corresponds to its number in the Description of figures within the Description of the invention; before the number it is written “fig.”; when one figure is placed on more than one sheet of paper, its separate parts are placed in such a way that lets their assembling into general figure without gaps, wherein they are numbered with one and the same Arabian figure, followed by consecutive letters;
- The drawings are performed according to the rules for designing of technical drawings and in such a scale in order to be reproduced and to be sufficiently sharp by diminishing up to 2/3;
- The drawings should not contain any sizes, captions, tables and specifications, except for extremely necessary single words as “water”, “steam”, “open”, “closed” etc.
- The presented on the drawings units and details are marked with the same figures and letters as they are marked in the Description; one and the same detail or unit on all figures is marked with one and the same figure or letter;
- Designations of the details or units are placed one towards other on sufficient distance, necessary for making corrections; the figures and letters should be with height at least 0.32 cm; all enclosed pictures, plots, nomograms, diagrams etc. are considered as drawings.
From the practice:
The number of the drawings and their views are not limited, it should be reasonable in order better to explain the essence of the invention.
Author name: Rumyana
Rumyana is an Industrial Property (IP) Representative before the Patent Office of Bulgaria, a former patent examiner at the Patent Office in the field of Chemistry, incl. Pharmaceutical Chemistry, Biochemistry.