The new official fees for all patent procedures will be effective as of July 1, 2004. Some rates are significantly increased and some are decreased. We will send you the formal updated Schedule of Charges as soon as we complete editing the new one. We herewith summarize some important items of new Official Fees for Patent for your reference (exchange rate so far: NTD33: USD1 and it will be adjusted according to the current exchange rate when we issue the debit notes):

Issue Fee and Annual Fees:

As of July 1, 2004, the new patent law will be effected in Taiwan. The main amendments are:

The substantive examination for Utility Model applications has been amended into a formal examination only.

Addition of new regulations to introduce the technical report system for Utility Model applications.
Since there is no longer any substantive examination of Utility Model applications, regulations regarding technical report have been adopted for Utility Model applications. Any party can apply for technical report up to the ROCIPO when the Utility Model application is published. In addition, when the patentee of a Utility Model application asserts his patent right, the patentee should submit a technical report, which is made by the ROCIPO, for the Utility Model application.

Certified priority documents can be supplemented within four months from the date of filing (originally, the limit was three months from the date after filing).

A request for re-examination can be filed within 60 days (originally, 30 days) from the date of receipt of the official rejection. However, such extension shall not apply to utility model applications since a formal examination system without the procedure of the substantive examination shall apply thereto.

If a utility model application is formally rejected due to a formality problem under the formal examination, the applicant should file a Petition of Appeal to the Ministry of Economic Affairs for administrative relief.

An invalidation application, pursuant to a violation of the new Article 12.1--when a patent is owned by two or more persons, all related persons should jointly file the patent application or the new Article 67.1(3)--where the patentee is found to be a person other than the person entitled to file the patent application, must be raised by an interested party. Except for the above, any party may file an invalidation application pursuant to other reasons.

The request to convert a patent application (among invention, utility model, design and associated deign applications) must be made within 60 days (originally, 30 days) from the date of receipt of the official notification.

For utility model applications, the applicant may supplement or amend the specifications or drawings within two months of filing. The scope of such supplement or amendment may not extend beyond the original scope of the application.

Abolishing the opposition system during the publication period in order to integrate the opposition and invalidation systems for patents.
Presently, the existence of the opposition system is an obstacle for applicants to obtain patent rights. Since the legal proceedings and effects under administrative appeals for the opposition applications are almost the same as those of the invalidation applications, the opposition system is abolished from the revised Patent Law.

Shortening the time to obtain a Letters Patent.
Presently, a Letters Patent will be issued after the three-month publication period with the payment of the official fee. Since the opposition system is abolished under the amended Patent Law, a Letters Patent can be issued soon after the grant of a patent with the payment of the official fee. Therefore, the applicant can obtain a Letters Patent more quickly under the amended Patent Law.

The dependent claim(s) for Invention and Utility Model patents should be written in Japson type, which contains the preamble part and characteristic part of the patent. A Utility Model application should include formal drawings.