What Is a Patent Examiner?

Patent examiners are professional and technical personnel engaged in examining patent applications within the national patent administration. The examiner examines the patent application to determine whether the patent application meets the conditions for obtaining patent rights, and notifies the applicant of the examination conditions in writing. Examiners must not only be proficient in the technical expertise of this field, but also master relevant laws and regulations such as the Patent Law. The technical positions of patent examiners in China are divided into four levels: patent examiner, patent examiner, assistant patent examiner, and patent examiner research intern. ^[1]

Patent examiner

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Chinese name: Patent examiner

Foreign name: Patent examiners

The emergence of Chinese patent examiners

In 1979, China began to prepare for the establishment of a patent system, and selected a number of professional technical cadres from central institutions such as the Chinese Academy of Sciences and major state-owned companies. The China Patent Office was established in early 1980. These technical cadres, as elite candidates for future Chinese patent examiners, are mainly sent to the German Patent Office for training. They have been studying there for a long time, more than half a year. These 1980s examiners tended to use German as their first foreign language. They also set the benchmark for Chinese patent examiners to have foreign language advantages.

In the 1980s and 1990s, the number of examiners in the patent office continued to increase, but compared with China's rapidly increasing patent applications, it seems a bit of a slap in the bucket. Mr. Zhang Li, who was interviewed by the reporter, is the deputy director of the Education Department of the Ministry of Personnel and Education of the State Intellectual Property Patent Office of China. He was a patent examiner in the mechanical profession and entered the bureau in 1996. He recalled that there were less than 30 fresh graduates that year, and no more than 40 were recruited from society. The total number of examiners was about 400 at that time.

Composition of Chinese Patent Examiners

From the adoption of the Patent Law by the Chinese legislature in 1984 to the acceptance of the first patent application on April 1, 1985, patent examiners have become a new profession in China.

As of the end of 2004, the number of personnel in the Patent Office of the State Intellectual Property Office was 1,685, and the vast majority, that is, more than 90% were examiners. Among them, 719 were males, accounting for 42.7%, and females were 966, accounting for 57.3%. Age structure: 1145 under 35 years old, accounting for 68%, over 56 years old accounting for 2.2%, 36-55 years old accounting for 29.8%. Education background: 13 doctors, accounting for 0.8%, 490 masters, accounting for 29.1%, and 1022 undergraduates, accounting for 60.7%. There are 160 people below the specialist level, accounting for 9.5%, and they work in the support department. Patent examiners are fully bachelor's or higher. Now the ratio of undergraduate to graduate is 2: 1, Zhang said that the proportion of graduate students will continue to increase.

Sources of Chinese Patent Examiners

As in many countries, the sources of Chinese patent examiners are fresh graduates from universities and social workers. The ratio of these two types of personnel varies from country to country. For example, the European Patent Office each has one-half. In recent years, China has focused on recruiting fresh graduates from universities. The ratio of social recruitment to fresh graduates is 1: 2.

According to Zhang Li, this is related to the government's requirement of "establishing a strong intellectual property rights bureau." In fact, objectively speaking, the "expanded enrollment" and employment situation of Chinese universities have also created conditions for the patent office to select elites. Like many civil servants in central state agencies, patent examiners are now more sought after positions.

From the 2006 Civil Service Employment Plan of the Central State Administration of China, the conditions for recruiting civil servants from the Patent Office of the State Intellectual Property Office, and the selection of several of them, can be seen that the threshold for recruiting talents at the Patent Office and the flexibility facing the market.

Examiner of the Ministry of Mechanical Invention Examination, professional in the field of hoisting machinery, design and manufacture of hoisting machinery, master's degree and above.

The examiner of the Electrical Invention Examination Department specializes in electrical engineering automation, electrical engineering automation, high-voltage technology, bachelor degree or above, English level 4 and above, and a master's degree, English level 6

The examiner of the Communication Invention Examination Department is a professional in wireless transmission field.

The examiner of the Optoelectronic Technology Invention Examination Department specializes in the field of biomedical engineering and instruments, medical imaging engineering, medical equipment and other undergraduates in medical equipment.

Almost only because there is still a lack of competitiveness with large companies in the competition for talents in communication, optoelectronic technology and other fields, the requirements of "undergraduate" and "level 4 English" will appear. In fact, the academic qualifications of patent examiners tend to be graduate level. . The "undergraduate" makes the average age of examiners in the field of communications and optoelectronics even only about 25 years old.

Zhang Li said that even in 2001, patent examiners were not as popular as they are now. At that time, it was difficult for us to recruit people, and graduates of some less well-known local universities were able to come in. But today it is different. Graduates from famous universities such as Tsinghua University, Peking University, and Jiaotong University have become our candidates. Since the "enrollment expansion" began in 2000, we have seen an increase of hundreds of people every year. It recruited 270 people in 2003, 240 people in 2004, and 300 people in 2005. It plans to recruit 564 people in 2006, 90% of which are patent examiners. There are now 18,000 applicants who have passed the qualification examination. After passing the qualification examination, they need to take a class B exam, a vocational ability test, for the recruitment of civil servants by central and state agencies, and they must also take relevant professional English exams organized by our bureau. The exam requires translation of a patent document and English-Chinese translation. Of course, there is an interview at the end. The serious thing is that until the interview, the admission ratio is still 4: 1.

Training of Chinese Patent Examiners

There is no university that specializes in patent examiners, and no unit other than the patent office has the profession of patent examiners. Therefore, each patent examiner is first-hand trained by the patent office. The first way of training is to study exclusively at home, and the second is to study abroad.

Mr. Zhang Li has received complete training as an examiner and is now also responsible for the training of patent examiners. He described the training of examiners by patent offices.

After a new examiner is enrolled, he must first undergo a four-month induction training, which is equivalent to a semester at the university. They are divided into classes like students, with class committees. The training courses are: 1. Civil servant training; 2. Patent law and its detailed implementation rules; 3. Patent search knowledge; 4. Examination and judgment of patentability of inventions; 5. Case exercises. After 4 months of in-coming training, they will return to their own examination department for internship. Each new examiner has an instructor. This instructor is of course the old examiner. He is responsible for guiding the search and examination of newcomers. This period is 8 months. In this way, the training of the new examiners for a total of one year is over, but whether the newcomers have met the training requirements will have to be defended. The defense includes familiarity with patent law and proficiency in search and examination services. Those who cannot pass will be transferred to other departments and even fired. The new examiner who passed the post defense must still accept the tutor and the old examiner's internship for one and a half years to complete the examination business independently.

There will be corresponding continuing education and training in the future, usually once every 2-3 years. If the Chinese Patent Law is amended in 2001, the examination guidelines will also be amended, and training will be provided for the amended part.

The improvement of inspectors' examination skills is endless. It is necessary for inspectors to look at foreign language materials. The Patent Office has been training foreign examiners tirelessly. In 2005, 20 foreign language training courses were held, including English, German, and Japanese. The Patent Office hires professional teachers from universities for this purpose.

However, in terms of follow-up training, whether in the examination business or the improvement of foreign languages, the Patent Office also has a training investment to send examiners abroad for further studies. Due to the relationship between the Chinese Patent Office and the German Patent Office, the Chinese patent examiners were more often sent to the European Patent Office. The foreign universities they visited include Marshall University in the United States, Washington University School of Law, Max Planck Institute in Germany, and so on. Generally, there are 10-15 people to each university each year. The characteristic of arriving in Japan is longer, 6 months to 1 year. In terms of participation in training courses, there are more in Japan and Europe. In addition to the training courses of the five branches of the European Patent Office, they also participated in training courses organized by the World Intellectual Property Organization in Geneva. Under normal circumstances, Chinese patent examiners attend 2-3 training courses every month. In fact, most Chinese patent examiners have the opportunity to study abroad in 3-4 years.

Zhang Li said that training of examiners is a very large investment for patent offices, but it is a need to build a strong IP office. Of course, now we also adopt the method of inviting experts from developed countries to give lectures. Officials and experts from the European Patent Office often hold lectures or training courses. The effect of this is that our patent examiners have narrowed or even eliminated the gap compared with European, American, and Japanese patent examiners. We actually have advantages in mastering multiple working languages and youthfulness. We are now able to work with the European Patent Office to train patent examiners in smaller patent offices in third world countries. Beginning in 2002, in addition to the 2003 SARS cause, we cooperated with the European Patent Office each year to organize patent examiner training activities in North Korea, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, India and other countries. We have the ability to train them in English. Many of our examiners can also speak a second foreign language.

Zhang Li personally participated in the training of patent examiners in other countries, and taught in English as a teacher.

Job Requirements for Chinese Patent Examiners

The annual workload of Chinese invention patent examiners is now standardized, which means that 80 patent applications are examined every year. Historically, Chinese patent examiners have been "overloaded". This is, of course, an overload caused by the backlog of applications, but it also raises concerns about the quality of the review. Zhang Li said with relief, now that the examiners no longer need to have such pressure. Examiners are not self-employed. They are trained in the civil service law and patent law, and are law enforcement officers who are responsible for official duties. It is their bounden duty to enforce the law impartially and review every application strictly in accordance with the law. A scientific and reasonable workload is the basic guarantee for achieving this duty.

The scientific and reasonable workload does not naturally lead to high-quality review cases. In order to improve the quality of examinations, the Patent Office has established three levels of quality inspection agencies. The elementary level is the quality inspection team of each division, which is responsible for the division chief; the intermediate level is the quality inspection team of each examination department, which is responsible for a deputy director of the department; the highest level patent office quality inspection team is composed of experienced patent examiners, Is a positive division setting.

On the occasion of the "World Intellectual Property Day" on April 26, 2004, the Chinese government published a white paper entitled "The State of Intellectual Property Protection in China in 2003"; the then State Administration of Intellectual Property Office, Wang Jingchuan, held a press conference at the Information Office of the State Council. The three special features of patent work in 2003 were particularly emphasized: First, the three types of patent applications formed a three-point world situation. The number of invention patent applications for the first time in 16 years was close to that of utility model patent applications. In 2003, the number of invention patent applications increased from the previous year. 31.3%, the growth rate is much higher than the other two categories. Second, the number of domestic applications for invention patents exceeded foreign applications for the first time in eight years. Since China became a member of the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) in 1994, foreign invention patent applications have increased dramatically, and domestic invention patent applications have been relatively small. However, in 2003, domestic applications for invention patents reached 57,000 and foreign applications for 49,000. However, he also pointed out that until 2003, the number of domestic applications for invention patents that were finally granted was still 11,404 per year, which was much lower than 25,750 overseas, with a disparity of 30.4: 69.6. Interpreting the above, there are answers: Chinese patent examiners successfully ushered in the rapid growth of invention patents; Chinese patent examiners strictly adhered to the neutral civil servants' position and followed the principle of equal treatment of all applications.

The Social Role of Chinese Patent Examiners

For 1.3 billion Chinese, Chinese patent examiners are strange and mysterious groups. By their nature, they rarely interact with the outside world. But in fact, the patent office still arranges social activities for them and conducts investigations in various places. On the one hand, they understand the status of patent application, implementation, and protection; on the other hand, they advertise professional knowledge and further undertake the task of formulating national intellectual property strategies.

With the approval of the State Council of China, in January 2005, the State Council set up a national intellectual property strategy development work leading group with Vice Premier Wu Yi as the group leader and more than 20 departments including the Intellectual Property Office to specifically organize and organize this work. Tian Lipu, director of the State Intellectual Property Office, is the deputy leader of the leading group for the formulation of the national intellectual property strategy. When answering the media in August 2005, he said that the national intellectual property strategy is not the development strategy of the intellectual property work system, but the overall situation of the country's economic and social development. It is the overall national strategy, and the national strategy of rejuvenating the country through science and education, The overall national strategies, such as the strategy of sustainable development and the strategy of strengthening the country by talents, are complementary, interdependent, and mutually reinforcing. The national intellectual property strategy should run through the entire process of creation, management, implementation and protection of intellectual property rights, and not be limited to the protection of intellectual property rights. Cultivation of intellectual property awareness in the whole society, intellectual property output ability, creative ability, industrialization of intellectual property rights, improvement of intellectual property dispute response capabilities, improvement of relevant laws and regulations, and reasonable and effective protection of intellectual property rights, intellectual property information and intermediaries The construction of a service system, the strengthening of international cooperation and international influence, and the cultivation of talents should all be important links in the intellectual property strategy. The formulation of intellectual property strategy is a global task. To do a good job in strategy formulation, we need to coordinate all aspects, but also do a lot of arduous and meticulous basic work. We also need to brainstorm, study repeatedly, carefully sculpt, and also need to be aggressive, Work hard to innovate.

In other words, Chinese patent examiners are not only professionals who do a lot of hard and detailed basic work, but many of them are strategic people. There are two directors of the State Intellectual Property Office who have worked as patent examiners. Among the deputy directors, patent examiners have more backgrounds. Tian Lipu, the new director in June 2005, was a patent examiner. The former director of the State Intellectual Property Office Jiang Ying and deputy director Wu Boming were both patent examiners. Jiang Ying is now a member of the CPPCC and Wu Boming is now a member of the CPPCC and counselor of the State Council. ^[2]

What Is a Patent Examiner?

Patent examiner

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