Japan Patent Office Totally Explained

Everything about The Japan Patent Office totally explained

The Japan Patent Office (JPO; 特許庁 Tokkyochō) is a Japanese governmental agency in charge of industrial property right affairs, under the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry. The Japan Patent Office is located in Kasumigaseki, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo and is one of the world's largest patent offices.
The Japan Patent Office's mission is to promote growth of the Japanese economy and industry by administering the laws relating to patents, utility models, designs, and trademarks. (Copyright affairs are business of the Agency for Cultural Affairs.) In 2005, the Japan Patent Office received 427,078 patent applications, 11,386 utility model applications, 39,254 design applications, and 125,807 trademark applications; it registered 122,944 patents, 10,573 utility model rights, 32,633 design rights, and 97,939 trademark rights in the same year. (External Link

) For more than 30 years, the Japan Patent Office has been notorious for its slow patent examination. Applicants can expect to wait approximately 30 months to receive a first examination letter from JPO after they request it. Also, some applicants have criticized JPO for the brevity of examination rejection letters, often charging that they're so perfunctory that the stated reasons for refusal can't be made out.
The JPO cooperates with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and the European Patent Office (EPO) as one of the Trilateral Patent Offices.

Organization

The Japan Patent Office is headed by a commissioner and consists of seven departments: (External Link

)

General Affairs Department
Trademark, Design, and Administrative Affairs Department, in charge of examining trademark right applications, design right applications and formalities check of all applications including patent applications
First Patent Examination Department, examining patent applications related to applied physics, optics, and architecture
Second Patent Examination Department, examining patent applications related to machinery
Third Patent Examination Department, examining patent applications related to chemistry, pharmacy, and biotechnology
Fourth Patent Examination Department, examining patent applications related to electronics, telecommunication, and information technology
Appeals Department

The commissioner of the JPO is appointed from higher officials of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry and generally changes in at most two years. The present commissioner is Makoto Nakajima (中嶋誠 Nakajima Makoto), succeeding in September 2005 Hiroshi Ogawa (小川洋 Ogawa Hiroshi) who had been in the place since July 2004.

History

During the Edo period, the Tokugawa shogunate discouraged inventions in order to preserve stability of the feudal society. In fact, Tokugawa Yoshimune, the eighth shogun of the Tokugawa dynasty, decreed in 1721 the "Ban on Novelty" (新規御法度 shinki gohatto), which was intended to prohibit everything novel, especially clothing of rich design.
   In 1868, the Tokugawa shogunate ended and a new reformist government took its place (the Meiji Restoration). The government studied the Great Powers and adopted a national policy of catching them up in various government areas. Industrial property rights were recognized as a means for achieving the policy.
   The first patent law in Japan was thus established in 1871, though it was abandoned in the next year. Today, the founding date of Japanese patent law and of the Japan's patent office is considered to be April 18, 1885, when the "Patent Monopoly Act" (專賣特許條例 senbai tokkyo jōrei) was enacted. In 1899, Japan acceded to the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property. Takahashi Korekiyo was the first commissioner of the JPO.
   The first patent was granted for Hotta Zuisho (堀田瑞松), a lacquerware craftsman, on 1885-08-14. The patent granted to him was for an anticorrosive paint containing lacquer, which effectively prevented ship bottom from corrosion.
   In 1978, Japan acceded to the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT). In 1980, the JPO adopted the International Patent Classification, discarding its own patent classification.

Miscellaneous

The Japan Patent Office (JPO), the State Intellectual Property Office of China (SIPO) and the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO) are sometimes referred to as "Asian Trilateral Offices".

Further Information

Get more info on 'Japan Patent Office'.

External Link Exchanges

Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

<a href="http://japan_patent_office.totallyexplained.com">Japan Patent Office Totally Explained</a>

Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.