Over the past decade or so due to rapid development of technologies more new types of works and creations are starting to be protected by intellectual property rights. Hence the relations and transactions related to intellectual property rights are becoming more complex and multifaceted. Naturally, reform of intellectual property legislation becomes necessary. So, new Law on Intellectual property was adopted on January 23, 2020 and came into force on December 1, 2020. Law on Intellectual property establishes general regulations related to intellectual property rights, legal status of intellectual property authorities and institutions. In one of our previous blogs, we have covered highlights of this law. And matters related to specific types of intellectual property are regulated by separate relevant laws.
As part of said reform several key laws were renewed and amended on May 6, 2021, particularly, Law on Patents, Law on Copyrights, and Law on Trademarks and Geographical indications.
Revised version of Law on Patents was adopted and it implements several new significant regulations. Here are highlights of these new regulations:
- new law provides to grant patents for utility models, whereas previously certificates were granted for utility models;
- patentability criteria of inventions, utility models and industrial designs are redefined, in the sense that they are more clarified;
- patent application filing procedures have become more detailed, particularly, formal examination of application is split into two stages: composition check of application documents and examination of application documents;
- due to the fact that terms in the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT), to which Mongolia is a party, are long and the need to bring the law into line with PCT, patent application filing terms and prior art search and substantive examination terms have been extended. Also, other relevant regulations have been brought into line with international treaties, to which Mongolia is a party;
- regulation of electronic filing of patent applications have been updated, while previous regulations were very vague;
- more clarified regulation is added concerning third-party observations (third-party objections);
- regulation on international patent application filing procedures, and licensing agreement regulations have become more detailed.
Overall, the new law has implemented more detailed regulations and precise terms of patent application filing, application examination and patent granting procedures, and has eliminated any previously existing inconsistencies and overlaps of regulations.
In our following blogs we shall discuss about new regulations established in Law on Trademarks and Geographical indications and Law on Copyrights.