Local Patent Application Requirements

September 1, 2011
Patent News and Interesting Facts

A local patent refers to the exclusive rights granted by a government or its representative patent office to an inventor for a specific period in exchange for full disclosure of information about the invention to the public.

A local patent is just that – local. It protects the invention against unauthorized usage and commercial gain by other parties.

The holder of a local patent has the right to set up agreements with other parties for usage, marketing, selling, production, and distribution by means of a licensing agreement.

The patent holder will then receive royalties for the above from the other parties. The patent rights holder can also assign the local patent to another party. This entails transferring all rights to another party.

A local patent doesn’t give the patentee the right to use or make and sell the invention, but rather excludes others from doing so regarding the local patent. It can be described as a monopoly right. The lifetime of a local patent is 20 years calculated from the first patent filing date.

If you want the patent to be registered and valid in other countries, thus be a foreign patent, you must file for such through the help of a patent attorney.

The South African Patent Office will not enforce the rights. It is the responsibility of the patentee to enforce the rights and take legal action against other parties who infringe upon his or her local or international patent rights.

To qualify as a local patent, the invention must be novel, thus never disclosed, used or sold anywhere in the world before the first patent filing date. The invention must furthermore be non-obvious to a person skilled in the trade and must involve an inventive step.

Finally it must be useful in agriculture, commerce or industry. Any public disclosure about the invention before the provisional filing date for a local patent will disqualify the invention.