Where URLs are requested below, it is preferred that either URLs which are likely to remain stable over time (three years or more) are provided, or home (main) page URLs are provided with a short explanation of how to access the corresponding information.
The expression "industrial designs" covers industrial designs and models. Offices which issue design patents should report their design patent information activities in this series of Annual Technical Reports.
In addition to the national application of industrial design at the Industrial Property Office it is also possible to obtain the protection of industrial design by Registered Community Design (RCD). This provides protection for the entire territory of the European Union. National applications of industrial designs are subject to formal and substantive examination. Applications of the Community design, processed by the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (OHIM), are only subjected to formal examination.
In 2006 there were 576 registrations in the industrial design register, containing 1,507 individual industrial designs. Of this amount 1,343 designs were registered for Czech and 164 for foreign applicants. The examination procedure was settled negatively in 86 application cases. As of 31 December 2006 there were 200 applications pending. The average time consumption of the design application procedure was reduced from roughly 9 months to 6 months during 2006.
In the Czech Republic there were 5,146 valid national registrations in the register by the end of 2006. On average, each of these constitutes protection for 3 individual industrial designs. There are also about 215,000 valid individual Community designs registered by the OHIM in force in the Czech Republic.
The number of national applications is declining in the long run. In 2006 there were 387 national applications of industrial designs filed, containing 1,222 individual industrial designs. This means, as for the number of designs, a 36% decrease in comparison with 2005 and the lowest number since 1993. The number of Czech applications decreased by 59% in comparison with 2005, the number of foreign applications decreased by 17%.
The rate of decrease of the number of applications accelerated after 2003, when the system of Community industrial designs started. This acceleration was noticed first for foreign applicants. As for Czech applicants, in 2005 the long-term declining trend was temporarily interrupted by a short-term increase thanks to the Act on Administrative Fees, which enabled the filing of simple applications free of charge. A new amendment to this Act eliminated this fee anomaly.
Currently, the decreasing trend of the number of national applications can be attributed on the one hand to Czech applicants who follow the foreign applicants in choosing Community design system for the protection of industrial design and on the other hand, to increasing public awareness of the existence of institute of the unregistered Community design, which provides the protection of industrial designs within the entire European Union without registration and costs by making a design available to the public within the European Union territory.
You can find statistics here: http://isdvapl.upv.cz/pls/portal30/docs/FOLDER/PDF_DOKUMENTY/ROCENKY/ROCENKA_2006.PDF
The Industrial Property Office of the Czech Republic (IPO CZ) carries out the substantive examination of industrial design applications. The subject of the application is not published during the examination procedure. Subjects of negatively settled applications are also never published.
Industrial design information is accessible in the Official Bulletin.
Official Bulletin of the Industrial Property Office of the Czech Republic is published exclusively in electronic form as from the beginning 2007. The paper version has been discontinued.
The Bulletin is published on a weekly basis (updated every Wednesday) instead of the monthly basis as it was before. The files are downloadable free of charge with no prior registration / subscription needed. The Acrobat Reader viewer enabling you to open, view and print PDF files. The information as published shall be the authentic one for legal purposes.
You can fin it here: http://isdvapl.upv.cz/servlet/page?_pageid=82,116&_dad=portal30&_schema=PORTAL30&447__102.menu_f=4314&448__102.folder_f=58
The standard content of the chapter "Industrial Designs" in part A is the following:
- List of registered industrial designs (numerical series with classification symbols)
- Registered industrial designs arranged according to the Locarno Classification (announcement contents, representation and bibliographic data)
- List of owners of registered industrial designs provided with the number of the registration and its classification
- Official decisions and announcements.
You can do the search of the Czech registered designs in this database:
http://isdvapl.upv.cz/pls/portal30/portal30_portlets.vz_en.formular
The 8th edition of the Locarno Classification has been used since January 1, 2004; the whole collection of the registered designs was reclassified according to the 8th edition of the Locarno Classification.
The industrial design search file of the IPO CZ comprises the registered industrial designs collection of the Czech Republic and Czechoslovakia starting from the year 1967 and official bulletins of foreign offices containing registered industrial designs.
Data are updated daily and stored on the disk array.
The national search industrial design database containing basic bibliographic data of registered designs including images is operational. This database is accessible online via the web site of the IPO CZ. It can be used free of charge (http://isdvapl.upv.cz/pls/portal30/portal30_portlets.vz_en.formular)
The IPO CZ has completed retrospective data in the search database of registered industrial designs, which are now completely accessible in this database. Now the database contains bibliographic data as well as images of approx. 80 thousand registered industrial designs. The oldest data came from the 1966/67 turn of the year.
In January 2004, the standard operation of the new information system for the industrial property rights applications proceedings and for keeping registers of subject matters of industrial property rights (IS SyPP) was started. The aim of the project was to create a modifiable and extendable information system over one unified database and to replace two originally separated systems with different conceptions, designed separately for patents, utility models and designs and separately for trademarks. The system is equipped with electronic archiving of incoming and outgoing files. The system makes it possible to receive data of European patents, and processes data of proceedings for the database and for publishing in the Office Bulletin.
Information system in addition to keeping the register of industrial design also provides information on legal status, statistics for the IPO management and Annual Reports. Since 1996 the Annual Reports are accessible online via the web site of the IPO CZ
http://isdvapl.upv.cz/servlet/page?_pageid=82,116&_dad=portal30&_schema=PORTAL30&447__102.menu_f=4318&448__102.folder_f=5862
Equipment: workstations -HP, processor 3 GHz, RAM 512 MB, memory 80 GB. 320 workstations connected in the Office network are of the Office staff direct service. Thereof 75 computers connected in the Office network are of the clients of the Office and staff training service. IPO uses CD, DVD and magnetic tapes as data carriers. The type of network used is ETHERNET. IPO uses WINDOWS XP and OFFICE - 2003 software and the ORACLE 10.1 database.
Development planning and administration of the new information system for application proceedings and for keeping registers of subject matters of the industrial property rights (IS SyPP) provides Patent Information and Analysis Department of the IPO and external companies. The automation and security in the information system for applications proceedings and for keeping the registers provides programmable system workflow.
In addition to paper form of applications, e-filing and filing application via e-mail with the electronic signature, the Office expands possibilities for different kinds of e-requests. After registration, the user can access interactive application forms and other functions. After e-filing the applicant receives confirmation e-mail. Providing that a design is already registered, the public can also search the steps of the application administrative procedure as it is recorded in administrative procedure database.
Greater safety is provided by SSL.
Security collection of the data changes executes twice a weak. Full back up of data executes weekly. Term of validity for one back up is 4 weeks.
The information centre and help desk operate during the working days. They provide the public with general information concerning design protection.
The industrial design collections including the Internet access to them are available in the public reading room. The public reading room staff carries out personal assistance and consultation for beginners.
Clients can order searches as a charged service.
Usage of paper collections for searches has been decreasing rapidly.
The Office web sites http://www.upv.cz are the rich source of information.
Official Bulletin, Part A (containing also industrial designs) was distributed to almost 200 clients in the Czech
Republic and in foreign countries in the year 2006. This was for the last time.
The Official Bulletin of the Industrial Property Office of the Czech Republic is published exclusively in electronic form as from the beginning 2007. The paper version has been discontinued.
Electronic form of Official Bulletin is accessible via web site of the IPO CZ .
http://isdvapl.upv.cz/servlet/page?_pageid=82,116&_dad=portal30&_schema=PORTAL30&447__102.menu_f=4314&448__102.folder_f=5825
There is no international or regional cooperation in the exchange of machine-readable information on industrial designs.
Various courses and seminars were organized for the students and representatives of SMEs or research institutions; Groups of university students were accepted in the premises of the IPO CZ.
In 20046, the two years study course of industrial property rights was conducted within the Office's own educational facility - the Industrial Property Training Institute.
The IPO CZ presented its information activities and products at the following exhibitions and trade fairs:
- International Machinery Trade Fair (Brno, CZ)
- MACH 2006 (Prague, CZ)
- FOR ARCH 2006 (Prague, CZ)
- Innovation 2006 (Prague, CZ)
- IENA - Exhibition of Inventions and Innovations (Nurnberg, DE)
- Exhibition of Inventions (Geneva, CH)
- PATLIB 2006 (Prague,CZ)
- Exhibition of Inventions (Geneva, CH)
- EPOPIC 2006 (Cyprus)
The IPO CZ co-operated with Regional Patent Information Centers (PATLIB) in information product dissemination or providing training and education.
We provided the two-week training course for group of trainees delegated by the International Bureau of WIPO.
The IPO CZ issued the Industrial Property Journal every two months.
Links related to:
- Information on legislation related to industrial designs:
http://isdvapl.upv.cz/servlet/page?_pageid=82,114&_dad=portal30&_schema=PORTAL30&445__102.menu_f=4256
- Annual reports:
http://isdvapl.upv.cz/servlet/page?_pageid=82,116&_dad=portal30&_schema=PORTAL30&447__102.menu_f=4318&448__102.folder_f=5862
- The Official Bulletin of the Industrial Property Office of the Czech Republic:
http://isdvapl.upv.cz/servlet/page?_pageid=82,116&_dad=portal30&_schema=PORTAL30&447__102.menu_f=4314&448__102.folder_f=5825
- The searchable database of the Czech registered industrial designs:
http://isdvapl.upv.cz/pls/portal30/portal30_portlets.vz_en.formular
- Summary of the industrial designs information:
http://isdvapl.upv.cz/servlet/page?_pageid=82,112&_dad=portal30&_schema=PORTAL30&443__102.menu_f=4576&444__102.folder_f=6462