The basic concept of the PPH programme is that where the Nordic Patent Institute acting as the International Authority has determined that one or more claims of a patent application is/are allowable in the international phase, the applicant will be entitled to the benefit of an accelerated examination before the Japan Patent Office in the national phase for the corresponding application. This is providing that certain conditions are met, including the sufficient correspondence of claims between the two applications and that work products of the former are made available to the latter.

The application which is filed with the JPO and on which the applicant files a request under the PCT-PPH must satisfy the following requirements:

• The latest work product in the international phase of a PCT application corresponding to the application (“international work product”), namely the Written Opinion of International Search Authority (WO/ISA), the Written Opinion of International Preliminary Examination Authority (WO/IPEA) or the International Preliminary Examination Report (IPRP), indicates at least one claim as allowable (from the aspect of novelty, inventive steps and industrial applicability).
   
• The relationship between the application and the corresponding international application satisfies one of the following requirements:
(A) The application is a national phase application of the corresponding international application. 
(B) The application is a national application as a basis of the priority claim of the corresponding international application. 
(C) The application is a national phase application of an international application claiming priority from the corresponding international application. 
(D) The application is a national application claiming foreign/domestic priority from the corresponding international application. 
(E) The application is the derivative application (divisional application and application claiming domestic priority etc.) of the application which satisfies one of the above requirements.
 
• All claims on file, as originally filed or as amended, for examination under the PCT-PPH must sufficiently correspond to one or more of those claims indicated to be allowable in the latest international work product of the corresponding international application.
   
• The JPO has not begun examination of the application at the time of request under PCT-PPH.

You will find more information on how to file a request on the Japan Patent Office web site

For more information contact Grétar Ingi Grétarsson, Vice-Director of Nordic Patent Institute, +45 4350 8500, gretar.ingi.gretarsson@npi.int.