Data transfer feature between TURKPATENT and EPO for European patent validations put into use

Turkish Patent and Trademark Office (TURKPATENT) has announced that a web service was created between European Patent Office (EPO) and TURKPATENT for the entries of the validation of the European patents and submission of the set of the claims for provisional protections in Turkey.

With the databases being integrated, when the users enter the grant number (B1) for validating the European patents in Turkey or the publication number (A1) for submitting the set of claims for European patent applications into the the EPATS, which is the electronic filing system of TURKPATENT, the following data will be automatically fetched from the database of the European patent register:

• European Patent Application Data
• European Patent Application Number
• European Patent Application Publication Date
• European Patent Grant Date
• International Patent Classes (IPC)
• Priority Claim Rights Data
• Title and Address of Applicants and Holders
• Title and Address of the inventors

This new facility will substantially accelerate the filing procedure and provide the consistency of the data between both Offices.

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Turkey further extended IP deadlines

Turkey has further extended IP deadlines keeping the time limits suspended as from 13 March 2020 due to noval coronovirus (Covid-19) pandemic.

The further extension has become possible by the recent presidential decision dated 29 April 2020 (Decision No: 2480). With the decision, all the deadlines, which were previously suspended starting from 13 March 2020 to 30 April 2020 by the omnibus bill issued on 26 March 2020, were further extended till 15 June 2020 and will resume on 16 June 2020.

As the calculation of the deadlines appears complex to some extent, Turkish Patent and Trademark Office (TURKPATENT) has indicated each situation for calculating the upcoming deadlines as follows:

• If the time limit set by the Office expired on 12 March 2020 or before, the time limit will not change, namely there will be no extension of time.
• If the time limit set by the Office expired between 13 March 2020 and 27 March 2020 (inclusive these dates), the deadline to act will be 30 June 2020.
• If the time limit set by the Office expired/will expire between 28 March 2020 and 15 June 2020 (inclusive these dates), the deadline to act will be the date which is calculated by adding the remaining time as of 13 Mart 2020 to 16 June 2020.
• If the time limit set by the Office started before 13 March 2020 and ended/will end on 16 June 2020 or later, the deadline to act will be the date which is calculated by adding 95 days to the expiry date of the time limit.
• If the time limit set by the Office started between 13 March 2020 and 15 June 2020 (inclusive these dates), the time limit set by the Office will start on 16 June 2020.

For calculating the deadlines, the spreadsheet calculator provided here can be used.

TURKPATENT remains fully operative and accept all the applications and requests by its electronic filing system (EPATS).

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A high number of trademark applications associated with coronavirus recently filed in Turkey

Turkish Patent and Trademark Office (TÜRKPATENT) has received a great number of trademark applications associated with "Covid-19" and "Coronavirus" in February and March 2020.

These trademark applications either directly cover "Covid-19" and "Coronavirus" or use a wording highly associated with Covid-19 and Coronavirus. To put it in numbers, 33 applications covering "corona" or "korona, and 17 applications covering "covid" were filed in the last two months.

Several of applied-for "Covid" marks

Class 5

Classes 3, 9, 10, 25

Classes 9, 10

Classes 1, 18, 25

Class 13

Class 3

Several of applied-for "Corona" marks

Classes 25, 35

Class 3

Classes 3, 5

Class 10

Class 25

These trademark applications cover a large spectrum of goods and services in different classes, including class 3 (soaps, detergents, cosmetics etc.) and class 5 (pharmaceuticals, hygiene products, disinfectants etc.) and class 10 (health masks). The examination of the majority of the applications is still in progress.

TÜRKPATENT has already refused several of the applications covering “corona” or “covid” in class 3  and class 5. However, it has allowed some applications to be published, e.g. the mark "covid-19" in class 9 and "corona" in class 13. 

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Turkish IP deadlines extended due to coronavirus

Turkey has recently extended legal and administrative deadlines, including those regarding the IP-related matters, due to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

The extension of deadlines became possible with a provisional article under an omnibus bill (Bill No: 7226) enacted by the Turkish Parliament. The bill came into force on March 26, 2020 after its publication in the Turkish Official Gazette (Gazette No: 31080).

With the entry into force of the provision made by the bill, Turkish Patent and Trademark Office (TÜRKPATENT) has announced that:

• All deadlines for the industrial property rights were suspended as of 13 March 2020.
• All the deadlines falling due between 13 March 2020 and 30 April 2020 will resume on 1 May 2020, which means that the deadlines during this time will have been extended till April 30, 2020.
• An additional 15 days will be added to the deadlines, which will expire within 15 days from 01 May 2020, whereas the remaining term will be taken into account if there are more than 15 days to expire on 01 May 2020.
• The applicants and attorneys will be able to retroactively perform any acts for which the deadlines had expired after 13 March 2020 but before 26 March 2020 on which extension of time was granted.

This deadline extension also covers the ongoing cases regarding the IP rights in the Turkish courts.

If the pandemic still persists after 01 May 2020, the President of Turkey will have the capacity to extend the deadlines of his own accord provided that it is for only once and not more than 6 months.

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TÜRKPATENT made COVID-19 restrictions on its premises

Turkish Patent and Trademark Office (TÜRKPATENT) has temporarily discontinued its information help desk and will not accept visitors on its premises due to novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. The stakeholders will be able to get information and response to their inquiries by calling call center of the Office.

As TÜRKPATENT has recently migrated all its services to electronic environment (EPATS), the applicants and attorneys will be able to file all the IP applications and lodge any requests by electronic means without experiencing any interruption of services.

TÜRKPATENT is fully operative and has not yet notified of any instances such as interruption of services, temporary closure or extension of time for deadlines.

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Turkish Plant Variety Office published a report for the activities of the plant varieties in 2019

Turkish Plant Variety Office has published an annual report regarding the applications and registrations for the plant varieties in 2019.

The report provides the following figures which cover the total application and registration activity since September 2004 when Turkey first started to accept the applications for the protection of the plant varieties after the issuance of the Regulation for the protection of the plant varieties (Reg. No. 25551 dated 12.08.2004) in Turkey.

Numbers of the applied-for, protected and cancelled plant varieties over the years in Turkey

According to the report, the number of the applications decreased in 2019 compared to 2018. The report informs that the recordal of the plant varieties (seed registration) under the regulation for recording the plant varieties) is widely thought as obtaining protection for the plant varieties by the plant breeders, whereas it is not the case as the protection is provided by the applications through the plant variety rights. This wrong assumption still keep the application numbers lower than what is expected.

The report emphasizes that Turkey started to accept the applications for all the plant genies and species of the UPOV as from 2018.

According to the report, in 2019, the Turkish Plant Variety Office received 2.214 applications, 1.978 of which were accepted after performing the examinations and 81 of which were refused due to various reasons, mostly lack of novelty and omissions for duly submitting the documents.

Accordingly, 1.422 applications of the total 1.978 accepted applications has been put under the protection. The technical examinations of the 403 applications are still ongoing.

Number of Applications in 2019 and status thereof

The Report informs that the crops are the first to be applied for and put under protection.

Number of the plant variety applications and protections in 2019 according to the plant groups

According to the report, %42 of the applicants are domestic while 58% of those are of foreign origin.

Percentage of domestic and foreign applications of Plant Varieties in 2019

Among the foreign-originated applications filed in 2019, the Netherlands comes first  and is followed by USA and Spain.

Number of plant varieties applications in 2019 by foreign countries

Among the companies, Nunhems B.V., a Netherland's company owned by the German chemical giant BASF, is ranked first with its 125 applications. Nunhems B.V. is followed with 118 and 117 applications by Monsanto A.S. and Trakya Tarımsal Araştırma Enstitüsü, respectively.

Number of the plant varieties applications in 2019 according to the companies and institutions

The report is also making specific emphasis on the following points:

• Turkey participated in UPOV PBR online application tool (PRISMA) as from 2017, whereby breeders can submit applications in any participating UPOV Members.
• A cooperation agreement is signed with Japan Plant Variety Protection Office. According to the agreement, no official fee will be requested by the Turkish Plant Variety Office for the DUS tests prepared by Japan PVP Office, while Japan PVP Office will pay 150 EURO for the DUS tests prepared in Turkey.
• Turkish PVR Office advises that it would be appropriate to use genetic analysis methods in comparing the production material or product claimed to be violated with the protected variety, and this method is very important in terms of the rapid conclusion of the legal cases.

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