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In addition to the PPH pilot program between TIPO and USPTO, as of January 2010, TIPO has been implementing the "Implementation Plan for Expedited Examination of Invention Patent Applications", under which an applicant may apply for expedited examination of his/her application based on any of the following reasons:
Reason 1:
where a corresponding foreign patent application has been allowed through substantive examination.
Reason 2:
where a corresponding foreign patent application filed with USPTO, JPO or EPO has not been allowed through substantive examination, but office actions and search reports have been issued therefor.
Reason 3:
where there is a need for commercial practice reason(s)
In principle, for a request filed based on Reason 1, TIPO may issue an examination notification (an office action or a decision) within 6 months from the date of submitting all required documents for such expedited examination. For a request filed based on Reason 2, TIPO may issue an examination notification (an office action or a decision) within 6 months (where the claims of the foreign case and the Taiwanese case are the same) or 9 months (where the claims of the foreign case and the Taiwanese case are different) from the date of submitting all required documents. In case of an expedited examination request filed based on Reasons 3, TIPO may issue a an examination notification (an office action or a decision) within 9 months from the date of submitting all required documents for such expedited examination. Having said that, the actual examination time needed would depend on the technology field involved. According to TIPO's statistics, during the period from January through November 2011, there are in total 1273 requests for expedited examination filed with TIPO. Among all these requests, there are 416 requests filed by domestic applicants and 656 requests by foreign applicants based on Reason 1; there are 7 requests filed by domestic applicants and 20 requests by foreign applicants based on Reason 2; there are 157 requests filed by domestic applicants and 17 requests by foreign applicants based on Reason 3.
