USPTO Announces PPH Pilot Programme With The Intellectual Property Corporation Of Malaysia
By Godson Umejiego, Bureau Chief, The Americas and Ron Chen, Bureau Chief, Asia
To perpetuate its mission of fostering innovation and growth worldwide, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) will commence a Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) pilot programme with the Intellectual Property Corporation of Malaysia (MyIPO) on March 2.
Malaysia is one of the major economies in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations region, and this pilot programme will facilitate patenting by US interests in that country.
“The new PPH pilot programme with the Intellectual Property Corporation of Malaysia is a further step in building a close and mutually beneficial partnership between the MyIPO and the USPTO,” said Kathi Vidal, Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the USPTO. “As we discussed in our trip to Malaysia at the end of the summer, I have no doubt our deeper collaboration will lead to a stronger and more productive relationship that will benefit our respective inventors and innovators.”
The PPH programme is a worksharing arrangement between two or more patent offices that enables an applicant who receives a positive ruling on patent claims from one participating office to request accelerated prosecution of corresponding claims in another participating office. Therefore, the PPH program allows the applicant to obtain an expedited patentability decision in the second office.
More information on the PPH program is available on the USPTO’s PPH webpage.
The pilot programme with the MyIPO will run for three years, ending on March 1, 2026.
