Summary
Novelty:
Novelty requirement in Jordan is absolute novelty. Yet, a grace period of 12 months starting from the first worldwide disclosure is available, in which the application can be filed without claiming a priority.
Formal Examination:
Once all formalities filed the application will be examined with respect to compliance with the formalities provided for under the patent law.
Substantive Examination:
The examination fee must be pay once the formal examination completed either voluntary or in response to the relevant invitation.
There is no special request for examination. Yet, amending the current claims to match the European allowed claims (after the end of opposition period) usually leads to accelerate registration. In other words, the substantive examination that will be conducted by the European examiners for the European counterpart will be taken into consideration to decide whether the application can be registered or not.
The examinations of other countries such as US & PCT will be taken into consideration for cases in which a European counterpart has not been filed.
Acceptance & Publication:
Once the application is accepted, the bibliographic data of the subject application will be published in the official gazette, for opposition purposes. Within three months from publication, any interested party may file an opposition against the acceptance of the patent at the Patent Office.
Patent Term:
For national phase applications, the annuity fees should be paid starting from the 1st year calculated based on the PCT filing date.
For conventional applications, the annuity can be paid while the application is still pending calculated based on the national filing date. Otherwise, all overdue annuities must be paid at the time of registration.
The due annuity can be paid within a grace period of six months with a penalty.
The term of patent protection in Jordan is 20 years as from the filing date. The application is subject to the payment of the prescribed annuity fees starting from the filing year, due at the time of registration. Further annual maintenance fees are payable on each anniversary of the filing date of the application. There is a grace period of six months for late payment of these annual maintenance fees with penalty fees.
Transfer of Right:
The right to a patent/application may be assigned, transferred through succession or license. The assignment of granted patents must be made in writing. An assignment will have no effect against third parties, unless it has been published in the Official Gazette and duly entered in the relevant records of the Patent Office.
Patent Elapse and Invalidation
The patent title and rights shall lapse in any of the following cases:
•The elapse of the protection period under the provisions of this law.
•Issuance of a final judgement on the patent invalidation by the competent authority.
•Non-payment of the annuity fees and any fine thereof after the elapse of 6 months of the due date.