Multilateral Cooperation

In the field of multilateral cooperation of the Intellectual Property Office of the Republic of Serbia, the primary importance is given to the cooperation with the World Intellectual Property Organization – WIPO (www.wipo.int) from Geneva and the European Patent Organization – EPO (www.epo.org) from Munich.

World Intellectual Property Organization – WIPO

WIPO is one of the 16 specialized agencies of the UN having competence in the international affairs referring to the rights of industrial property and copyright and related rights. WIPO was founded on April 26th, 1970, when the Convention Establishing WIPO entered into force.

WIPO performs tasks of administering international treaties in the field of intellectual property, takes care of the harmonization of practice in the issues of international conventions enforcement, initiates amendments of the valid conventions and the adoption of new ones, implements programs of technical assistance to developing countries and the least developed countries, implements education programs through WIPO Academy specially established for that purpose, issues publications, unifies and publishes statistical data concerning the registration of particular rights of industrial property in the member states and performs other tasks of common interest for the member states. According to the data from July 13th, 2007, WIPO gathers 184 member states.

The Republic of Serbia has ratified 19 WIPO international agreements, and their enforcement is the competence of the Office.

Between the Intellectual Property Office of the Republic of Serbia and the WIPO, from its foundation in 1970, tradition of good and substantive relationships developed, which did not die out even in the period of the enforcement of international sanctions against the FRY. In the course of more than two decades, and in particular in the last four years, WIPO significantly contributed to the development of the Office and to the strengthening of the intellectual property in our country through expert and technical assistance.

Main Forms of Cooperation with the WIPO:

• Cooperation with regard to the enforcement of treaties concerning the international registration of specific industrial property rights: the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT), Madrid Agreement Concerning the International Registration of Marks, Hague Agreement Concerning the International Registration of Industrial Designs and Lisbon Agreement for the Protection of Appellations of Origin and their International Registration. Every year, in the Republic of Serbia, by the implementation of the Madrid Agreement, 5000 foreign trademarks are registered, by the enforcement of the PCT Treaty, 300 foreign patents are registered, by the implementation of the Hague Agreement, 600 designs are registered and by the enforcement of the Lisbon Agreement, 10 foreign appellations of origin are registered;
• Participation in the work of the annual sessions of the governing bodies of WIPO: the General Assembly and the assemblies of the unions of the state members of particular conventions;
• Participation in the work at the regular sessions of the permanent committees of the experts of WIPO, where current issues, from the various fields of intellectual property rights, are discussed (Permanent Committee for Trademarks, Permanent Committee for Patents, Permanent Committee for Copyright and Related Rights, etc.), just like taking the active role in the work of particular provisional expert committees, like the committee for information technology, for documentation and standards, for the enforcement of intellectual property laws, for the development programs of WIPO, working groups for the patent system reform, patent classification, industrial designs, trademarks, etc.
• Participation at the diplomatic conferences for the adoption of the new international treaties from the field of intellectual property, just like at the other international and regional meetings from the field of intellectual property;
• Holding of national and regional seminars and workshops at the various topics from the field of intellectual property rights enforcement, licensing, the importance of intellectual property for the development of small and medium enterprises, etc.
• Cooperation with the WIPO Academy: experts in the Office, students and assistants from some faculties, researchers from the institutes and the representatives of chambers take the courses, and pass final exams at the basic or advanced courses of distance learning trainings in the field of intellectual property; the employees from the Office get expertise at the courses at the WIPO or in some national offices lasting for one week or several weeks;
• WIPO expert visits connected to the evaluation of the technical facilities and the efficiency of the technological processes in the Office;
• Donors assistance of the WIPO to the Office in the informatics equipment, specialized software programs for work with the applications of patents, trademarks and industrial designs;
• Cooperation in the issuing of WIPO publications in Serbian (manuals, brochures, seminar materials).

European Patent Organization

European Patent Organization is the regional international organization established by the Convention for the Grant of European Patents in 1973. The Convention was established with the purpose to strengthen the cooperation between the European states in the field of protection of inventions, and also to create the unified European patent system. The Convention establishes the multinational system of legal norms which regulates the procedure of granting European patents and their direct effect on the territories of the member states. The effect of the Convention is reflected in the rationalization of tasks with regard to the filing of applications for the sake of protection, in the examination of applications, and the grant of patents. Instead of having the same parallel procedure enforced separately in more countries, where the applicant wishes to patent his invention, it is conducted in one place, in the European Patent Office. Today, the European Patent Organization gathers 32 member states. In one year, the European Patent Office is filed around 200,000 patent applications, and from the day it started working, in 1977, the European Patent Office granted 823,500 patents.

Cooperation and Extension Agreement that the European Patent Organization signed with the FRY in 2001, which was ratified and applied since 2004, envisages technical, legal and administrative cooperation for the purpose of infrastructure development for the efficient patent system in the Republic of Serbia. It particularly envisaged that the application of the European patent, with the designation of Serbia, and the European patent extended to the Republic of Serbia, produce the same legal effect like the national application or national patent on the basis of the national Patent Law. Until the present day, on the grounds of this agreement for the protection of IP, 6000 European patent applications have been filed in our country.

By the implementation of the Cooperation and Extension Agreement, many kinds of technical cooperation have been developed between the European Patent Office and the Intellectual Property Office. In 2006, 32 experts from the Office visited the European Patent Office on various programs of training and expert workshops, and the European Office helped the building of IT system serving the procedure for the grant and administration of patents.

The cooperation with the European Patent Organization was realized through the Regional CARDS program intended for the strengthening of intellectual property in the countries of Western Balkans (2003-2006), and also through the National CARDS program intended for the strengthening of the Intellectual Property Office of the Republic of Serbia (2005-2007). The European Patent Office was the implementing agency of both agreements.

In October 2005, the status of observer in the Administrative Council of the EPO was approved for SMN, which is, on the basis of succession, taken over by the Republic of Serbia. On this ground, the representatives of the Intellectual Property Office were attending the majority of sessions of the Administrative Council which took place in 2006 and 2007. Bearing in mind that the Administrative Council is the highest governing body of the European Patent Organization, the most important decisions are passed at its meetings, which refer to the management of the European Patent Office, the expanding of the EPO, the development of the European patent system, the strategy of trilateral cooperation EPO-USA-Japan, etc.

BILATERAL COOPERATION

Basic forms of cooperation :

- Bilateral agreements of cooperation in the field of intellectual property are signed with: the Intellectual Property Office of the PR of China, in 1998; State Office for Inventions and Trademarks of Rumunia, in 2001; and the Agreement with the State Office for the Intellectual Property of Ukraina is in preparation;
- Agreements on the exchange of patent documentation are signed with the Intellectual Property Office of Ukraina, in 1998, Intellectual Property Office of the PR of China in 1998 and the State Office for Intellectual Property of the Russian Federation- ROSPATENT in 2000;
- In the last ten years, the representatives of the Office organized bilateral visits to the national offices of Russia, Ukraina, China, Rumunia, the Czech Republic, Macedonia, Albania, Croatia, Bosna and Hertzegovina, Moldavia, etc.
- The expert study visits were organized to the Intellectual Property Office of Croatia, the United States Patent and Trademark Office, Norvegian Agency for Reprographic Rights, Slovac Patent Office, State Office for Inventions and Trademarks of Romania, etc.

Projects of the European Union

I CARDS 2002 Regional Project for the protection for intellectual property rights for the countries of Western Balkans

The Project started in September 2003 and lasted until December 2006.

The complete realized results for 3,5 years of enforcement are:
1. The improvement of legislation harmonization in the filed of intellectual property of the Republic of Serbia with the equis of the EU.
2. The expert studies for the employees in the Office, and institutions for the enforcement of intellectual property rights, through the seminars, workshops, study visits;
3. Establishment of regional cooperation between the national offices for intellectual property and other institutions for the enforcement of intellectual property rights;
4. The determination of strategic goals of further development of intellectual property protection in Serbia, and the stregthening of cooperation between the Office and the competent enforcement institutions in Serbia;
5. Improvement of operations in the protection of trademarks in the Office: expert evaluation of the Methodology Applied by the IPO in the Procedure Relating to the Registration of Trademarks and the Procedure Based on the Registered Trademarks;
6. Improvement of public awareness on the importance of intellectual property rights for the economic development of the Republic of Serbia.

II CARDS 2004 National Program – Technical Assistance to the Intellectual Property Office of the Republic of Serbia

The program is enforced from September 2005 and should finish on December 31, 2007. The program is managed by the European Agency for Reconstruction and enforced by the European Patent Office.

The goals of the National Project are:

- the increase of capacity and efficiency of the Office in all the tasks of intellectual property rights protection;
- strengthening of techical and technological equipment of the Office in compliance with the European standards;
- digitalization of documentation of industrial property –scanning of all the patent applications and patent documentation from 1921 to 2006;
- expert training of the employees in the Office through courses and workshops, courses of the English language; administrative and informatic training of employees for new technologies;
- organization of national seminars on patent claims, the protection of trademarks, etc.

The National Program is developing according to schedule, and in particular segments the results have been achieved: all computer equipment has been delivered and installed, just like all the appropriate software, thus bringing the Office to the planned level of information technology equipment; the national data base of trademarks and the database of the International Patent Classification have become accessable to the public; the new telephone equipment has become installed; the major part of patent documentation has been scanned; the publication server became operational; the installation of the building security is under construction (cameras, safety doors, bars on the windows, climatization and server hall security); two seminars were held for the employees in the Office and the expert public; three semesters of the English language courses are terminated for the employees in the Office, etc.

Other international projects

According to the Agreement on financing the Project for the operational and organizational technical assistance to the Intellectual Property Office of the Republic of Serbia, which was concluded on September 13, 2006 between the representatives of the government of the United States of America and the Director of the Office, assistance to the Office is envisaged by the development of functions which surpass the framework of classical administration body, and refer to the education in the field of intellectual property, support to inovations, incitement to economic exploitation of inovations and also making of the new model of the Office as financially self sustaining institution.

The beginning of the realization of the Agreement is planned for September 2007, and the termination for the first half of 2008.