Patents and Utility Models
Patents:
Patents are property titles that the Superintendent’s Office of Industry and Commerce (Colombian IPO) grants to a product or process that provides a new way of doing something or offers a new technical solution to a problem.
The patent is granted for a term of twenty (20) years from the filing date of the application and it is not renewable. Thus, the patent holder has the right to exclusive use of the patented invention during the term of protection.
In Colombia, for an invention to be patentable it must be new, it must take an inventive step, and it must be industrially applicable.
Novelty indicates that the invention has not been made accessible to the public by a written or oral description, use, marketing or any other means.
The inventive step indicates that the invention is not an obvious result of the state of the art and that it is non-obvious to a person skilled in the art.
Finally, industrial application discloses that it should be possible to produce and use the invention on an industrial scale.
Utility Models:
According to the prevailing norm in Colombia on industrial property, the utility model patent is a title that is given to any new form, configuration or arrangement of elements, of any device, tool, instrument, mechanism or other object or any part thereof, which allows a better or different operation, use or manufacture of the object that incorporates or provides some utility, advantage or technical effect that it previously did not.
The utility model patent is granted for a period of ten (10) years from the filing date of the application and it is not renewable.
The requirements for obtaining a utility model are less strict than for invention patents. In this way, for an invention to be patentable in this mode in Colombia, it must be new and industrially applicable.
Our firm Cárdenas Vega Asesores has experienced attorneys that will advise you, through personal attention, regarding your application procedures of patents before the Superintendent’s Office of Industry and Commerce. Contact us.