The PPH Pilot program between the Intellectual Property Office of Vietnam (IPVN) and the Japan Patent Office (JPO) is currently in its Phase 3 which lasts three years (2022-2025). Each year of the phase includes two stages: The first stage lasts from 1 April to 30 September and the second stage lasts from 1 October to 31 March of the following calendar year, with a maximum of 100 PPH requests per stage.
The IPVN has just announced on its website the number of PPH requests filed in the second stage of the first year. Unlike the previous Phases 1 and 2, where the PPH request volume quickly reached the quota of 100 PPH requests, in Phase 3 only 66 requests were filed in the first stage of the first year (from 1 April 2022 to 30 September 2022), and as just announced the same number of requests (66) were filed in the second stage (from 1 October 2022 to 31 March 2023). Thus, the total number of PPH requests in the first year of Phase 3 was only 132, while the maximum number of requests is 200.
The second year of Phase 3 started on 3 April 2023. However, the number of PPH requests filed with the IPVN was very small (about four requests) on the starting day of the stage; while all the quotas of PPH requests were filed on the starting days of the first years of the program.
Looking at the numbers above, it is evident that the trend of filing PPH requests under the program has significantly decreased.
By Dao Thu Trang
Deputy Director of Patent Department
