DPMA: growing in strength

At first glance, it might seem unlikely that the EU ‘patent package’, leading to the eventual creation of a Unified Patent Court (UPC) and a unitary patent, would create a sense of optimism among national patent offices.
But it has for Cornelia Rudloff-Schäffer, president of the German Patent and Trade Mark Office (DPMA), Europe’s biggest national patent office, ranking sixth among the largest IP authorities in the world.

Rudloff-Schäffer is a supporter of the UPC, and she is also confident about the future of the DPMA. “Our services and products are recognised around the world for their high quality. The constantly robust and increasing demand for German IP rights underlines this.”

How does she reconcile the apparent contradiction that the introduction of the UPC can be beneficial for the DPMA?

The figures show that the number of applicants registering with the DPMA is growing; many of them are from overseas. In 2013, foreign applications totalled 63,000, a 4.6 percent increase from the previous year. The countries leading the pack were the US and Japan, where applications for patents grew by 9.5 percent and 20.7 percent, respectively.

“In total, more than 569,000 patents were in force in Germany by the end of 2013,” Rudloff-Schäffer says.

“I am particularly delighted about the fact we were able to conclude significantly more patent examination procedures in 2013. The increase of 12.6 percent is something to be proud of. The number of granted patents increased as well, by 22.1 percent to more than 14,000,” she adds.

German patents have a good international reputation and are seen as key for multinational companies entering the European market.

It is a similar story for trademark applications. Last year, Rudloff-Schäffer says, “a total of 60,161 trademarks were registered at the DPMA”—a record number.

So overall the outlook is positive and points towards further growth at the DPMA, even though the UPC and the unitary patent are on their way.

“Patent and trademark applications have continued to increase significantly in the first months of 2014. We would like to continue these very positive trends in the years to come,” Rudloff-Schäffer says.

Modernisation

She notes that the automobile and engineering sectors are among those leading the way in applications for patents at the DPMA. These are global industries and that has forced Rudloff-Schäffer and the DPMA to make it easier for international applicants to register their IP with the DPMA.

The office has been modernised to meet this need, utilising digital technology to speed up the process of applying for and granting patents.

“Our international customers are particularly interested in electronic file inspection via the internet. It is available to the public worldwide for patent and utility model files via the DPMAregister database. This new service has been perceived extremely positively from the beginning and is working smoothly,” she says.