“Interesting patent applications, Self cancelling indicator for two wheelers, Morse pen as a communication tool for blind, John Deere sues AGCO for patent infringement, China expresses regret over European Commission’s WTO complaint, India to organise meet on biopiracy in Geneva, Patenting Biological Inventions, Patent Tip of the week and other Weekly Patent News,” presented by the Patent attorneys and experts of BananaIP Counsels, India’s leading Patent Firm.
Patent Quote of the Week
A patent, or invention, is any assemblage of technologies or ideas that you can put together that nobody put together that way before. That’s how the patent office defines it. That’s an invention. – Dean Kamen, American engineer, inventor, and businessman.
Indian Patent Statistics
A total of 687 patent applications have been published in the 22nd issue of the patent journal. Out of the 687 applications, 68 applications account for early publications while 619 applications account for ordinary publications or publications occurring after the 18 month period. A total of 211 applications have been granted this week thus marking an increase of about 36.13% in comparison to the number of applications granted in the previous week.
Early Publications
| City | Previous Week | This Week | Percentage of change |
| Delhi | 10 | 24 | 140% increase |
| Mumbai | 52 | 21 | 59.62% decrease |
| Chennai | 46 | 20 | 56.52% decrease |
| Kolkata | 2 | 3 | 50% increase |
| Total | 110 | 68 | 38.18% decrease |
Ordinary Publications
| City | Previous Week | This Week | Percentage of change |
| Delhi | 177 | 304 | 71.75% increase |
| Mumbai | 43 | 83 | 93.02% increase |
| Chennai | 246 | 209 | 15.04% decrease |
| Kolkata | 11 | 23 | 109.09% increase |
| Total | 477 | 619 | 29.77% increase |
TOTAL PUBLICATIONS (Previous Week): 587
TOTAL PUBLICATIONS (This Week): 687
Percentage difference: 17.04% increase
First Examination Report (FER) Statistics
A total of 1680 FER’s have been issued last week. Applicants and their agents can check if any of their patent applications have been examined by referring the journal available here.
| City | No. of FER Issued |
| Delhi | 522 |
| Mumbai | 228 |
| Chennai | 599 |
| Kolkata | 331 |
| Total | 1680 |
PUBLICATIONS UNDER GRANT
| City | Previous Week | This Week | Percentage of change |
| Delhi | 74 | 99 | 33.78% increase |
| Mumbai | 16 | 26 | 62.5% increase |
| Chennai | 44 | 62 | 40.91% increase |
| Kolkata | 21 | 24 | 14.29% increase |
| Total | 155 | 211 | 36.13% increase |
Number of Applications published based on applicant city
Of the total 687 patent applications published in the journal last week, Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Kolkata have contributed a total of 90 applications. The total applications from each of the previously mentioned cities for the past week are as follows – 26 from Bangalore, 19 from Delhi, 16 from Chennai, 14 from Mumbai, 8 from Hyderabad and 7 from Kolkata.
| List of Cities | 1st January 2018 – 1st June 2018 | 26th May 2018 – 1st June 2018 |
| Delhi | 539 | 19 |
| Mumbai | 368 | 14 |
| Bangalore | 407 | 26 |
| Chennai | 229 | 16 |
| Hyderabad | 223 | 8 |
| Kolkata | 95 | 7 |
Total number of applications published by the Indian Patent Office from the 1st of January 2018 till date: 16258
- Early publications: 1507
- Ordinary Publications: 14751
Total number of patents granted by the Indian Patent Office from the 1st of January 2018 till date: 6111
- Delhi – 2360
- Mumbai – 708
- Chennai – 1867
- Kolkata – 1166
Indian Industrial Designs Statistics
The designs office has registered a total of 130 designs this week. The total designs registered from the 1st of January 2018 till date now adds to a total of 4286 applications.
Total designs registered in the previous Week: 139
Total designs registered this Week: 130
Percentage Difference: 6.47% decrease
Total designs registered from the 1st of January 2018 till date: 4286
Interesting Patents
SELF CANCELLING INDICATOR FOR TWO WHEELERS
Tired of switching your two wheeler’s indicator every time you make a turn while riding? Patent application number 201611040462 could be the answer to your problems. The abstract text of this interesting patent application reads as follows: “A system and method for that auto cancelling an indicator in vehicles that are handle driven such as two wheelers. The invention discloses a microprocessor driven device uses the microprocessor logic to switch on and off the indicator. The microprocessor takes input from a sensor and switch. Switch is used to turn the indicator ON while the sensor detects the angular displacement of the vehicle and turns the indicator OFF accordingly. A digital orientation sensor is mounted on the body of the vehicle. Whenever the vehicle turns, it changes the orientation of the vehicle (measured by earth™s magnetic field). When the orientation is changed significantly from the original position, the turn signal can be switched off.” (The abstract text has been taken as is and has not been corrected for errors)
MORSE PEN AS A COMMUNICATION TOOL FOR BLIND
Yet another interesting patent application that was published in the 22nd issue of the patent journal is titled “MORSE PEN AS A COMMUNICATION TOOL FOR BLIND”. The abstract text of the Indian patent application number 201611040790 reads as follows: “The present invention discloses a Morse pen for visually impaired persons. The inventors have developed and designed a pen that enables visually impaired persons to type/write characters in form of Morse code that are interpreted by this device for the user. The pen contains buttons linked with specific sensors fixed in the pen that perform function of writing, erasing, and space, enter, send and voice feedback for user. The present invention solves the problem of learning and feeling embossed braille characters by physical touching by visually impaired person. This device enables physically impaired person to operate smartphone and use its features like mail and message and sending it to other persons. The Morse pen developed by the inventors is compact, low cost, easy to use, and portable device.” (The abstract text has been taken as is and has not been corrected for errors)
Patent /Design Infringements, Disputes, Licensing and Settlements.
John Deere sues AGCO for patent infringement
US based farm equipment manufacturer Deere & Co has filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court in Delaware against Precision Planting LLC and AGCO Corp, claiming that the companies have infringed on 12 of its patents. The news release from Deere & Co states that “The inventions protected by Deere’s patents allow farmers to achieve accurate seed placement, uniform seed spacing and even crop emergence while planting at higher speeds than had been possible in the past,”
International Patent / Design Updates
China expresses regret over European Commission’s WTO complaint
China has said that it regrets the European Commission’s (EC) complaints to the World Trade
Organisation over matters related to European firms’ patent rights. The European Commission, last week announced that it would lodge a complaint against China over its “breach of patent rights of European companies,”along with complaints against the United States over its
tariffs.
India to organise meet on biopiracy in Geneva
India will be co-organising an international brainstorming session in Geneva early next month on the rampant practice of commercial exploitation of natural products by obtaining patents without fairly compensating the communities from which these originate. India had revived the discussions on biopiracy at the WTO last year in March and proposed a work programme for a legally binding outcome on the linkage before 2019 at the ministerial conference in Buenos Aires.
BananaIP’s Patent / Design Tip of the Week
Patenting Biological Inventions
Apart from being a good practice, it is also a requirement under the Indian patent act to seek approval from the National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) before filing patent applications that use biological resources. Approval from NBA is however not required for applications where the invention does not relate to a biological resource defined under the Biological Diversity Act, such as (a) value added product, (b) Biowaste or (c) Synthetically prepared biological material.
Author: BIP’s Patent Attorneys
Led by Senior Partners, Somashekar Ramakrishna, Nitin Nair and Vinita Radhakrishnan, BIP’s Patent Attorneys are among the leading patent practitioners in the country. They work with clients such as Mahindra and Mahindra, Samsung, HCL, Eureka Forbes, and Titan. They specialize in IT/Software, Electronics/Telecom, Mechanical, Automotive, and Bio/Pharma domains, and help clients with patent filing, prosecution, management and strategy in India, and across the world.
The weekly patent news initiative is a part of their pro bono work, and is aimed at spreading patent awareness. You are free to share the news with appropriate attribution and backlink to the source.
If you have any questions, you may write to BIP’s Patent Attorneys – contact@bananaip.com.
