Patent reform in Ukraine

The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine adopted the Law on Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine on the Reform of Patent Legislation (Bill No. 2259, July 31, 2020, was sent for signature to the President).

The Law is aimed at ensuring the fulfillment of Ukraine's obligations in the field of European integration in terms of harmonizing the requirements of the current legislation of Ukraine regarding the protection of rights to inventions and utility models with the law of the European Union.

The new Law proposed to make the following changes:

1. to expand the list of objects that are not covered by legal protection;
2. to provide for the possibility of filing applications in electronic form;
3. to provide any person with the opportunity to file a reasoned objection to the application within six months from the date of publication of information about the application for an invention;
4. to clarify the procedure for granting additional protection of rights to inventions;
5. to expand the list of rights and obligations of subjects of rights to utility models and inventions;
6. to provide for the possibility of recognizing the rights to an invention and utility model as invalid in the administrative procedure.

Mechanisms are also proposed that help to achieve a balance of interests between the patent monopoly and the right of every person to the availability of medicines in order to provide the population of Ukraine with affordable medicines and in the future to avoid a situation in which prices for some medicines in Ukraine are dozens of times higher than the prices in European partners.