EPO further postpones opposition hearings until end of 2020

On July 29, the European Patent Office (EPO) issued a statement concerning upcoming Oral Proceedings before examination and opposition divisions and Boards of Appeal. Until further notice, oral proceedings in opposition or examination scheduled until December 31, 2020 will be postponed. This does not apply to proceedings that have already been confirmed to take place by video conference or to those that will be held by videoconference with the parties' explicit consent under the pilot project.

Please note that different measures apply for oral proceedings before the Boards of Appeal. To know more about this, please read the article via the link. 

If these new measures affect proceedings where we act as representative for you as a client, we will be in touch in due time with details on how to proceed.

For proceedings that have been scheduled from January 4, 2021 onwards, the EPO hopes and intends to let these go ahead as planned. We are keeping a close eye on the situation and, if the EPO should take further measures, we will of course communicate this as well.

In case you have any questions about upcoming proceedings before the EPO or any Intellectual Property issues in general, feel free to reach out to us via info@dcp-ip.com. We would be happy to help!

Read the full statement via the link. 

For an up to date overview of the measures taken by official institutions, please visit this link.