New Technical Committee Mechanism.

Among the novelties contained in the recent Reform that entered in force to Mexico’s Federal Law for the Protection of Industrial Property (LFPPI) is the creation of a completely new Specialized Technical Committee (integrated by at least three members) constituted by the Mexican PTO’s (IMPI’s) Board of Directors.

This new Technical Committee will be responsible for determining if a request for the issuance of a mandatory resolution of a pending application should proceed. The request for the issuance of a mandatory resolution is made by the applicant and applies for all patent, utility model and design applications that incurred in unjustifiable delays during prosecution.

Specific timeframes are determined for the Technical Committee to contact the Examiner in charge and for the Examiner to comply with the requirement of the Technical Committee. Failure to comply with the requirements of the technical committee could result in the application of sanctions to Examiners.

The creation of this new Technical Committee is another effort to expedite resolutions for patent, utility model and design applications and provide certainty to applicants that the new reduced prosecution timeframes will be strictly applied. However, at this moment the criterion for the selection of the members of the technical committee remains unclear as well as the criterion that will be used to determine whether a delay was reasonable or unreasonable.

Applications that are currently pending and which were filed before the Reform entered into force can apply for a mandatory resolution once the specialized technical committee has been assembled.

Further developments are anticipated, as the implementation of the Regulations is still pending and is expected to occur in the near term.

At OLIVARES, we are closely monitoring the implementation of these changes and will keep you informed of any further relevant developments.