| Legal requirements applicable to European patent applications and patents |
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| Patentable subject-matter (Article 52) Novelty (Article 54) Inventive step (Article 56) Industrial applicability (Article 57) Unity of invention (Article 82) Disclosure of the invention (Article 83) Claims (Article 84) Amendments (Article 123) |
| Note: The above list of legal requirements is not exhaustive. |
Under Article 82 EPC, a European patent application must "relate to one invention only or to a group of inventions so linked as to form a single general inventive concept".[1] This legal provision is the application, within the European Patent Convention, of the requirement of unity of invention which is applicable also in many other jurisdictions.
The lack of unity (of invention), or non unity (of invention), can appear either "a priori", i.e. before taking into account the prior art, or "a posteriori", i.e. after having taken into account the prior art. An a posteriori lack of unity usually results from a lack of novelty or inventive step of the subject-matter of one independent claim.
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If, when carrying out a search, the search division considers that the application lacks unity (i.e., if the provisions of Article 82 are considered not to be met), a partial search report is established.[2] One or more further search fees are then requested by the EPO for the other identified inventions (or groups of inventions) to be covered by the search.[2]
The former time limit for paying the further search fees was a period specified by the EPO, which had to be between two weeks and six weeks.[2] Under new Rule 64 EPC, which entered into force on April 1, 2010, [3] the time limit for paying the further search fees is now a period of two months. [4]
The findings of the search division may be contested before the examining division, during the examination phase. If successful, further search fees may be refunded.[5] The responsibility for establishing whether or not a European patent application meets the requirements of unity of invention ultimately rests with the examining division.[6]
An objection of lack of unity of invention raised in a communication of the Examining Division may trigger a 24-month time period for filing a divisional application, if the particular objection is raised for the first time.[7]
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