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II.
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Nature and purpose of the European Patent Convention
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5
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The EPC has created a single European procedure for the grant of patents on the basis of a uniform body of substantive patent law in order to provide easier, cheaper and stronger protection for inventions in the contracting states.
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In each contracting state for which it is granted, a European patent gives its proprietor the same rights as would be conferred by a national patent granted in that state. If its subject-matter is a process, protection is extended to products directly obtained by that process. Any infringement of a European patent is dealt with by national law (but see point 9).
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Art. 64
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A published European patent application provides provisional protection which is no less than that conferred by a contracting state for a published national application and which must at least include the right to reasonable compensation in the event of wrongful infringement.
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Art. 67
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The standard term of a European patent is twenty years as from the date of filing.
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Art. 63
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Art. 63(2) sets out circumstances in which the term of a patent can be extended or a longer term granted. This option is intended primarily for medical product patents, where licensing takes so long that the useful life of the patent is diminished.
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6
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European patents may also be effective in some countries that have not acceded to the EPC. At present this applies to Albania, Croatia, Latvia, Lithuania and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (see point 26).
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A. General
I. Introduction
III. Relationship to other international conventions
