On April 28th, 2021, Brazilian Supreme Court started judging the Direct Unconstitutionality Action (ADI) no. 5529, filed by the Brazilian Association of the Fine Chemistry, Biotechnology and its Specialties (ABIFINA) that requested nullity for the Sole Paragraph of Art. 40 of the Intellectual Property Law no. 9.279/96. Such paragraph provided a minimum term of validity for patents – 10 years for Invention Patents and 7 years for Utility Models, counted from the date of grant. In this regard, due to the amount of time that the Brazilian Patent and Trademark Office (INPI) took to examine a patent application, the patents’ terms exceeded in many years due to Art. 40 of the Brazilian Intellectual Property Law (LPI).
On May 6th, 2021, Brazilian Supreme Court ruled for the annulment of the Sole Paragraph of Art. 40, which means that there will no longer be the possibility of extension of the patents’ terms, i.e., such period will be counted from the date of filing.
On May 12th, 2021, through a modulation in the sentence, the Brazilian Supreme Court ruled that:
a) the period of validity of the patents that will be granted by the INPI is 15 years for Utility Model and 20 years for Invention Patents, counted from their filing date; and
b) for pharmaceutical products and processes, and healthcare equipment patents that are already granted, the period of validity will be reduced to 15 years (Utility Model) and 20 years (Invention Patent), counted from their filing date.
The INPI is publishing the lists of patents that had their validities altered, in view of the Brazilian Supreme Court’s abovementioned decision, as the affected patents are reviewed and confirmed by the office. Below are the lists published so far, that will be updated according to new publications:
Click here to download the list of patents published by INPI on May 18th, 2021.
Click here to download the list of patents published by INPI on June 1st, 2021.
