Links
Without claiming to be exhaustive, here are some useful links on the subject of commercial legal protection:
Offices, courts and authorities
- German Patent and Trade Mark Office (including links to German patent information centers and patent information offices as well as patent databases)
- Federal Patent Court (including annual reports with the focal points of case law)
- Patent server of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (including information on legislative projects and funding programs)
- European Patent Office (including decisions of the Boards of Appeal)
- OHIM – Office for Harmonization in the Internal Market (Trade Marks and Designs)
Foreign national patent and trademark offices (selection)
- Institut National de la Propriété industrielle (France)
- Japan Patent Office (Japan)
- Ufficio Italiano Brevetti e Marchi (Italy)
- UK Patent Office (United Kingdom)
- United States Patent and Trademark Office (USA)
Associations
- German Association for the Protection of Intellectual Property and Copyright
- AIPPI – Association Internationale pour la Protection de la Propriété Industrielle
- German national group of the AIPPI
- VPP – Association of Intellectual Property Experts
- Chamber of Patent Attorneys (public corporation of German patent attorneys)
- Markenverband (Association of the Branded Goods Industry)
Scientific and science-related institutions
- Fachinformationszentrum Karlsruhe – Gesellschaft für wissenschaftlich-technische Information (provider and mediator of electronic technical information within the STN – International database network)
- Max Planck Institute for Intellectual Property, Competition and Tax Law (scientific research institute in the field of intellectual property law)
Free research on the Internet
- espacenet-Europe’s Network of Patent Databases (search in original-language patent applications (full texts) of all members of the European Patent Organization, the EPO, the WIPO (PCT applications) as well as English-language patent databases of numerous other countries; no claim to completeness and in some cases only taking into account applications of the last 24 months)
- USPTO Web Patent Database (search in the patent documents of the US Patent and Trademark Office)
- Delphion Intellectual Property Network (IPN) (search in worldwide patent information (including US applications and abstracts of Japanese applications) and the IBM Technical Disclosure Bulletin (TDB))
- Intellectual Property Digital Library (search in WIPO databases: Madrid Express Database (internationally registered trademarks), PCT-Gazette and JOPAL (bibliographic references to publications in scientific and technical journals)
- CTM-ONLINE (Trade mark search for Community trade marks (OHIM))
Other
- WIPO – World Intellectual Property Organization
- Transpatent GmbH (including full texts of German laws/regulations and international treaties)
- Patentfuehrerschein A service from the Institute for Information, Communication and Media Law that enables virtual training in the field of patent law.
