WIPO

IPC/WG/12/4 ORIGINAL: English DATE: December 10, 2004

WORLD INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY ORGANIZATION
GENEVA

SPECIAL UNION FOR THE INTERNATIONAL PATENT CLASSIFICATION
(IPC UNION)

IPC REVISION WORKING GROUP

Twelfth Session
Geneva, November 29 to December 10, 2004

INTRODUCTION

1. The IPC Revision Working Group (hereinafter referred to as "the Working Group") held its twelfth session in Geneva from November 29 to December 10, 2004. The following members of the Working Group were represented at the session: Brazil, China, Denmark, Egypt, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Norway, Portugal, Republic of Korea, Romania, Russian Federation, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States of America, European Patent Office (EPO) (23). The list of participants appears as Annex A to this report.

2. The session was opened by Mr. M. Price (United Kingdom), Chair of the Working Group. Mr.  M. Makarov, Deputy Director, Technology Retrieval Systems Service, Office of the PCT (Patent Cooperation Treaty), WIPO, welcomed the participants on behalf of the Director General.

OFFICERS

3. Mr. A. Farassopoulos (WIPO) acted as Secretary of the session.

ADOPTION OF THE AGENDA

4. The Working Group unanimously adopted the agenda, which appears as Annex B to this report.

DISCUSSIONS, CONCLUSIONS AND DECISIONS

5. As decided by the Governing Bodies of WIPO at their tenth series of meetings held from September 24 to October 2, 1979 (see document AB/X/32, paragraphs 51 and 52), the report of this session reflects only the conclusions of the Working Group (decisions, recommendations, opinions, etc.) and does not, in particular, reflect the statements made by any participant, except where a reservation in relation to any specific conclusion of the Working Group was expressed or repeated after the conclusion was reached.

report on the THIRTY-fifth SESSION OF THE IPC COMMITTEE OF EXPERTS

6. The Working Group noted an oral report by the Secretariat on the thirty-fifth session of the IPC Committee of Experts (hereinafter referred to as "the Committee") (see document IPC/CE/35/9), in particular, that the Committee was considering documents relating to a procedure of the Special Subcommittee for the Supervision of the Advanced Level of the IPC, to a new procedure of the Working Group in the reformed IPC and to the coordination of activities of the two bodies. The Working Group was informed that adoption of the above-mentioned documents was expected at the next session of the Committee, in February 2005.

7. The Working Group also noted that the Committee had approved its actions concerning the tasks "Introduction of residual main groups in IPC subclasses" and "Consideration of references in the advanced level of the IPC" and provided further guidance in respect of those tasks.

8. The Working Group noted the request by the Committee to consider the possible need for changing the name of the Working Group, in view of its modified mandate in the reformed IPC, and agreed to recommend to the Committee the retaining of the present name because its new mandate would still cover revision activities with regard to the core level of the IPC and because of the desirability of maintaining continuity in references to the Working Group in various IPC-related documents.

9. The Working Group realized that its new responsibilities in the reformed IPC could require reconsideration of the practice of holding its meetings, including such aspects as their frequency, duration, format and use of electronic communication, and agreed to consider this matter at its next, thirteenth session (see also paragraph 51 below).

updating of ipc training examples

10. Discussions were based on Annexes 26 and 27 to project file WG 093, containing, respectively, the "Guidelines on Drafting Training Material" and the corresponding "Template for Training Examples", which had been approved by the Task Force on IPC Training Examples on a temporary basis, and on Annexes 29 and 30 to the project file, containing relevant comments submitted by the United States of America and the European Patent Office.

11. The Working Group approved, with some amendments, the Guidelines and the corresponding Template, which appear, respectively, as Annexes G and H to this report.

12. It was noted that, during this session, the Task Force held separate meetings in the three technical fields, where 29 training example projects were discussed. A summary of these discussions appears as Annex I to this report.

13. Bearing in mind the aim of considering all training examples by the end of 2005, the Task Force distributed among its members 35 additional examples for consideration. The decisions of the Task Force with respect to the training example projects and the deadlines for the next round of actions are summarized in Annex J to this report.

14. The Working Group accepted, with gratitude, an invitation made by the Delegation of Ireland, to host a meeting of the Task Force on IPC Training Examples at the Irish Patents Office, Kilkenny, in late April - early May 2005. It was noted that at this meeting the Task Force could finalize several training examples before their formal approval at the thirteenth session of the Working Group. The International Bureau and the Irish Patents Office would arrange the exact dates in January 2005 and inform the other Task Force members accordingly.

introduction of residual main groups in ipc subclasses

15. Discussions were based on a compilation of Projects R 701 to R 706, on project file WG 111 and on an additional working document, prepared by the Secretariat, listing all proposals for new residual main groups in subclasses where consensus to create them had been reached. The Working Group approved the majority of those groups and also approved some amendments to existing groups. A list of the approved new groups and amendments is given in Annex K to this report.

16. It was agreed that the new residual main groups should also be indicated in subclass indexes, where such indexes exist, and that horizontal lines should be included to separate them from other groups, where needed. The Secretariat informed the Working Group that all these amendments would be prepared in the form of technical annexes for adoption at the next session of the Committee of Experts.

17. The Working Group reconfirmed its decision taken at its eleventh session to use the symbol 99/00 for new main groups residual to the whole subclass (see document IPC/WG/11/7, paragraph 24). In order to avoid confusion, it was decided that symbol 99/00 should be used exclusively for residual groups, and therefore existing group A43D 99/00 was renumbered to A43D 98/00.

18. The Secretariat informed the Working Group that an updated list, based on Annex G of document IPC/WG/11/7 would be posted to Project WG 111, indicating where new residual main groups were introduced, where consensus was reached not to create any residual group, where residual main groups already existed, including their numbering, and where no agreement could be reached.

19. The Working Group invited comments to be submitted to Project WG 111 by March 30, 2005, on how to proceed with the remaining subclasses where there was disagreement between the recommendations given in the residual projects, the recommendation of the rapporteurs and the opinions by commenting offices. Comments were also invited on whether the numbering of existing residual main groups, being residual to the whole subclass, should be changed to 99/00 or 999/00. The Secretariat was asked to act as rapporteur and to prepare a report by April 30, 2005.

PRESENTATION OF NOTES IN THE REFORMED IPC

20. Discussions were based on Annex 14 to project file WG 112, containing a proposal submitted by Sweden on the introduction, in each of subclasses under classes C01 and C07, of a new note indicating the last place priority rule in those subclasses.

21. The proposed wording of said new note, which would appear in subclasses under classes C01 and C07, was approved by the Working Group, with some amendments, and is reproduced below:

The placement of the note in the mentioned subclasses was approved by the Working Group without changes, as indicated in Annex 14 to the project file.

22. The Working Group also considered and approved, with some amendments, the notes after classes C01 and C07, which had been provisionally approved by the Working Group at its eleventh session, as follows:

23. The Working Group also discussed document IPC/WG/12/2, containing comments submitted by the United States of America on the standardized notes for classifying mixtures or compositions, adopted by the IPC Committee of Experts at its thirty-fourth session in the framework of the treatment of hybrid systems in the IPC.

24. It was agreed that although these notes, strictly speaking, were covered by paragraphs 149, 150, 153 and 154 of the Guide to the IPC, they were particularly useful to the users of respective areas of the IPC where hybrid schemes had been eliminated, indicating to them how they should apply the new rules on classifying mixtures. It was noted that amending these notes at this stage would not be possible, in view of the limited time available before the next edition of the IPC. The Working Group could reconsider, during the next revision period, whether these notes could be deleted or amended.

consideration of references in the advanced level of the ipc

25. The Working Group noted an oral report by the Secretariat on the progress of Project WG 091. As agreed at the eleventh session of the Working Group held in June 2004 (see document IPC/WG/11/7, paragraphs 35 to 41), the International Bureau had made available lists including a total of approximately 5,100 references in the advanced level of the IPC, pointing to places outside their hierarchical branch. The volunteering reviewing offices have considered those references and have determined which groups in the core level could bear an asterisk, indicating that the core level user should consult the references in the advanced level subgroups in order to determine the exact scope of the core level group. The results of this extensive work are detailed in Annexes 14 to 24 to the project file.

26. It was noted that roughly one out of four considered references could lead to the inclusion of an asterisk in a core level group. The experience of the reviewing offices has shown that the consultation of the advanced level by a core level user, in order to determine the scope of a core level group, would be a complicated exercise. On the other hand, the RIPCIS system is able to display core level groups with different titles (or references) when consulting the core level than when consulting the advanced level. Therefore, core level groups could include a reference (to another core level group) instead of an asterisk when consulting the core level, whereas they would remain unchanged when consulting the advanced level.

27. It was therefore decided to abandon the inclusion of any asterisk in the core level. Instead, the reviewing offices were requested to propose references in those core level groups where the inclusion of an asterisk had been proposed. The titles of these references should be simple enough for core level users and their usefulness, in the context of the core level, should be carefully considered. The reviewing offices should consider abandoning inclusion of references that could not fulfil the above requirements.

28. Each reviewing office was invited to submit such references in those sections that it had already considered, by the end of February 2005, in order to allow their introduction in the eighth edition of the IPC.

ipc definitions program

29. The Working Group had before it, in particular, document IPC/WG/11/7 and compilations of the relevant definition project files. The decisions of the Working Group with respect to those projects, in particular new deadlines and translating offices, are listed in Annex F to this report and further information with respect to some of those decisions is given in paragraph 30, below. It was further agreed to create a new definition Project (D 070) for subclass A23L.

30. The Working Group made the following observations, in addition to the decisions set forth in Annex F to this report, with respect to the IPC Definition projects. All references to annexes in this paragraph refer to annexes of the corresponding project file, unless otherwise stated.

Project D 002 (chemical) – The Working Group agreed that the example related to "prilling" in the definition statement should be removed and approved the other amendments to the English version according to Annex 36; the French version of Annex 38 was conditionally approved subject to introduction of corresponding changes.

Project D 003 (chemical) – The Working Group approved the amended English version of Annex 31 and the French version of Annex 33.

Project D 004 (chemical) – The Working Group approved the amended English version of Annex 38 and the French version of Annex 41.

Project D 005 (chemical) – The Working Group approved the amended English version of Annex 27 and the French version of Annex 31.

Project D 006 (electrical) – In view of the amendments approved to subclass B81B in the framework of revision Project C 384 (see Annex 1 to this report), the Working Group agreed that the references in the deleted Note (3) of subclass B81B should be considered as references to application places and be placed under the corresponding subheading. It was also decided that the reference to Section C in "Informative References" (see Annex 40) should be transferred under "References Relevant to Classification". The Working Group invited comments on the placement of these references and on the last paragraph under subheading "General Relationship of Microstructures of B81B with Micro-sized Structures Found in the Subclasses of Sections C and H" (see the said Annex 40).

Project D 007 (electrical) – The Working Group approved the amended English version of the definition as proposed by the Rapporteur in Annex 28. The Working Group also approved the French version of Annex 26. The Secretariat was invited to place the references in said Annex 26, according to their placement in said Annex 28.

Project D 008 (electrical) – The Working Group approved the amended English version of the definition as proposed in Annex 26. The Working Group agreed that the reference to A61K 9/51 should be placed under the subheading corresponding to references from general to application places and that this amendment would be introduced by the Secretariat into said Annex 26. The translating office was requested to introduce said amendments into the French version.

Project D 009 (electrical) – The rapporteur was requested to prepare a new proposal taking into account the recent comments submitted by France and Sweden (see Annexes 23 and 24).

Project D 010 (electrical) – The Working Group conditionally approved the proposal in Annex 25, subject to deleting the term "distance" in the glossary and replacing the definition of the term "object" by the respective one of Annex 19.

Project D 012 (mechanical) – The Secretariat was invited to sort the "References Relevant to Classification" of the latest rapporteur proposal (see Annex 24) and to place them under the relevant subheadings. The Working Group invited the translating office to review the latest comments on the French version and to submit a revised French version taking into account the above-mentioned sorting of references. The French-speaking offices were invited to approve said revised French version electronically.

Project D 013 (mechanical) – The Working Group approved the English version according to Annex 14.

Project D 014 (mechanical) – The Working Group agreed that subject matter as defined by the fifth bullet of the definition statement would not be covered by subclass A61N, in view of its title (see Annex 19), and asked the rapporteur to remove this bullet and review the proposal accordingly.

Project D 015 (mechanical) – The Working Group conditionally approved the French version of Annex 15 and invited the rapporteur and the translating office to incorporate in their proposals the latest remarks (November 2004) submitted by France and the EPO to the e-forum.

Project D 016 (mechanical) – The Working Group invited comments on the latest rapporteur proposal (see Annex 15).

Project D 017 (mechanical) – The English version of the project (see Annex 24) was conditionally approved. The Secretariat was invited to sort the "References Relevant to Classification" and to place them under the relevant subheadings.

Project D 018 (mechanical) – The Working Group invited the Rapporteur to prepare a new proposal taking into account the recent comments submitted by the United States of America (see Annex 24).

Project D 019 (mechanical) – The Working Group approved the English version of Annex 28 and invited comments on the French version of Annex 29.

Project D 020 (mechanical) – The Working Group approved the English version of Annex 24.

Project D 021 (chemical) – The Rapporteur was requested to introduce the subheading "Multiple Classification" in the section "Relationship Between Large Subject Matter Areas" similar to definitions in class C07 (e.g., see Annex 36 to project file D 002) and place the references to A61P and A61Q thereunder. The Working Group also recalled the rule in the Guidelines for Drafting Definitions that said section should only explain relationships that cannot be expressed in the form of references and asked the rapporteur to review the references presently included in said section. Furthermore, it was agreed that the term "active" should be removed from the text of the present fifth bullet on page 3 of Annex 35.

Project D 022 (chemical) – The Working Group approved the French version of Annex 19.

Project D 023 (chemical) – The Working Group approved the French version of Annex 17, subject to replacing "comprend" by "comprennent" in the first entry of the glossary.

Project D 024 (chemical) – The Working Group agreed that an explanation of the acronym "HPLC" should also be included in the English version and approved the French version of Annex 24, subject to amendments taking into account the remarks of the European Patent Office submitted on November 26, 2004.

Project D 025 (chemical) – The Working Group approved the amended English version of Annex 31 and asked the Rapporteur to use subscripts and superscripts for the chemical formulae in section "Synonyms and Keywords".

Project D 027 (electrical) – The Working Group conditionally approved the English version of Annex 33. Rapporteur was requested to delete the phrases referring to G01N 21/00 and G02B in the section "Relationship Between Large Subject Matter Areas" of the definition of main group G01M 11/00 and to introduce a corresponding reference to G02B in the section "Informative References".

Project D 028 (electrical) – The English version of the project was approved (see Annex 14).

Project D 030 (mechanical) – The Working Group approved the French version (see Annex 21).

Project D 031 (mechanical) – The Working Group agreed that the definition statement proposed in Annex 26 was too extensive and complex in view of the subject matter covered by subclass E01D. Further comments were therefore invited and the rapporteur was asked to submit a new proposal with due regard to those comments.

Project D 036 (chemical) – The Working Group agreed that the examples of documents listed in the section "Special Rules of Classification" of the latest rapporteur proposal (Annex 35) should be deleted. Comments were invited on said proposal.

Project D 037 (chemical) – The Working Group approved the amended English version of Annex 22 and agreed that, in accordance with the definition of subclass C07C (Project D 002), the paragraph relating to class C07 should be placed first in the section "Relationship Between Large Subject Matter Areas". The Rapporteur was invited to apply this correction in said Annex 22. The Working Group also approved the French version of Annex 25, subject to the above amendments and alphabetic ordering of the glossary entries.

Project D 038 (chemical) – It was agreed that the paragraph relating to class C07 should be placed first in the section "Relationship Between Large Subject Matter Areas". It was further agreed that "so" in the last sentence of said section in Annex 22 should be replaced by "for example", and "to" in the entry "Immunoglobulins" in the glossary by "two". The translating office was asked to resubmit the French version incorporating the above changes.

Project D 039 (chemical) – The Working Group agreed that subclass C12S should not be included in the range of subclasses mentioned in the first paragraph of section "Relationship Between Large Subject Matter Areas" and approved the English version according to Annex 33. It was agreed that subclass C12S should be removed from the list of subclasses between which the last place rule applies as given in Note (1) after class C12. The Rapporteur was invited to submit a proposal to that effect following the procedure described in paragraphs 39 to 44, below.

Project D 040 (chemical) – The Working Group approved the amended English version of Annex 26 and agreed on a new wording for the entry "Micro-organisms" in the glossary. This new wording should also replace the present wording of the corresponding entry in the definition of subclass C12N (see Annex 33 to Project D 039). It was also agreed to delete the second entry in the glossary.

Project D 043 (electrical) – The Working Group invited comments on the placement of references in the latest rapporteur proposal (see Annex 5) following a request by the Rapporteur (see Annex 4).

Project D 044 (electrical) – The Working Group approved the amended rapporteur proposal of Annex 17 and the French version of Annex 20.

Project D 045 (electrical) – The French version of Annex 12 was approved.

Project D 047 (electrical) – The French version of Annex 8 was approved.

ipc revision program

31. The Working Group had before it, in particular, document IPC/WG/11/7 and the relevant project files.

32. The Working Group discussed 10 pending IPC revision projects and approved amendments relating to those projects (see Technical Annexes 1 to 22 to this report). The decisions of the Working Group with respect to those projects are listed in Annex C to this report and further information with respect to some of these decisions is given in paragraph 33, below. A list indicating to which classes or subclasses amendments have been approved during the revision period appears as Annex D to this report. Changes to amendments approved at earlier sessions are indicated in Annex E to this report. Annex L gives a list of subclasses to which said Technical Annexes 1 to 22 pertain.

33. The Working Group made the following observations, in addition to the decisions set forth in Annex C to this report, with respect to the IPC revision projects.

Project C 388 (mechanical) – The remaining groups of the scheme of subclass B60W were approved (see Annex 6 to this report) as well as changes and references in other subclasses, due to the creation of subclass B60W (see the relevant Technical Annexes to this report).

Following the approval of a new scope for main group B60W 30/00, it was decided that its subgroup 30/12, already approved at the eleventh session of the Working Group, was no longer correctly placed under main group 30/00; the Working Group examined other alternatives, for example, the creation of a new main group 35/00, which were considered inappropriate in view of the first place rule in this area, and it was finally decided to remove this subgroup from the scheme. The Working Group invited the Advanced Level Subcommittee to consider the creation of such a subgroup in the advanced level.

The complete French version was also approved and the project was considered completed.

Project C 426 (mechanical) – It was decided to delete the term "fodder" in the title of subclass A01F. In view of the confusion that this term might create in other places in the IPC, the definition Projects D 067 (subclass A01D), D 068 (subclass A01F) and D 069 (subclass A23K) were created. Sweden volunteered to act as Rapporteur for these projects.

Project C 427 (mechanical) – The Working Group decided to keep in the advanced level of the IPC only those unprinted subgroups of subclass B31B that had some activity and delete all the others, as proposed by Rapporteur in the latest report (see Annex 9 to the project file), but without any change in their titles (see Annex 15 to this report).

Project C 430 (chemical) – It was agreed that definitions were needed for subclass A62D. A definition project was therefore created (D 071) and EPO volunteered to act as Rapporteur.

updating of the ipc material in the wipo handbook on industrial property information and documentation

34. The Working Group considered the rapporteur report, submitted by Sweden (see Annex 7 to project file IPC/WG/113), which outlined possible directions of work on documents "Philosophy of the IPC Revision Work" and "Specific Instructions for the Revision of the IPC" contained in the WIPO Handbook on Industrial Property Information and Documentation.

35. The Working Group accepted the proposal by Sweden that the contents of the above-mentioned publications should be substantially revised and restructured rather than simply updated according to the new principles and rules introduced by IPC reform, and agreed that the contents of the publications should be combined in a single document so as to provide the user with a comprehensive publication giving guidance with respect to the theory and practice of the revision work.

36. The Working Group approved the structure of the new publication proposed by Sweden which would consist of three parts describing, respectively, general goals of the IPC, presentation of classification schemes and the methodology of IPC revision.

37. The Working Group also considered documents proposed for inclusion as annexes to a new publication and agreed on the usefulness of their inclusion, having indicated, however, that as regards the document "Revision Philosophy and Revision Procedure for the Reformed IPC", only the material relating to the revision philosophy should be included.

38. The Working Group expressed its gratitude to Sweden for having taken a leading role in preparing a new important publication on the revision process in the reformed IPC and invited Sweden to submit a consolidated version of the publication by March 15, 2005. Comments on the proposal were requested by April 15, 2005.

proposals for improving the IPC collected from definition projects

39. Discussions were based on Annex 6 to project file WG 114, containing a rapporteur proposal submitted by the International Bureau, on how to collect proposals for improving the IPC, emanating from definition projects, with the objective of their incorporation into the scheme of the IPC.

40. It was agreed that proposals for improving the IPC, in general and not only emanating from definition projects, should be collected in dedicated WG projects according to the technical area, and in an additional project for proposals independent of any technical area.

41. A fixed deadline before each Working Group session should be set for submitting proposals for improving the IPC. The proponent office should indicate whether the proposal leads to reclassification of documents or not.

42. Upon submission of the proposals, offices would comment thereon; deadlines would be indicated for the submission of those comments. Finally, the International Bureau would create, before each session of the Working Group and for each project, a compilation of proposals with the corresponding comments. This procedure could be used not only for improvements emanating from definition projects, but for any type of improvements, for example, revision proposals. Separate projects could be created in the future for collecting revision requests, if the total number of the received proposals becomes too high.

43. The Working Group would then examine these proposals, determine whether a revision, definition or maintenance project would be needed and whether that project should be further considered by the Advanced Level Subcommittee or by the Working Group. The Working Group should also set priorities according to the workload.

44. A separate dedicated project would also be created for collecting obvious errors that the International Bureau should correct in the IPC without the need of any further discussion.

request for revision of the ipc

45. Discussions were based on document IPC/WG/12/3 containing a revision request submitted by China on the subdivision of main group A01N 65/00.

46. The Working Group decided to include this request in the program of the next revision period (Project C 432). China was appointed Rapporteur.

47. The Rapporteur was invited to test the proposed scheme and to provide statistical data on the potential file size and rate of growth of the proposed groups.

48. The Working Group invited comments, in particular by the members of the Task Force on Traditional Knowledge, on:

– which of the proposed groups, in view of the above statistical data to be provided, could be part of the core level and as a consequence, which body should further consider this project;

 – whether the proposed subdivision, based on botanical classification, was appropriate for the subject matter covered by group A01N 65/00;

 – the available resources for the subsequent reclassification.

Deadlines for actions are indicated in Annex C to this report.

Status of the work

49. The Chair stated that 10 revision projects on the agenda of this session (see Annex B to this report) had been dealt with and completed. The Chair indicated that Annex C to this report gave the status of each revision project and brief information on actions to follow. He furthermore stated that, in total, nine definition projects were approved in English and 14 definition projects were completed in both English and French. He also indicated that Annex F to this report gave the status of each definition project on the program. He finally stated that 29 training example projects were examined by the Task Force and seven of them were completed. Annex J to this report gave the status of each training example project on the program.

50. The Chair stated that, at this session, the Working Group had continued an important work program of the implementation of the results of IPC reform and had achieved good progress.

Next SESSION OF THE WORKING GROUP

51. The Working Group held a preliminary discussion on the length and the number of its annual sessions. In order to prepare this matter for consideration at its next session, Project WG 121 was created and Ireland volunteered to act as Rapporteur. Rapporteur was invited to submit an initial proposal to the e-forum and to set actions and deadlines.

52. The Working Group having assessed the workload expected for its next session (see paragraph 53, below), agreed to devote the first two days to the mechanical field, the third day to the electrical field and the last two days to the chemical field. When convening the next session, the International Bureau was requested to consider the possible need for an extension of the session, depending on the envisaged amount of work, and for the modification of the number of days devoted to any technical field. It was noted that the International Bureau would develop a procedure for remote adoption of the report using electronic communication means to be introduced for the next session.

53. The Working Group noted the following tentative dates for its thirteenth session:

June 13 to 17, 2005.