Home | About | Help | Disclaimer | Quick Search | Advanced Search

AU Published Patent Data as of 4 March 2010

Important: Please read our Disclaimer regarding use of IP Australia's database services and AU Published Patent Data Searching - Introduction and Help before using AU Published Patent Data Searching (APPS). Patenting is a well accepted business strategy for protecting innovative technological developments. APPS can be used to monitor patent activity in Australia by searching patent documents by patent application number, patent serial number, words in title, applicant name, inventor name, technological classification, etc. Please note that the abstracts are in image form and cannot be keyword searched on their text. APPS can provide a different perspective of the marketplace or useful background information for R&D efforts. Australian standard patents are first published (AU-A publication level) as unexamined patent applications prior to consideration of whether the application can be accepted for a patent grant. If the application is accepted, the patent is republished as an AU-B level publication. A comparatively small number of patents are first published when accepted. Australian innovation patents are usually first published (AU-A publication level) as granted unexamined innovation patents. If certified, the innovation patent will be republished as an AU-B level publication. Subsequently amended standard and innovation patents will be republished as C level publications. The majority of AU-A patent applications are filed through the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT). The full specifications of PCT applications, including those designating Australia, are published as WO patent applications on CD-ROM (see http://www.wipo.int/ for subscription information) and on the esp@cenet web site. Data Coverage Abstracts of all published Australian patent applications filed since 1st January 1975 appear on APPS, the earlier applications will generally have an abstract prepared by Derwent Information Ltd. Please note that copyright on Derwent abstracts is owned by Derwent Information Ltd; please see Derwent Conditions of Use.. Pre-1975 Australian applications going back to 1920 have some bibliographic data on APPS. Usually this is only the application number and IPC classification marks, and hence, this data is generally searchable only on these fields. Copies can also be purchased from IP Australia by contacting the Customer Support Centre on (02) 6283 2999 or email assist@ipaustralia.gov.au or fax (02) 6283 7999. Contact your State Office on 1300 651 010 for details of their individual holdings of these records. Searching APPS Using the Simple Search option, only the Application Number, Patent Number and words in the Title can be searched. Any number of Application Numbers or Patent Numbers separated by commas, can be retrieved at a time. Data fields listed in the table below can be searched using the Advanced Search option. The data fields can be used either individually or in a logical combination, to retrieve the abstracts of relevant AU published patent data. Data Field Application Number Patent Number Title (supplied by applicant) International Patent Classification (IPC) Application Date Publication Date Publication Journal Date Accepted Journal Date Granted Journal Date Certified Journal Date Amended Journal Date Corrigenda Journal Date Applicant Name Inventor Name Attorney Name WIPO Number Document Kind The abstract is in GIF format. If you click on the "Printer-friendly PDF" link, the image will be launched as a PDF document if you have Adobe Acrobat Reader (freely downloadable from http://www.adobe.com) installed. You can then print the image from the Adobe Acrobat Reader. Some abstracts also have a link to IP Australia's AU-A/B/C full patent specifications website. Clicking on this link will take you to the PDF version of the corresponding full specification from IP Australia's website. If you locate a relevant Australian patent document, you may need to determine whether the patent application is still in force. Australian standard patents usually have a maximum possible life of 20 years from the date of filing. Petty Patents can have a maximum life of 6 years and Innovation Patents have a life of 8 years from the date of filing. Standard patents in the pharmaceutical field can have their term extended by a further 5 years. To remain in force, Australian patents must be maintained by the patentee by payment of annual renewal fees. You can find out whether an Australian patent is still in force by contacting IP Australia on phone (02) 6283 2999 or 1300 65 1010, or by checking the New Patent Solution (NPS) database, for new patent application number format YYYYNNNNNN, and the Patent Administration System database on IP Australia's mainframe, for old patent application number format YYYYNNNNN. All major Patent Offices, including Australia, classify patent applications according to technology using the International Patent Classification (IPC). The current eighth edition of the IPC is available at the World Intellectual Property (WIPO) website. The IPC is one of the searchable fields in APPS. When using the various data fields in a search it is critical that the following are understood: You do not need to enter the preceding zeros for the IPC mark subclass. Applications filed post 1970 have been reclassified in line with the IPC8 reform and you do not need to enter the preceding zeros for the IPC mark subclass. IPC Marks must be searched without the space between the IPC subclass and the IPC main group. For example, you should enter B25C1/00 and not B25C 1/00. Applications filed prior to 1970 have not been reclassified in line with the IPC8 reform and you will still need to enter the preceding zeros to the subclass. IPC Marks must be searched without the space between the IPC subclass and the IPC main group. For example, you should enter B25C001/00 and not B25C 001/00. As IPC marks will be reclassified with each revision of IPC8, you will need to search using current IPC marks. Note: If you choose to view / access any images (abstracts / full documentation) from documents published prior to the effective revision of IPC8, the images will display the original marks (ie. the marks applied at time of publication); which may be different to the reclassified marks used to search and locate the application. Patent applications and patents in APPS with the old AU patent application number format YYYYNNNNN do not identify related divisional or additional patent applications with the new AU patent application number format YYYYNNNNNN Some of these patent applications filed via the PCT, and designating Australia, will not have had IPC classification data provided by other IP offices to IP Australia Except for preceding point and some old inactive Australian patent classes, IPC classification marks, application numbers and patent numbers are mostly complete for Australian applications filed since 1920 The titles are those provided by the applicant and are not suitable for rigorous keyword searching All the bibliographic data fields are available, if applicable, for applications filed since January 1986. Absence of data in any field for applications filed before 1986 may merely mean that the data was never captured in electronic form Date fields are stored in numerical form with the year including the century and must be searched as such Text fields such as applicant name are also indexed according to each word to allow for partial name searches using the "CONTAINS" operator The bibliographic data is that which was extracted from IP Australia's computer systems at the date of publication of the abstract of the application/patent in Australian Patent Abstracts on CDROM. Consequently, some data may have since changed, such as through assignment of the invention to a different owner It is likely that older patents, could still be flagged as an A1 document kind, even though they would a 6-digit Patent Number. In general, from publication year 1998 onwards, publication document kind would be properly identified as being one of A1, B1, B2 or B3 and from 7 August 2003, one of A1, A2, A4, A5, A6, A8, A9, B1, B2, B4, B8, B9, C1, C4, C8 and C9. Please note that APPS cannot be used to determine whether an invention is new, although it may indicate that an invention is not new. In processing patent applications, IP Australia and most other Patent Offices have regard to worldwide patent, and other, documentation in determining whether an invention is new. Australian patent documents account for only about 7% of the world's patent documentation. Access to the world's patent documentation is available by subscription to any of a number of commercial on-line service providers or via various sites on the Internet. Before you make significant business decisions based on published patent information you should seek professional assistance, such as from a patent attorney and/or a commercial search service provider. Similar advice applies where you need assistance to search Australian or world-wide patent documentation, or where you need assistance in interpreting the results of patent searches. Derwent Conditions of Use Use of Derwent data is subject to the following Conditions of Use of Derwent Information: 1.1 Subscriber hereby undertakes in favour of Derwent as follows: (a) subject as hereinafter provided, not to copy, duplicate. translate into any language or in any way reproduce Derwent data, nor knowingly to permit the same, without the prior written consent of Derwent, except that Subscriber shall be entitled to reproduce a reasonable number of copies of extracts from Derwent data (provided that such extracts do not constitute a substantial part of any particular subject matter contained in Derwent data) for the purposes of Subscriber's own internal research or private study; (b) to ensure that all copies of Derwent data are, unless otherwise agreed in writing with Derwent, conspicuously marked with Derwent's copyright notice as follows: FOR INTERNAL USE ONLY - COPYRIGHT DERWENT INFORMATION LIMITED (c) not to disclose Derwent data nor make it available in any way to any third party; any third party requesting access to Derwent data should be referred to the Marketing Director, Derwent Information Limited; (d) to effect and maintain adequate security measures to safeguard Derwent data from access and use by any third party or unauthorised employees or representatives of Subscriber; and (e) to notify Derwent promptly upon any unauthorised disclosure, use or copy of Derwent data, of which Subscriber has notice. 1.2 Subscriber shall procure that its employees and representatives are made aware of and comply with the restrictions set out in this Clause 1. 2. Derwent data, all parts thereof and all copyright therein are and shall at all times remain the property of Derwent. No rights to or property in Derwent data shall pass to Subscriber hereunder. 3. Derwent shall not in any circumstances be liable or responsible for the completeness or accuracy of Derwent data and will not be liable for any direct, indirect, consequential or economic loss or loss of profit resulting directly or indirectly from the use by Subscriber of such data or from the performance or non-performance by Derwent of its obligations hereunder. 4. Failure by Derwent to enforce any of these terms and conditions shall not be construed as a waiver of its rights hereunder. 5. Subscriber shall not, without the prior written consent of Derwent, sub-license or assign or otherwise, transfer or dispose of its rights or obligations hereunder. 6. The invalidity, illegality or unenforceability in whole or in part of any of these terms and conditions shall not affect the validity, legality and enforceability of the remaining terms and conditions or part thereof. 7. These terms and conditions shall override and take the place of any other terms or conditions in any document or other communication used by Subscriber in concluding the subscription. No variation or amendment of or addition to these terms and conditions shall form part of any contract unless made or specifically accepted by Derwent in writing. 8. These terms and conditions shall be governed by and construed in accordance with English Law. Data Update Published patent data on APPS will get updated weekly, one week after publication of the Australian Official Journal of Patents (AOJP). Note that there will be no weekly publication during the Easter and Christmas period. Help If you need any further assistance, please contact the IP Australia Customer Support Centre on (02) 6283 2999, your nearest State Office on 1300 65 1010, or email assist@ipaustralia.gov.au or fax (02) 6283 7999.