Accelerated Examination in Israel - Green Application/PPH/GPPH

When applying for an invention patent in Israel, you can request accelerated examination. The main methods of accelerated examination are as follows:

Ordinary accelerated review:

• Applicants may apply for accelerated examination for business (e.g. competition) and personal reasons (e.g. illness or old age). Applicants must submit reasons for accelerated examination, including a written statement, and a request for priority examination, and pay relevant fees. Reasons for accelerated examination include:
  • Applicant's age or health reasons
  • The patent application has a potential risk of infringement or is suspected of being misused by a third party without permission
  • The examination time is too long compared to other patent applications of the same category
  • Public interest related
  • Special circumstances, including the economic loss caused to the applicant by the delay in examination

Third-party expedited review:

• After the patent application is published, an interested third party may also request accelerated examination of the published application. The third party must submit written reasons for accelerated examination and pay relevant fees. The relevant reasons include:
  • The normal review speed will affect the product development process or manufacturing
  • The examination time is too long compared to other patent applications of the same category
  • Public interest related
  • Special circumstances

Green Application:

• Refers to inventions that are intended to improve the environment, including preventing the causes of global warming, reducing air or water pollution, promoting pollution-free agriculture, and inventions related to alternative energy sources, etc. ILPO announced the eligibility criteria for accelerated examination of "green applications" on December 13, 2009. For green inventions that meet the criteria, their examination will begin within 3 months after the classification date.

PPH Request:

• The ILPO promises to complete the PPH examination within 3 months of entering the PPH examination procedure, or within 3 months of submitting the response to Article 18 of the Law (whichever is later). No official fees.
  • A PPH application based on two priorities from two different institutions can also be subject to PPH, as long as the application has been examined by one of the GPPH member institutions or the ILPO has a bilateral PPH agreement with one of the priority institutions, the PPH application can be approved.
  • For a PPH application that shares only one priority claim among multiple priorities with a corresponding application, when the corresponding application has more priority claims than the Israeli application, the ILPO’s policy is that the applicant needs to convince the ILPO that the claims of the Israeli application are derived from the shared priority claim.
  • When the corresponding application has a smaller priority claim than the Israeli application, the ILPO's policy is to accept the application, provided that the other PPH requirements are met.
  • Before receiving a notification from the ILPO under Article 18, it is best for the applicant to file a response to Article 18 together with the PPH request to save the ILPO time and effort.
  • The applicant can describe the connection between the corresponding application and the Israeli application in the attachment, declare and prove that the Israeli application is clearly derived from the corresponding application, and explain that the claims of the corresponding application are derived from a common priority declaration. If the ILPO is convinced that the application is clearly derived from the corresponding application, the application can enter the PPH procedure.
  • The Israeli application claims priority based on the US Provisional application. Even if the provisional application has no corresponding agreement in the bilateral or GPPH agreement, the ILPO will allow it to enter the PPH procedure as long as the ILPO confirms that it is derived from the corresponding application (provided that other requirements are met).
  • The applicant may make amendments on his/her own initiative during the PPH procedure in accordance with Art. 17c or the examination opinion.
  • If the claims are actively amended after entering the PPH procedure and no longer fully correspond to the claims in the corresponding application, the patent application will return to the regular examination procedure.
  • If the ILPO acts as the international search and examination authority and the search report is positive, in this case, the PPH procedure can be initiated.

GPPH Request:

• Bilateral agreements involve only an agreement between the Israel Patent Office (ILPO) and a specific corresponding authority, whereas GPPH (Global Patent Prosecution Highway) is a collaboration between a group of authorities that relies on the work products of the members of the group. When a bilateral PPH agreement already exists between two participating institutions, the guidelines of GPPH will take precedence over the existing bilateral PPH agreement. The difference between PPH and PCT-PPH is that PPH relies on the work products of a specific corresponding authority in its national capacity, while PCT-PPH relies on the work products of that authority in its international capacity.