Kuwait in the Middle East of Global Patent GO——Introduction to Kuwait Patent Application

Kuwait, a local tyrant in the Middle East

From August 1990 to February 1991, the United Nations led by the United States and composed of 35 countries sent troops to Iraq and won a decisive victory at a small cost in 42 days. This was the first large-scale ground war since the end of the Cold War. It is the famous Gulf War, and the leading actor in the Gulf War is Kuwait we are going to mention today.

Kuwait, still a hereditary emirate with a land area about the size of Beijing, has a population of only 4.74 million and has the most expensive currency in the world, the Kuwaiti Dinar, which is equivalent to 3.26 US dollars. In 2021, the total GDP of Kuwait is 135.4 billion US dollars, and the per capita GDP is 28,500 US dollars. Every household has a luxury house and 2-3 cars. Kuwaiti citizens can enjoy free medical care, free education, exemption from water and electricity bills, income tax exemption and subsidies in various aspects such as housing, drinking water, and electricity. These benefits basically cover all security systems for Kuwaitis from cradle to grave. All this benefits from Kuwait's rich oil and gas resources.

Kuwait has proven oil reserves of 14 billion tons, ranking sixth in the world, and natural gas reserves of 1.78 trillion cubic meters, ranking eighteenth in the world. The output value of the oil and natural gas industry accounts for 45% of GDP and 92% of export revenue. In recent years, while focusing on the development of petroleum and petrochemical industries, the Kuwaiti government has also emphasized the development of various economies, continuously increased foreign investment, and introduced a series of tax-free policies to attract foreign investors. According to data released by the Kuwait Direct Investment Promotion Agency (KDIPA), as of the end of March 2020, Kuwait has attracted a total of 1.076 billion dinars (about 3.55 billion U.S. dollars) of foreign direct investment, mainly in information technology, oil and gas services, construction and hydropower field. Well-known IBM, Huawei, General Electric (GE), Honeywell, McKinsey, etc. have invested heavily in Kuwait. Like many Middle Eastern countries, Kuwait also suffers from severe air pollution and water shortages. For this reason, the Kuwaiti government has proposed an initiative to diversify the oil economy through green technology, saying that it will use renewable energy by 2030. It accounts for 15% in Kuwait. Solar energy projects, fresh water technology, green building materials and other related technologies will all have great potential in Kuwait. In the "2020 Global Innovation Index" released by WIPO in 2020, Kuwait ranked 78th out of 131 countries and regions in the world.

The Islamic religious law system used by Kuwait did not contain any intellectual property protection before, but since the Gulf War, Kuwait has maintained a closer cooperation with Western countries and is highly connected with the world. In 1995, Kuwait joined the WTO Organize the Agreement on Trade-related Intellectual Property Rights, joined the World Intellectual Property Organization in 1998, passed the first Kuwaiti copyright law in 1999, and also joined many organizations and treaties such as the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), the Berne Convention and the Paris Convention member states. From March 27, 2018, the Kuwait Patent Office began to accept applications for entering the national phase of PCT international applications. Although the processing speed of the backlog of patent applications is slow, initial results have been achieved, and search reports and examination opinions have been issued successively. In 2021 The two authorized patents were announced in the Kuwait Official Gazette published in January. Another GCC procedure, which can designate the country of Kuwait through the Gulf Arab Commission (GCC), will also resume from January 1, 2023, and will accept new patent applications on behalf of Bahrain and Kuwait, and conduct formality examination and verification of them. substantive review.

Kuwaiti Patent Features

1. The patent application in Kuwait is currently trying to return to the normal operation track. If the applicant receives the review opinion issued by Kuwait, it should reply within 3 months; the applicant or the right holder may have the right to report to the patent supervisor at any time Departmental filing of amendments, as long as the amendments do not affect the patent application itself;

2. If the Kuwait Patent Office believes that the patent involves national defense affairs or has military value, it will submit the patent application and its attached documents to the Command of the Armed Forces, and the Command will decide within 3 months whether to purchase the patent, or with the The right holders reach an agreement;

3. In Kuwait, the patentee, trademark owner, and copyright owner can apply to the court for a preventive injunction, but the trademark owner and copyright owner can apply before filing a substantive infringement lawsuit, and the patentee can only apply for a substantive injunction. You can only apply after the sexual infringement lawsuit.

Friendliness to Chinese applicants:

★★★

Gold content of patent rights:

★★

The degree of perfection of the rights protection mechanism:

★