As per the Patent Act, for an invention to be patentable, the invention must be a new product or process, involving an inventive step and capable of being made or used in industry. It means the invention to be patentable should be technical in nature and should meet the following criteria –

• Novelty: The matter disclosed in the specification is not published in India or elsewhere before the date of filing of the patent application in India.
• Inventive Step: The invention is not obvious to a person skilled in the art in light of the prior publication/knowledge/ document.
• Industrially applicable: Invention should possess utility so that it can be made or used in an industry.

A patent application for an invention can be made by any of the following persons either alone or jointly with any other person:

• The true and first inventor
• True and first inventor‘s assignee
• The legal representative of the deceased true and first inventor or his/her assignee

The Patent Act defines the word “person” as including any natural person, company or association or body of individuals or government body, whether incorporated or not. In the case of a proprietorship firm, the application should be made in the name of the Proprietors. In the case of a partnership firm, the names of all personally responsible partners must be included in the patent application.

An assignee can also be a natural person or other than a legal person such as a registered company, LLP, a Section 8 Company, an educational institute or Government.

It is also important to note that true and first inventor does not include either the first importer of an invention into India or a person to whom an invention is first communicated from outside India. Th applicant is required to disclose the name, address and nationality of the true and first inventor.

The types of a patent application are:

• Provisional Application
• Ordinary or Non-Provisional Application
• Convention Application
• PCT International Application
• PCT National Phase Application
• Patent of Addition
• Divisional Application

The rest of the article covers these types in detail.

A provisional application, also known as a temporary application, is filed when an invention is under experimentation and isn’t finalized. Moreover, it is a preliminary application which is filed before the patent office for claiming priority, as the Indian Patent Office follows the ‘First to File’ system (known popularly as the First-Come-First-Served-Basis). In technical terms, early filing of an invention will prevent the occurrence of any other related inventions from being designated as prior art to the inventor’s application.

To add more, this type of patent application is filed when an invention requires additional time for development. If an application is supported by a provisional specification, the applicant is necessitated to file a complete specification within twelve months from the date of filing a provisional application. A failure in this part would render the application void.

An application for this purpose must include a brief explanation of the invention and must be drafted in a meticulous manner so as to ensure that the priority rights are secured for the invention.