While the system’s implementation was a decades-long process, the Unitary Patent System is now available to provide uniform protection of a patent across all participating countries, through the jurisdiction of the Unified Patent Court (UPC). According to the commission, the Unitary Patent System will serve individuals, companies, and research organisations producing inventions that need to be patented. Through applying for a unitary patent at the at the European Patent Office, inventors will be able to get their inventions without complex validation, and significantly cheaper: before, the approximate costs for a territory covering all participating countries was around 30.000 EUR – which now changes to less than 5000 EUR. These changes are expected to encourage companies’ patenting in the EU. The Unitary Patent will be valid in the 17 countries participating in the Unitary Patent Regulation which and ratified the UPC Agreement. 8 more countries, which participate, but have not yet ratified the agreement are expected to do so soon, in which case, inventions will be protected in 25 countries.
While in an older statement, the European Federation of Academies of Sciences and Humanities (ALLEA) welcomed an unitary system, they also highlighted the inadequacies of the patent system in context of open science last year.
