Opportunities for patenting confidential inventions

Conference talk on 10. Conference of the working group Optics und Optronics of the DWT e.V., 22 October 2019 Berlin, speaker PA Marschall

Patents are subject to the constraint of publishing. Confidential inventions are subject to the constraint of non-publishing. Nevertheless, patents on confidential inventions have been granted. How do the two go together?

The talk explains the existing legal exemption clauses for patenting confidential inventions, explains the bureau 99 of the German Patent and Trademark Office, shows how the examination procedure looks like and how such patents can be enforced.