Research on Patent Examination Practices for Emerging Technologies in ASEAN Member States

Mandated by the Ninth ASEAN–Japan Heads of Intellectual Property Offices Meeting, ERIA conducted a research project and produced a report titled ‘Research 2019–2020 on Patent Examination Practices for Emerging Technologies in ASEAN Member States.’ The aim of the project was to assist the intellectual property (IP) office in each ASEAN Member State (AMS) with the further development and advancement of patent examination guidelines focusing on emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI). Thanks to the close cooperation with ERIA of the AMS counterparts responsible for patent examination or its rule-making in the respective IP offices, the report was able to cover many aspects of ‘patentability’ of AI-related inventions, which are assessed in this study. The research also revealed that the ASEAN IP offices have made great efforts to establish and improve patent examination guidelines for state-of-the-art technologies. The report includes comments by the ASEAN IP offices that show how they struggle with newly emerged and unfamiliar technologies in the patent examination. ERIA hopes the report may suggest areas for possible future assistance to be provided for the ASEAN IP offices concerned. The research report was prepared by Shobayashi International Patent & Trademark Office in Tokyo, under the instruction of and with the cooperation of ERIA.