Recently, Guangzhou Municipal Intellectual Property Bureau held the "Patent Development Fund Project Application & Online Training Meeting for PCT Patent Application of Guangzhou in 2020", which detailed the flow for applying for patent development fund projects and PCT patent application system of Guangzhou.

The training meeting was held online, at which the keynote speaker detailed the application guidelines for patent development fund projects of Guangzhou, the marking criteria for competitive items and matters needing attention during application, and answered the questions raised by audience online; relevant experts also explained the PCT patent application system, related provisions, application flow and skills in an easy-to-understand way.

It is introduced that nearing the National IP Publicity Week 2020, in order to support market players to resume work and stimulate and guide enterprises to use IP as a tool for innovation and creativity, Guangzhou Municipal Intellectual Property Bureau recently issued the Guidelines for Patent Special Fund (Development Fund) Project Application of Guangzhou in 2020, with a special fund of nearly RMB 60 million being invested to support IP projects.  

It is learnt that in recent years, Guangzhou has speeded up the implementation of IP strategy, made active efforts in building a city strong on IP and kept optimizing its IP operation environment to facilitate innovation-driven development of the whole city, with remarkable results being achieved. In terms of IP creation, in 2019, the number of granted patents in Guangzhou reached 105,000, a year-on-year increase of 16.7%, among which 12,000 were invention patents, a year-on-year increase of 13%; by the end of 2019, the number of valid invention patents city-wide was 58,000, a year-on-year increase of 20.8%; the number of invention patents per 10,000 heads was 39.2, increased by 6.8 compared with that of last year; and the number of valid registered trademarks was 1.25 million, a year-on-year increase of 32%. (Translated from CNIPA Website Chinese Version)