In European Union member countries, a supplementary protection certificate (SPC) is a sui generis, patent-like, intellectual property right. This type of right is available for medicinal products, such as drugs, and plant protection products, such as insecticides, pesticides and herbicides. In law, particularly in common law jurisdictions, intellectual property or IP refers to a legal entitlement which sometimes attaches to the expressed form of an idea, or to some other intangible subject matter. ... For copyright issues in relation to Wikipedia itself, see Wikipedia:copyrights. ... Industrial design rights are intellectual property rights that protect the visual design of objects that are not purely utilitarian. ... A patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a state to a person for a fixed period of time in exchange for the regulated, public disclosure of certain details of a device, method, process or substance (known as an invention) which is new, inventive and useful. ... A trademark (Commonwealth English: trade mark)[1] is a distinctive sign of some kind which is used by a business to identify itself and its products or services to consumers, and to set the business and its products or services apart from those of other businesses. ... A trade secret is a confidential practice, method, process, design, or other information used by a company to compete with other businesses. ... Sui generis is a (post) Latin expression, literally meaning of its own gender/genus or unique in its characteristics. ... Database rights are a form of exclusive right introduced by European Union Law to those countries which follow EU Law in 1997. ... The United States Code defines a mask work as a series of related images, however fixed or encoded, having or representing the predetermined, three-dimensional pattern of metallic, insulating, or semiconductor material present or removed from the layers of a semiconductor chip product, and in which the relation of the... Plant breeders rights, also known as plant variety rights (PVR), are intellectual property rights granted to the breeder of a new variety of plant. ... Sui generis is a (post) Latin expression, literally meaning of its own gender/genus or unique in its characteristics. ... A patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a state to a person for a fixed period of time in exchange for the regulated, public disclosure of certain details of a device, method, process or substance (known as an invention) which is new, inventive and useful. ... In law, particularly in common law jurisdictions, intellectual property or IP refers to a legal entitlement which sometimes attaches to the expressed form of an idea, or to some other intangible subject matter. ... Many drugs are provided in tablet form. ... Divisions Green algae Land plants (embryophytes) Non-vascular embryophytes Hepatophyta - liverworts Anthocerophyta - hornworts Bryophyta - mosses Vascular plants (tracheophytes) Seedless vascular plants Lycopodiophyta - clubmosses Equisetophyta - horsetails Pteridophyta - true ferns Psilotophyta - whisk ferns Ophioglossophyta - adderstongues Seed plants (spermatophytes) †Pteridospermatophyta - seed ferns Pinophyta - conifers Cycadophyta - cycads Ginkgophyta - ginkgo Gnetophyta - gnetae Magnoliophyta - flowering plants... Insecticide application by crop spraying An insecticide is a pesticide whose purpose is to kill or to prevent the multiplication of insects. ... An airplane spreading pesticide. ... A herbicide is a pesticide used to kill unwanted plants. ...

A supplementary protection certificate comes into force only after the corresponding patent expires. It has a maximum life time of 5 years. The market exclusivity cannot however exceed 15 years. It may be viewed as an extension of life time of a patent, although the rights are somewhat different.

Supplementary protection certificates were introduced to compensate for the long time needed to obtain regulatory approval of these products (i.e. authorization to put these products on the market).

Applications for a supplementary protection certificate must be filed on a country-by-country basis. There is no unitary European supplementary protection certificate, but national ones only.

Legal basis

Supplementary protection certificates in the European Union are based on two regulations:

• Council Regulation (EEC) No 1768/92 of 18 June 1992 concerning the creation of a supplementary protection certificate for medicinal products [1]
  • entered into force on January 2, 1993
• Regulation (EC) No 1610/96 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 July 1996 concerning the creation of a supplementary protection certificate for plant protection products [2]
  • entered into force on February 8, 1997

Supplementary protection certificates may come into life at the expiry of a national or European patent. However, the European Patent Convention (EPC) needed to be modified to allow such "extension" of the term of European patent. Article 63 of the EPC was modified on December 17, 1991 to specifiy to, although European patents have a term of 20 years as from the date of filing of the application (Art. 63(1)), The Council of the European Union forms, along with the European Parliament, the legislative arm of the European Union (EU). ... The European Community (EC), most important of three European Communities, was originally founded on March 25, 1957 by the signing of the Treaty of Rome under the name of European Economic Community. ... June 18 is the 169th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (170th in leap years), with 196 days remaining. ... 1992 is a leap year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... January 2 is the 2nd day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1993 is a common year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar and marked the Beginning of the International Decade to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination (1993-2003). ... The European Community (EC), most important of three European Communities, was originally founded on March 25, 1957 by the signing of the Treaty of Rome under the name of European Economic Community. ... The European Parliament is the parliamentary body of the European Union (EU), directly elected by EU citizens once every five years. ... July 23 is the 204th day (205th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 161 days remaining. ... 1996 is a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. ... February 8 is the 39th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1997 is a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... The European Patent Convention (EPC) or Convention on the Grant of European Patents of 5 October 1973 is a legal text instituting the European Patent Organisation and the system according to which European patents are granted. ... December 17 is the 351st day of the year (352nd in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1991 is a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

" nothing (...) shall limit the right of a Contracting State to extend the term of a European patent, or to grant corresponding protection which follows immediately on expiry of the term of the patent, under the same conditions as those applying to national patents: (...)

(b) if the subject-matter of the European patent is a product or a process of manufacturing a product or a use of a product which has to undergo an administrative authorisation procedure required by law before it can be put on the market in that State. " [3]

This constituted the first revision of the European Patent Convention since its signature in 1973. 1973 was a common year starting on Monday. ...

External links

• Supplementary Protection Certificates for Medicinal Products and Plant Protection Products - A Guide for Applicants (PDF file 120Kb), by the UK Patent Office