The term of a patent is the maximum period during which it can be maintained into force. It is usually expressed in number of years either starting from the filing date of the patent application or from the date of grant of the patent. In most patent laws, renewal or maintenance fees have to be regularly paid in order to maintain the patent into force. Otherwise the patent lapses before its term. 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 year is the time between two recurrences of an event related to the orbit of the Earth around the Sun. ... A patent application is a request filed before a patent office in which an applicant applies for a patent for an invention. ... Corruption Jurisprudence Philosophy of law Law (principle) List of legal abbreviations Legal code Intent Letter versus Spirit Natural Justice Natural law Religious law Witness intimidation Legal research External links Wikibooks Wikiversity has more about this subject: School of Law Look up law in Wiktionary, the free dictionary Law, Legal Definitions...

Significant international harmonization of patent term across national laws was provided in the 1990s by the implementation of the WTO's Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs Agreement). Article 33 of the TRIPs Agreement provides that the // Events and trends The 1990s are generally classified as having moved slightly away from the more conservative 1980s, but keeping the same mind-set. ... The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an international organization which oversees a large number of agreements defining the rules of trade between its member states (WTO, 2004a). ... The WTO Agreement on Trade_Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs) is an international treaty which sets down minimum standards for most forms of intellectual property regulation within all member countries of the WTO. Specifically, TRIPs deals with copyright and related rights (ie. ...

"The term of protection available [for patents] shall not end before the expiration of a period of twenty years counted from the filing date."

Consequently, in most patent laws nowadays, the term of patent is 20 years from the filing date of the application. This however does not forbid the states party to the WTO from providing, in their national law, other type of patent-like rights with shorter term. Utility models are an example of such rights. Their term is usually 6 or 10 years. A utility model is an intellectual property right to protect inventions. ...

In the United States, under current patent law, the term of patent is either 20 years from the earliest claimed filing date or 17 years from the issue date, depending on the filing date and the issue date. (See: term of patent in the United States). Corruption Jurisprudence Philosophy of law Law (principle) List of legal abbreviations Legal code Intent Letter versus Spirit Natural Justice Natural law Religious law Witness intimidation Legal research External links Wikibooks Wikiversity has more about this subject: School of Law Look up law in Wiktionary, the free dictionary Law, Legal Definitions... In the United States, under current patent law, the term of patent is either 20 years from the earliest claimed filing date or 17 years from the issue date, depending on the filing date and the issue date: for patents in force [i. ...

See also

• Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, provides what is called the "priority year"
• Provisional patent application
• Submarine patent
• Supplementary protection certificate (SPC), provides some kind of time extension to the protection conferred by a patent