The USPTO enters into patent worksharing arrangements with foreign intellectual property (IP) offices to improve patent examination efficiency, facilitate cooperation within the global patent system, and make it easier for U.S. applicants to obtain patents in foreign jurisdictions. Patent worksharing helps IP offices to collaborate in the examination of patent applications with corresponding filings in multiple countries or jurisdictions. These typically protect the same invention and are associated through a claim of foreign priority under an international framework, such as the Paris Convention or the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT).
Several patent application filing trends have motivated many IP offices to enter into patent worksharing arrangements. These trends include an ever-increasing number of patent application filings, an exponential growth in the body of prior art available, a growing complexity of new technologies, and limited IP office resources. Furthermore, certain global patenting strategies have led innovators and businesses to increasingly file common patent applications, with similar specification and claims, across several IP offices.
Historically, the IP5 offices—a forum of the world’s five largest IP offices—have led worksharing efforts. These offices account for the majority of the world’s patent applications. But recently, other jurisdictions have been emerging as innovation hubs in cutting-edge technologies, becoming essential components of global supply chains and drawing foreign investment from global businesses. The increasing relevance of these jurisdictions is driving an increase in the number of patent applications filed there, resulting in even more redundant filings across global IP offices. This trend has spurred a need to expand existing worksharing programs to additional offices and develop new worksharing models.
Patent worksharing reduces many of the inefficiencies that IP offices experience when repeating each other’s work in searching and examining corresponding applications. This interoffice collaboration often leads to timelier and potentially less expensive issuance of patent rights. It also may produce higher-quality patents. The benefits of worksharing can be especially significant when the offices involved have different capabilities and strengths that can be leveraged by each other. This can come in the form of the number and specialization of examiners, accessibility to prior art in different languages, or even availability of specialized IT resources and tools.
In addition to benefiting the participating offices, worksharing programs also benefit U.S. applicants seeking patent protection for their inventions in partner jurisdictions, by reducing the cost and time required to obtain a patent in certain situations.
The USPTO has developed various patent worksharing arrangements, including the Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH), the Parallel Patent Grant (PPG), the Accelerated Patent Grant (APG), and others. For more information, visit the USPTO’s Pursuing international IP protection page.
Patent Prosecution Highway
The Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) is an applicant-driven patent worksharing arrangement between two or more IP offices. These arrangements allow an applicant who has received a favorable decision from a first participating IP office, including a favorable PCT search report, to request fast-track examination of a corresponding patent application that is pending in a second participating IP office. The USPTO is party to various bilateral and multilateral PPH arrangements, most notably the Global and IP5 PPH arrangements. This gives U.S. applicants access to a large network of partner offices. For more information, including a list of partner offices, see the USPTO's PPH webpage.
Accelerated Patent Grant
The Accelerated Patent Grant (APG) is an applicant-driven patent arrangement between the USPTO and a partner IP office. An applicant who has received a U.S. patent may request the partner office to grant its national patent on a corresponding application that is pending in that office, on the basis of the issued U.S. patent. The partner office issues the national patent without conducting a substantive examination of the corresponding application. Instead, it relies on the search and patentability analysis carried out by the USPTO. The partner office does, however, ensure that granting the patent is appropriate subject to the relevant national laws of that country, for example, subject matter eligibility. The first APG agreements undertaken by the USPTO were with Cambodia (in 2020) and Mexico (in 2023). Several other countries have more recently become APG partners, as indicated below. It is anticipated that the program will expand in the future.
Parallel Patent Grant
The Parallel Patent Grant (PPG) is an office-driven patent worksharing arrangement for expediting the grant of a foreign patent based on an issued U.S. counterpart patent. The USPTO and Mexican Institute for Industrial Property (IMPI) launched a pilot PPG program in 2020. Under PPG, IMPI intends to review corresponding patent applications to ensure compliance with eligible subject matter under Mexican IP law and will directly notify qualifying patent applicants about the possibility of taking advantage of PPG. IMPI will also make effective use of the USPTO search and examination results in expediting the grant of Mexico corresponding patents.
The Parallel Patent Grant (PPG) is an office-driven patent worksharing arrangement for expediting the grant of a foreign patent based on an issued U.S. counterpart patent. Applicants cannot independently choose to participate in the PPG. The USPTO and the Mexican Institute for Industrial Property (IMPI) launched the pilot PPG program in 2020. Under the PPG, IMPI reviews corresponding patent applications to ensure compliance with eligible subject matter requirements under Mexican IP law. IMPI then directly notifies qualifying patent applicants about their option of taking advantage of PPG. If selected by IMPI, participation by applicants in the PPG program can lead to a corresponding patent being issued by IMPI without carrying out a substantive examination of the application, instead relying on the USPTO’s examination.
Legacy patent worksharing programs that are no longer active
PCT Collaborative Search and Examination Pilot (CS&E)
The CS&E was a pilot program that allowed examiners from the IP5 offices (in their capacity as PCT International Authorities) to collaborate on the search and examination of a single international application. The result was an international search report (ISR) and written opinion (WO) from the chosen International Searching Authority (ISA) based on contributions from all participating offices. The active phase of this pilot program has now concluded, and no more applications are being accepted. For more information on this worksharing arrangement, visit the USPTO’s CS&E webpage.
Expanded Collaborative Search Pilot (CSP)
The expanded CSP provided applicants with search results from multiple offices early in the examination process for common patent applications. It was designed to accelerate examination and provide applicants with more comprehensive prior art by combining the search expertise of examiners at the USPTO, the Japan Patent Office, or the Korean Intellectual Property Office, before issuing a first office action. This pilot program has now concluded. For more information on this worksharing arrangement, visit the USPTO’s CSP webpage.
