Patent filing in Costa Rica:

Building a strong patent portfolio starts with your filing strategy. For patent filing in Costa Rica, you need to know the local patent office requirements. This guide will take you through all filing requirements and important stats in Costa Rica.

When conducting a PCT national phase patent filing in Chile, you must submit the following documents:

• Identification of the PCT application.
• Complete identification of the applicant, including citizenship, domicile, or incorporation place if the applicant is a corporation.
• Power of attorney duly authenticated by a notary public in the document’s origin. The power may be filed with a term of one month, counted as from the local filing date of the application. – NOT MANDATORY FOR FILING BUT HIGHLY RECOMMENDED TO AVOID FORMAL OFFICE ACTION.
• Information concerning the priority application, if applicable.
• Patent document including specification, claims, summary, and drawings. This document is necessary for obtaining an application date and number.
• Spanish translation of the Patent document if it is in a different language *.
• If applicable, certificate concerning the biological material deposit*.
• Assignment document from the inventors to the applicant, duly authenticated by a notary public and subsequently apostilled. This document will not be necessary if, during the international phase, declarations under rule 4.17.II have been timely submitted by the applicant. *

* This document may be filed within a term of two months come counted us from the corresponding requirement by the Costa Rican patent office.

For direct (Paris Convention) filings only

• A certified copy of the Priority Document is required three (3) months after filing. A simple Spanish translation thereof is also required.
• A simple copy of the Assignment Document is required three (3) months after filing. A simple Spanish translation thereof is also required.

When patent filing in Costa Rica, A Spanish translation is mandatory upon filing.

For direct filings, a simple Spanish translation of priority documents and assignments must be filed three (3) months after filing.

In Costa Rica, the deadline for filing is 31 months counted as from the priority date.

Patents are granted for 20 years counted as from the international application date.

To obtain the patent number and the corresponding certificate, a registration fee of 500 USD must be paid in accordance with article 33 f of the Patent Law. The registration fee covers the first annuity.

Additionally, in accordance with article 33 bis of the Patent Law and 46 of the Patent Law Regulations, annuity payments are required to maintain the patent in force. The annuities corresponding to the prosecution year must be paid upon registration. The current, official annuity fee is 500 USD per year.

Subsequent annuities must be paid each year before the end of the anniversary month, considering the PCT international application date or within a grace period of six months with a 30% surcharge. One or more annuities may be paid in advance.

Once a patent is registered before the National Registry, it cannot be abandoned due to inactivity.

In accordance with the currently applicable regulations, to close a patent file an express waiver to the registration, which requires publication in the official gazette to be effective, must be filed.

Three months counted as from the notification of the corresponding requirement from the CRPO. Said notification usually occurs within a term of 18 months counted as from we seen the term of two years counted as from the publication of the patent application in the Costa Rican official gazette.

The PPH (Patent Prosecution Highway) is a procedure that speeds up the processing of a patent application, based on the favorable result obtained in a foreign office, with which a cooperation agreement has been reached.

PPH is available in Costa Rica through the following bilateral and multilateral agreements:

• PROSUR (Latin America)

Annuities payments must be up to date to proceed with the corresponding closing.

For patent filing in Costa Rica, you must address the local office: Costa Rica’s patent office is the National Registry of Industrial Property.

Their website is:

Link: www.rnpdigital.com

Yes, the Costa Rica patent office accepts requests for restoration of the right of priority (PCT Rule 26bis.3) applying the “due care” criterion.

Costa Rica saw a sharp -15.9% decline in total patent filings in 2023, falling to 986 applications. The drop was primarily driven by a -17.7% decrease in non-resident filings, which make up the vast majority of the country’s patent activity. PCT applications, in particular, saw a steep decline, dropping from 577 in 2022 to 481 in 2023. However, resident filings showed a modest increase, rising to 18 applications, with a notable rise in PCT filings from 4 to 15.

The United States remained Costa Rica’s top foreign filer with 267 applications, though this marked a slight -4.9% decline from 2022. Switzerland and Germany both saw sharp drops, with the latter’s filings falling by nearly 50%. Meanwhile, Japan, Sweden, and the United Kingdom all reported lower filings than in previous years. China’s filings remained flat at 9 applications, but it continued to rank lower compared to other leading filers, reinforcing the broader trend of declining Chinese interest in Latin America.