Guide to STN Patent Databases – Basic Version - Paton - TU Ilmenau

Types of search
However, a detailed analysis by the EPO of given patent documents can lead to some priorities being considered
"non-active". This means that these priorities are ignored for simple patent families. This assessment may change
when new facts come up, e.g. a new publication. It may be said that define the
technical contents of the simple family . WO priorities are often non-active because they share the same technical
contents with the national applications. Active and non-active priorities are marked in the documents (Y = active
priority, N = non-active priority).
PATENT FAMILY INFORMATION
AN 35175373 INPAFAMDB
=================================
EPO simple family (SFN): 37031203
=================================
Y: active priority
N= non-active priority.
WO 2007009624.
+-------- Publications --------+ +-------- Applications --------+
DE 102005034274 A1 20070125 DE 2005-102005034274 A 20050722
JP 2009503313 T 20090129 JP 2008-521843 T 20060708
US 20080216788 A1 20080911 US 2008-9848 A 20080122
WO 2007009624 A1 20070125 WO 2006-EP6710 W 20060708
+--------- Priorities ---------+ +------------------+
DE 2005-102005034274 A 20050722 (DEA, 20070208, Y)
WO 2006-EP6710 W 20060708 (WOWW, 20081016, N)
2 priorities, 4 applications, 4 publications
22.4.2 DWPI
All family members in one database document have the same priorities as the Basic Patent, the first family member
that was used for indexing by Thomson Reuters.
When a new priority appears this publication is the basis for a new document in the database:
Each database document has a reference to other documents belonging to the same family in the CR
(Cross Reference) field
Complex patent families result from multiple priorities being assigned to one patent application, in
particular if there are Continuations in part.
The DWPI family is well suited to find closely related family members in a big patent family which is beneficial when
reviewing search results.
Different Basic Patents may be used for indexing in DWPI and CAPLUS.
22.4.3 CAPLUS
All family members in one database document have the same priorities as the Basic Patent. In case of complex
patent families more than one document is created in the database for one family.
In contrast to DWPI the same patent numbers may appear in more than one database document.
Whether a new family document is created is decided based on the priorities. New family documents are created in
CAPLUS when new priorities appear. A hint that there are other documents of the same family can be found in the
FAN.CNT (Family Accession Number Count) field.
Other reasons to create more than one document in the database for a family are:
Many substances that must be indexed, exceeding the limit for one document.
From 2008-07-01 one family document is created and indexed for the oldest national priority of US, DE, GB,
FR, CA, EP and a second document for the WO application (WO documents often contain more information,
including more chemical structures).
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