Strategy of the intellectual property development for the period of ...

In the last few years, the Office is in the process of intensive human resourcestransformation and modernization with the aim to increase capacities of this institutionfor the sake of more efficient execution of its competencies. Largely due to the foreignaid (EU funds, funds of the European Patent Office and World Intellectual PropertyOrganization), a considerable improvement has been achieved in the field ofcommunication-information infrastructure, which not only made the work in the Officefaster and of higher quality, but it also enabled the interested parties outside the Office touse the web site of the Office and gain insight into particular data bases. That processcontinues in the context of extension and general shift of focus of the Office from theadministrative tasks (conducting the administrative procedure) to those client-orientedlike giving information services, education, mediation and coordination between therepresentatives of certain relevant interest groups. Along with that, a significant HRstrengthening has been implemented in the Department for Copyright and Related Rights,which will give more potential not only to the supervisory function but also to the role ofcoordination in the field of collective management of copyright and related rights.Keeping the focus, for the moment, only on the administrative tasks of the Office, it canbe stated that a trend is under way which is characteristic not only for the small countriesand countries in transition, but also for all states which have been integrated, just like theRepublic of Serbia, in the international systems of acquiring intellectual property rights.As a matter of fact, these systems facilitate and make less expensive, the protection of thesame intellectual property (for example, the invention) in a larger number of states insuch a way as to enable valid performance of certain acts in the administrative procedurein foreign or international institutions, leading to less burden being placed on the countrywhere the protection is sought. That process advances the farthest in the filed of patentgrant, where the conditions for the grant of right are universal: the foreigner who wishes apatent in the Republic of Serbia, combining the possibilities given by the PatentCooperation Treaty and the European Patent Convention, gains a patent, while the Office,in the entire procedure, has, so to speak, no other task save to entry the patent in theregister 2 . By accession to the European Union (which represents the perspective of theRepublic of Serbia) every country enters in the system of so called Community protectionof trademark, design, rights of protection of plant varieties breeder, and in the near future,patents. That means that every person has the liberty to choose to ask protection for theterritory of certain member state of the EU or for the entire territory of the EU. In thisother case, the competence for the conducting of the administrative procedure is entirelyon the appropriate regional administration, which additionally reduce the scope ofactivities of the national administrations for intellectual property.2 The data from 2009 convincingly confirm that trend lasting for several years: from the total of 4,618applications requesting patent in Serbia, only 320 have been filed to the Office directly, and 4,258 are socalled European applications filed in the European Patent Office or represent an international patentapplication (according to the Patent Cooperation Treaty) which has been transformed into the Europeanapplication. The Office does not conduct the administrative procedure with regard to these otherapplications till the European Patent Office grants European patent on this basis, which is valid also on theterritory of Serbia. The Office then just enters such a patent in its Register14