IP Intelligence
Patent Criticalities
The things that quietly decide whether an invention can be protected - explained before they cost you anything.
Showing 12 of 56.
The prior art nobody checked
Prior art is anything already available to the public, anywhere in the world, in any language, in any form. A team can be genuinely original and still be second - an…
Nobody asked the Patent Office to look at it
An Indian patent application is not examined unless someone files a request and pays for it. If the request is not filed in time, the application is treated as withd…
The reply that quietly gave the patent away
A first examination report is an opening position, not a rejection. The two ways applicants lose value here are missing the date, and buying a grant by conceding mor…
New is the easy part. Inventive is the hard part.
Novelty is a single-document test and it is largely mechanical. Inventive step is a judgement about whether a competent, unimaginative person in your field would hav…
Software claimed as software
You cannot patent a computer programme per se. You can, on current Indian authority, patent an invention that happens to be implemented in software if it delivers a …
There is nowhere to retreat to
Claim 1 will often not survive examination. What decides whether you still have a patent worth having is whether the drafter built a ladder of narrower, meaningful p…
Most applications do not fail. They stop.
Very few Indian applications are refused after an argument. Most simply end because a date passed - and because there is no decision to appeal, there is often nothin…
Somebody is reading your published application
Publication makes your application visible to everyone who competes with you. In some industries, opposition is a routine part of the landscape rather than an except…
Why unity objections arise
A unity objection is not an attack on your invention. It is the examiner saying that one application cannot cover all of this - and it creates a decision with a dead…
The divisional you could no longer file
A divisional application must be filed before the parent is granted. That is a moving target you do not control - and it is the single most common way that valuable …
Everything is obvious once you know the answer
Once you have read the invention, the route to it looks inevitable. Combination objections often rely on that effect - so the reply has to force the analysis back to…
The form that can revoke a patent
Section 8 requires you to tell the Indian Patent Office about corresponding applications filed abroad. It is administrative, it is easy to overlook in a large family…
This is the Ragulika IP Educational Criticality - our own editorial prioritisation device, to help you decide what to read first. It is not a legal score, it is not calculated from your facts, and it says nothing about the strength of any particular application.
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Educational guidance, not legal advice. This material is published by Ragulika IP for general education and information. It is not legal advice, it does not create a professional-client relationship, and it is not a substitute for advice on your own facts. Patentability, infringement, prosecution strategy and every other IP outcome turn on the specific facts and on the law and Patent Office practice as they stand at the time you act. Please take professional advice before making a decision, and read the underlying provision or judgment before relying on any point stated here.