Tag Archives: patents

Guide to Espacenet

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I’ve discovered a very clear introductory guide for translators to the new tools of the European Patent Office (EPO) database. It is a recap of “Befriending the new Espacenet tools for patents translation”, a session at the last ATA conference.

The recap was published earlier this month by the Law Division of the American Translators’ Association and is written by Françoise Herrmann, a freelance translator and interpreter (French and English) specializing in medical and patent translation. She has taught patent, medical, and technical translation at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey and New York University.

“The New Espacenet interface is now accessible in all the national languages of the Patent Offices connected to the database. Continue reading →

IP Kat

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As you can see, I’m rolling with the intellectual property theme this week. If you translate any matters to do with IP, the blog IP Kat is a sine qua non. It is ranked “Most Popular Intellectual Property Law Blawg” and “Most Popular Copyright Blawg” of all time according to Justia rankings of March 2021.

Since June 2003, the IPKat has covered copyright, patent, trade mark, designs, info-tech, privacy and confidentiality issues from a mainly UK and European perspective. Continue reading →

Patent Cooperation Treaty glossary

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The World Intellectual Property Organization in Geneva makes available a Patent Cooperation Treaty Glossary.

WIPO recommends it as “a useful tool for Offices and applicants in understanding the PCT and drafting or translating PCT documentation”. The glossary is available in French, Russian, Spanish, Portuguese, German, and English – you change languages using the roll-down menu at top right of the website. Continue reading →

Guest post – Reporting from the Oxford Unitary (EU) patent conference

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guest bookI’m delighted to welcome Helen Smith today, a freelance translator based in Oxford, UK. She obtained a BA (Hons) in Modern Languages (French and Spanish) from the University of Oxford, and then worked for 5 years at a top 50 City of London law firm, where she trained and qualified as a solicitor. You can find out more about Helen from her website.

Helen kindly offered to report on the recent Oxford conference on the Unitary Patent for those of us who weren’t able to attend. Over to you Helen!

Continue reading →

Great basic patents glossary (in English)… and more

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Gong_and_Signal_Chair_patentEarlier this week, the BBC published this glossary in English: Patents: A beginner’s guide to intellectual property. The article was written with help from Jonathan Radcliffe, an intellectual property lawyer at Mayer Brown, and Professor Andrea Matwyshyn from Wharton School’s Legal Studies and Business Ethics department at the University of Pennsylvania.

Continue reading →

Medicines Patent Pool

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ted_talksI have blogged before about the great initiative TEDTalks, and here is one that I think might interest you. Ellen ’t Hoen is an independent medicines law and policy consultant. In 2009, she founded the Medicines Patent Pool at WHO/UNITAID, to accelerate the availability of low-cost HIV treatments, especially antiretroviral medicines, in developing countries through patent licensing.

She recently gave a TEDxTalk in Geneva, Switzerland, about how collaboration from drug companies can allow AIDS drugs to be made available at a much lower cost.

Here is her talk, entitled “Pool medical patents, save lives“.

hand gesture body languageYou might also be interested in two other TEDTalk posts – Plain language in Portugal, and Arianna Huffington on sleep habits – How to succeed? Get more sleep. 

Glossary – US Patent & Trademark Office

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Knowing that quite a few translators work on patents, I thought this glossary from the United States Patent and Trademark Office might be of use.

Personally, I’m not too keen on the visual presentation of the glossary, but it certainly seems useful.

There are also a number of videos providing introductions to various procedures and terms (such as “specimen”, “applicant”, “drawing” and “basis”) used by the Office. You can access a list here. Beware – not all computers will play the videos and some of the links appear to be broken. 😦