Insights

After a pilot phase, the European Patent Office has announced the wider use of AI-assisted tools for preparing minutes of oral proceedings. Under the workflow described by the EPO, audio from the hearing can first be transcribed by an AI tool, after which members of the division may use another AI tool to prepare a draft of the minutes; the final record remains under the responsibility of the competent examining or opposition division. The point is not to automate oral proceedings, but to make an important procedural record faster to produce and easier to check.

For applicants, opponents and representatives, quicker access to minutes is useful, but it also raises the value of clear procedural discipline during the hearing. Requests, concessions, new submissions and technical points should be presented in a way that can be captured accurately. The EPO’s accompanying internal guidance on AI-enabled examination processes keeps the essential boundary in place: AI may support efficiency, but the substantive decision to grant or refuse a patent remains a human examiner’s task. That distinction will matter whenever parties need to challenge the record or understand the reasons behind an examination outcome.

The EUIPO Observatory has announced that Agorateka, its gateway for directing users to legal online content, now covers all 27 EU Member States. The portal’s purpose is straightforward: help consumers find lawful sources for music, films, games, books, sports and other protected content, reducing the default visibility of pirate services. In the EU’s wider digital enforcement landscape, however, full coverage matters. Once legal access points are mapped across the Union, platforms, advertising networks and enforcement bodies can compare unauthorised content distribution with available lawful alternatives in a more consistent way.

The parallel push on open-web and dark-web enforcement shows where EU anti-piracy work is heading. OSINT methods, website monitoring and AI-based crawlers are increasingly used to trace commercial-scale infringement, especially networks monetised through advertising traffic, redirect domains, mirror sites and hidden communication channels. For right holders, the lesson is practical. The value of removing one link is falling; stronger action depends on turning repeated domains, ad-placement trails, payment clues, account migration and content fingerprints into evidence packages that enforcement agencies can actually use. Anti-piracy work is moving from reactive takedown to earlier mapping of the business network behind infringement.

The African Intellectual Property Organization (OAPI) has announced the 2026 call for its IP-based Structural Project Financing Programme, PFPSPI-2026, opening applications to projects from its 17 member states. The programme targets initiatives that can connect intellectual property tools with economic and social development, and applicants are expected to submit their files through the national liaison structures in OAPI member states. OAPI has also made available the press release, the call document, the application form and an explanatory note for preparing the submission package.

The practical point is not simply that another funding window is available. OAPI is pushing IP policy into project design, local industry development and public-interest outcomes. Applicants will need to show how patents, trade marks, industrial designs, geographical indications or collective marks can support commercialisation, branding, technology diffusion or community-level value creation. A strong application is therefore unlikely to be built on a broad development narrative alone; it should connect the IP asset, the target beneficiaries, the implementation path and measurable economic or social results.

The Japan Patent Office has updated its PPH anniversary information, reporting that 56 intellectual property offices had implemented the Patent Prosecution Highway by April 2026. The programme began as a JPO–USPTO pilot in July 2006 and has since become a familiar tool for applicants seeking to reuse positive examination results across jurisdictions.

The latest figures also show 29 offices participating in the Global PPH framework, for which JPO serves as secretariat. For applicants managing parallel filings, the practical message is clear: PPH planning should sit closer to the filing and prosecution strategy, not be treated as an afterthought once a first allowance arrives. A usable early examination result can still change timing, cost control and response tactics in later offices.

IP Australia’s latest Australian IP Report 2026 records a sharp rise in filing activity during 2025: trade mark applications reached 97,345, up 13.3%, while design applications increased to 10,296, up 7.1%. Both categories set new records. Standard patent applications, by contrast, eased by 0.5% to 30,348, suggesting that technology filings have moved into a more selective phase rather than following the same expansion seen in brands and product appearance.

The report’s research on firm performance gives the figures a practical edge. Businesses tend to show sustained gains in productivity, sales efficiency and revenue after receiving their first patent or trade mark. For companies entering or scaling in Australia, the filing surge is a signal to review trade mark clearance, product design protection and launch timing earlier in the process. The small fall in standard patents should not be read as weak innovation; it points more to a need for better prioritisation of patentable assets with clear commercial use.

Brazil’s National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI) has opened Phase II of its priority trademark examination programme, significantly widening the situations in which applicants may request faster handling. The new categories include Brazilian basic applications linked to Madrid System international registrations where INPI acts as the office of origin, applicants that need trademark registration to operate on online marketplaces, traditional communities and family farming applicants, applicants domiciled in countries with reciprocal arrangements with Brazil, and cases where registration is a prerequisite for obtaining a government licence, authorisation or concession.

The policy is more than a procedural shortcut. It signals that INPI is trying to steer limited examination capacity toward cases where timing directly affects market access, platform operations or regulated business activity. For 2026, the programme has a total quota of 3,000 requests, split into two windows of 1,500 each, with a cap of 10 requests per applicant. Companies using Brazil as part of a Madrid filing strategy, or preparing launches that depend on marketplace onboarding or public authorisations, should identify priority candidates early and prepare supporting documents before the commercial deadline becomes tight.