The new Portuguese Industrial Property Code, which was approved by Decree-Law No. 36/2003 on the 5th of March 2003 came into force on the 1st of July 2003.
The law seeks to ensure that various provisions of Portuguese IP laws are harmonized with international and Community law and should improve and extend IP protection including patents, designs, and trademarks.
As far as patents are concerned, the Code stated that the same invention can be protected either by a patent or by a utility model. Two new items have been included in the new Code, the first is the working of the inventions, the second is that the regime concerning the SPC-Supplementary Protection Certificate. Furthermore, the requirements that claims, descriptions, abstract and drawings must comply with were correctly defined. Validity years and terms of payment of annuities have also been amended.
With regards to Designs or models, the Directive of the 13th of October concerning Designs or Models is now included in the new Code. Maintenance fees shall be paid every five years instead of one year.
Several amendments were made with respect to trademarks. One of them is that the notion of trademark of high renown and the notion of imitation of a registered trademark have been corrected as per the new Code.
Further, the old regime of trademarks registered by classes in accordance with the Law of the 21st of May 1896 is now extinguished.
According to Article 240 of the new Code, it is not acceptable to register labels or packages that may be confused with others already known and used in connection with registered word marks.
The new Code also covered the logos where the notion and regime applicable to the same are now corrected.
The regime concerning the Topography of Semiconductor products is included in the Code as provided for in Directive 87/54/EEC of the Council, dated 16th of December 1986.
The law also stated general rules such as that certificate attesting industrial property rights issued by WIPO, EPO and OHIM, shall be equivalent of certificates attesting the rights granted by the Portuguese Industrial Property Office.
The Court of Commerce of Lisbon shall be the competent authority, which decides upon appeals against decisions by the Portuguese Industrial Property Office to grant or refuse any industrial property rights.
Furthermore, the timeframe in which opposition can be filed was extended for an extra month.
Finally, the regime concerning the infringement has been corrected and the possibility of seizure by Customs has been modified.