The Canadian government has undertaken several changes to patent law as part of its new Intellectual Property (IP) strategy and as part of a series of international conventions and agreements recently signed. Tis article provides a review of the most important changes already in force or in the makings.
First discussed in this article, the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) introduced in 2017 an extension of the protection of pharmaceutical products in the form of Certificates of Supplementary Protection (CSPs) and radically changed the regime for pharmaceutical patent litigation.
The second section of this article covers the implementation of the Patent Law Treaty, which aims to simplify and harmonize administrative practices with regards to patent applications. The third part covers the recent Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) which features important changes relating to patents in general and, more specifically, patented biological and pharmaceutical products.
Finally, part four examines a new series of changes proposed on October 30, 2018 with the objective to better protect intellectual property and promote innovation in Canada.
Read Canada: Review of recent and upcoming changes to Patent Law (pdf 84.4 KB)
