Free ground shipping is available on every in-stock West order shipped within the United States. If you choose this option, your order will generally ship from West within 1-2 business days and arrive within 7-10 days via the carrier that West selects. Past-due accounts and other credit issues may delay your order.
September 2009
Foreign patents on Westlaw: Click locally, search globally
If your organization practices patent law, you may need to retrieve foreign patents and patent applications for any number of reasons, including the following:
- You want to stay current on the activities of your client, company, or existing or potential competitors.
- You want to file for patent protection in another country.
- You want to stay current on technical advancements and patent filings in other countries. ("Certain technologies may be more advanced overseas than in the U.S., so a search that focuses on U.S. patents may miss the most pertinent prior art." Brian M. Berliner, Predicting the Future by Studying the Past: Giving an Opinion on the Patentability of an Invention, in Preparing Patent Legal Opinions 2002, at 411, 417 (PLI Pat. Copyright Trademark & Literary Property, Course Handbook Series No. 715, 2002).)
Thankfully, you can now retrieve European Patent Office (EPO), French, German, and U.K. patents and patent applications on Westlaw. The following databases—the first international patent record databases made available on Westlaw since the removal of Dialog—were recently released on Westlaw:
- EPO Patent Applications (EPO-PAT-APP)
- EPO Patents (EPO-PAT)
- EPO Patents and Applications (EPO-PAT-ALL)
- European Patents and Applications (EURO-PAT-ALL)
- French Patent Applications (FR-PAT-APP)
- French Patents (FR-PAT)
- French Patents and Applications (FR-PAT-ALL)
- German Patent Applications (DE-PAT-APP)
- German Patents (DE-PAT)
- German Patents and Applications (DE-PAT-ALL)
- U.K. Patent Applications (GB-PAT-APP)
- U.K. Patents (GB-PAT)
- U.K. Patents and Applications (GB-PAT-ALL)
Unlike other online sources, these databases can be searched using the Terms and Connectors or Natural Language search method or a Basic or Advanced search template. When you use the search template in the multibase EURO-PAT-ALL, you can retrieve patents, applications, or both from one or more of these databases with one search.
Patent and application records contain links to the full-text document in PDF—a major benefit. As Berliner observes, other online sources "do not always include the full text of the document, but are often limited to abstracts and bibliographic information." Berliner, supra, at 417.
For more information about these and other West products and services, contact your West Librarian Relations manager.
See all articles in current issue