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Patent Translations – Filing Your Patent The Right Way

    

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Submitting a patent is no easy task, and having to submit it along with a translated copy or even worse, with multiple translated copies in several languages can create a lot of stress and pressure.

But how can you get rid of this stress and pressure? You may want to find a firm that will consult you with your multilingual patent translation needs and helps you to maneuver efficiently through the patent application process.

Many patent attorneys and patent agents are facing similar issues here, they sometimes pick a supplier who claims to have the knowledge, but in the end delivers something far from being useable. This may even turn worse, if you do not speak the language, submit your application to the Patent Office and weeks later, certainly after you paid the language suppliers invoice, find yourself confronted with a rejection letter issued by the Patent Office claiming that the translated copy will not be accepted due to several reasons, such as quality.

Quality may not just be defined as a good understandable translation, but the Patent Offices require a very special use of terminology and not many translators can apply or meet this. That means you might take your translation to yet another translator, who tells you this must be a mistake as the translation is well understandable and well written, leaving you even more jeopardized as before.

Learning from faults is good –but as someone submitting a patent application you do not want this to be rejected. Therefore it is important that you select a firm or a linguist that possesses the skillset required by patent translations.

Now you may have paid attention and realize a patent translator is a good choice, but does this translator know the field he shall translate in? Very good objection! Relating this to the legal industry, if you want a patent submitted, you may not want to retain the service of a family attorney. Same applies to patent translations. You need to make sure that the linguist who will be working on your patent translation is also a field specialist in the area he is supposed to translate. This means that a patent translator who is a field expert in bioscience will most likely fail in doing a great job for a patent translation in telecommunications.  If you work with a multilingual language provider (translation agency) they will pay close attention to this, but do ask such questions to make sure they also know what they are doing!

A multilingual service provider usually possess as a standard ISO 17100 and applies this standard. For patent translations we always suggest to even use a higher standard, making e.g. sure that the patent translator has 10 years of experience as a patent translator.

Summary

Make sure to retain the services of:

  • a professional patent translator
  • who is native of the target language
  • with 10 or more years’ experience in patent translations
  • field expert in the subject matter

Imagine you have done this now successfully for your first language combination but are stuck with 12 more languages to assign. Do you really want to do this 12 more times and screen linguists yourself? Also – keep in mind that screening the linguist is only one step, but you still have to manage your project. Linguists might have questions regarding terminology, run into problems with formatting or do not know newly published or updated requirements of the Patent Office. You may want to indeed go with multilingual language service provider after all.

Project Management

The Language Service Provider (LSP) will take over all of your project management requirements. As a project stakeholder he will keep you updated about the progress at all times. They will maneuver you efficiently through the patent application process and will listen closely to your needs, taking away the pressure from the complicated and complex translation requirements.

Nonetheless, do ask for partial updates and partial deliveries along the way. A professional LSP will provide you with this without discussion. You may also want to agree to milestone deliveries. But do note, usually LSPs and the patent translators perform the Quality Assurance Lifecycle after the translation is done, yet another advantage working with a LSP. So if you still see some minor mistakes, such as spelling errors, do not get worried.

Should you want to clarify any of this, do send your LSP a quick email or give them a phone call. A professional LSP will listen closely to your concerns and respond to them appropriately.

If you retain the services of a LSP make sure to receive a formal quote outlining their services, the costs and a delivery date for each language combination. Make sure that the offer includes TEP (Translation, Editing and Proofreading) and pay close attention, that the LSP knows and respects the requirements outlined by the Patent Office you wish to submit your patent application to. Some Patent Offices require the LSP to either verify or certify the translation. If this is the case, make sure the LSP includes this into your quote. It is also important that you have a direct Project Manager or Team assigned to your project and you, so that you have a direct contact person within the LSP.

Summary

  • Get a direct Project Manager assigned to your project
  • Outline the requirements in writing, including pricing and service ordered
  • Check if the translation meets the Patent Office requirements
  • Check if you need Verification or Certification
  • Patent Specification translation for validation in the U.S., European Territories and Overseas

VERIFICATION

Verification of a translation means that the translation must be accompanied by a statement signed by the applicant or by the translator, to the effect that, to the best of his knowledge, the translation is complete and faithful.  There are only a few designated Offices that require verification.

CERTIFICATION

Certification of a translation means that the translation must be certified by a public authority or a sworn translator. This is usually not required for an (international) application, but if a designated office reasonably has doubts about the accuracy of the translation, it may require the applicant to furnish a certification of the translation.

Another good way to choose your LSP is the level of service they are offering. LSPs usually have different divisions within their organization such as DTP or QA. You may believe still you may not need DTP services, but this is might be a false conclusion.

You may have special formatting requests or only have the patent text available as scan or pdf. That means that the Project Manager of your project will schedule the DTP Division to help with the OCR or formatting work, prior and after the translation is done.
The DTP division will also be of great help when it comes to rebuilding complex tables, drawings, flow charts or graphs.

Summary
A good LSP will provide:

  • Patent specification translation for validation in the U.S., European Territories and Overseas
  • Multilingual translation of Descriptions, Claims and Abstracts
  • Translator Certification and Verification (If Needed)
  • Special Formatting – ensure documents are ready to send to your agent abroad
  • Complex tables, drawings and flow charts rebuilt
  • Skilled Project Management Team
  • Quality Assurance Service

Patents vs Trade Secrets – Excursion: Software Localization

While patents are often the most powerful protection for technological advances, the trade secrets gain more popularity. The main reason for this is that patents expire and the applicant must disclose the invention to the public.

A very interesting view can be drawn towards Software, especially in the U.S., where the U.S. Supreme Court has also made patents less effective for software with its 2014 Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank decision, invalidating patentability of abstract ideas not incorporated into something tangible, giving a rise to trade secrets and having software firms opting for trade secrets over patents. Working on such occasions, even if this is only partially revealed to your LSP, make sure to have your LSP provide you with proper security measures.

IT Security

A LSP usually comes into contact with many sensitive data from financial information, bank details to social security numbers or trade secrets, that need to be processed. Such LSPs should have a proper high security in place to keep information secure and protected. A minimal standard should be encrypted emails for your communication with the LSP, to protect your content from being read by other entities or non-intended recipients.

Do also check with the LSP about their data protection, data storage and data disposal policies as well their IT Security policies, including but not limited to the Data Centers.

Wagner Consulting is one of the best online translation agencies that provides professional Translation, Globalization & Localization services to a large local and foreign customer base. Our Patent Division has translated into and from, but not limited to languages such as Arabic, Chinese, Danish, English, Finnish, French, German, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Norwegian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, Ukrainian more than 10 Mio words from Bioscience to Technical that have been filed successfully with several Patent Offices domestically and overseas.

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If you wish to receive a detailed offer on or consultation on Globalization or Localization services provided by Wagner Consulting, then please feel free to contact our Sales Team, who will gladly assist you.

Patent & IP Division at Wagner Consulting
Phone:
US: (718) 838 9533
EU: (718) 618 4268
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