What is Information Disclosure Statement : Patent laws of most countries requires that the attorney and/or the agent or even the inventor who has prepared the patent application to disclose to the Patent Office any information known to them that is material to the patentability of the application. A patent application is typically always accompanied with an information disclosure statement (IDS) that enlists such material information.
Information Disclosure Statement
Typically, it is expected that the patent practitioner in good faith will disclose all prior-art known to him/her which is relevant to the present invention. This information is presented in the form of a list in the information disclosure statement.
The information disclosure statement itself is generally composed of two parts: a list of patents, publications, or other information, and a concise explanation of the relevance of each listed item that is not in the recognized language of the concerned patent office.
The content of the information disclosure statement may include, but not limiting to:
- Any references found in any search in the technology, including prior-art search, novelty search, state-of-the-art search, infringement search, patentability search, etc.
- References cited in related applications, including parent and sister applications, divisional applications, continuation applications, etc.
- References cited, for example by the Examiner during the prosecution of the related foreign applications and known to the practitioner while preparing the IDS for filing.
- Any information and documents known to the inventor including product brochures, research papers, information obtained from convention addresses, posters, etc.
It may be considered that the preparation of IDS may also provide means for preparation of a better patent application. In the course of preparing the IDS, the practitioner had to consider the prior art when drafting the claims in the application, and it is much easier to discuss the relevance of the references. Therefore, it becomes easier to write a strong patent application knowing all the prior art.
