CLIENTS FIRST

Our support for the acquisition of strong and effective patents starts from the invention creation stage, which is the starting point for building an IP portfolio and IP landscape. By participating in inventors' brainstorming sessions to be involved in creation of an invention from an early stage, we will understand the essence of the invention and promote the acquisition of rights for the important invention. We organize technical issues and prior art through the prior art search and make a proposal to clarify the direction of inventor's examination and proposal.
We then propose what rights should be acquired through the exchange of opinions with the inventor and IP personnel.
Specifically, we analyze the invention and the concept from multiple perspectives and propose a strategy for acquiring multifaceted rights by presenting specific claims.

In the examination process, we proceed with OA responses by taking into account the strategy for acquiring rights presented at the application stage and changes in technological trends since then. We realize the acquisition of strong and effective patents together with inventors and IP personnel by flexibly utilizing procedures such as amendments, divisions, accelerated examinations, and interview examinations for domestic filing. For foreign filing, we further utilize our understanding of legal systems of each country and practical expertise. These activities contribute greatly to solid IP management and aggressive IP management through IP portfolios and IP landscapes.

We work with inventors and IP personnel to acquire "strong and effective rights that function as exclusive rights".
In the collaboration work, we elicit ideas from the inventors through interviews, draft claims based on the prior art, and present a path to acquiring a strong and effective patent.
Specifically, we provide a service to refine the content of an application through participation in brainstorming and study meetings for actualizing an invention, clarification of the core idea of the invention, and discussions on the multifaceted expansion and development of the invention.
In doing so, we make full use of multiple advanced open AI patent analysis systems and generative AI to organize technical issues and prior art, stimulate inventors' ideas, and support clarification of the direction of discussion.
Then, we analyze a created proposal from multiple angles, draft claims by approaching the invention from multiple perspectives, and present a right acquisition strategy map.
Further, we discuss the strategy map with the inventors and IP personnel and finalize a policy for acquisition of rights.

Our specialized team strongly supports applications for AI-related inventions, which have been rapidly increasing.
In addition to AI-applied inventions such as image recognition, control systems, imaging systems, and medical systems, we can also support applications and acquisition of rights for AI core inventions and research results of academic papers.

Since foreign filing is one year after the basic application, we draft the claims again and propose a strategy for acquiring rights taking into account additional improvements at that time. We re-draft the claims when the basic application is filed by another patent firm, in particular.
In addition to applications through the Paris Route and the PCT Route based on regular domestic filings, we support a number of strategic U.S. provisional applications and PCT applications in English.
In the case of PCT applications, we propose a preliminary amendment incorporating the results of ISR before the local Patent Office starts examination.

For foreign filing processing, we work closely with members of 50 offices in our own WASHIDA GLOBAL NETWORK.
Basically, we decide on an OA response policy through detailed meetings with the inventor and IP personnel and prepare a document to be submitted to the foreign Patent Office in English in accordance with the policy.
The local lawyer checks the English OA response from a supervisory perspective. The procedure for the foreign OA response is carried out in this workflow.
For important cases and complex cases, we flexibly incorporate discussion with the local lawyer into the workflow to carry out the procedure.
More than 10 years have passed since we established this workflow, and the procedure is now very smooth and stable.

Since OA is issued after a certain period of time from the filing date, technological trends after the filing date need to be reflected in the initial rights acquisition strategy when responding to the OA. Thus, we obtain from the applicant the original purpose of acquiring rights and both the latest technical information and evaluation information including the importance of the application, and based on these, we propose a response to the notice of reasons for rejection.

Specifically, for implementation-related applications, we perform special intermediate work to check and control the claims for conformity with products implemented by other companies, and for standards-related applications, we check and control for conformity with standards.
Since the amendment at this stage determines the value of the right, we carefully proceed with the right acquisition procedure while fully consulting with the inventor and IP personnel as well as checking the examiner's impression. During the process, we propose necessary strategies for acquiring rights, such as amendments to expand rights, divisional applications, accelerated examinations, and interview examinations, when necessary.
For foreign filing, the same person as for the domestic filing similarly responds to the OA while referring to other family applications.

Intellectual property rights are more important than ever, and opportunities for the use of rights have been increasing. With this trend, there has been increased requests for infringement appraisals, invalidity appraisals, validity appraisals, and simplified appraisals, as well as countermeasures against other companies' patents and consideration of design changes.
We also receive requests for consultation on license agreement policies, negotiations with counterparties, drafting and checking contracts, and support for infringement lawsuits in response to the growing awareness of the rights of right holders.
In both cases, we will provide support based on our extensive experience.
In the event of an incident, we will do our best to help our client from the standpoint of the client and make the best proposal according to the situation. In such a case, we will respect our client's rights and provide support regardless of whether the client is on offense or defense.

To practice sound intellectual property management, it is essential to build a system to prevent infringement issues. We help our clients build and maintain the system. Our support includes FTO searches before development, establishment of a monitoring system for patents requiring attention based on the results of the searches, establishment of a procedure to prevent the acquisition of rights by other companies' applications, determination of the need for design changes, and proposals for the changes.
Whether the claims are well-written or not becomes apparent only at the stage of exercising rights (dispute and contract works), but we reflect our experience at this stage in our filing works and intermediate works as much as possible.

Our translation department produces translations for applications using multiple machine translation systems and a term list for each product and technology created in-house for each client. In our workflow, translators work closely with the engineering department to understand the technical content before translating, then the translations are cross-checked within the department and reviewed by our patent attorneys.

We aim to maintain and improve the quality of translation for applications by receiving feedback from local offices (with native speakers) after the in-house translation.
For foreign OA response procedures, we also receive feedback from local offices on response letters prepared by our patent attorneys.

We provide highly accurate prior art searches and evidence searches that are exclusive to patent firms. Our patent attorneys understand the technical contents of inventions, examine the logic of inventive step rejection and patent invalidity, review all relevant publications, classify patents requiring attention by importance, and summarize the search results.

We use several open AI patent search and patent analysis systems as search tools, and we are also exploring new ways of the patent search that classify and organize prior art and problem-solving methods by combining the systems with generative AI tools in pre-application searches.
We will actively introduce and use new patent search systems and generative AI to provide useful patent search services to our clients.

We manage basic information and deadlines for domestic and foreign filings using an existing patent management system. Additionally, we use an in-house development system that utilizes data from the existing system for detailed process management, workflow management, and individual client support. This ensures proper implementation of procedures and improves operational efficiency.
In this in-house development system, deadlines and progress are separately managed by a system for the technical department and a system for the administrative department to ensure reliable business operations.