Currently, trademark applications have taken approximately 14 to 20 months to be decided by the BPTO. This timeframe is detrimental to applicants’ interests, as only upon the grant of the registration by the BPTO do applicants obtain ownership of the trademark and are able to fully exercise their rights over it.

In order to reduce this timeframe, the BPTO has been adopting several measures, such as, since 2022, the implementation of expedite examination in specific situations, related to the applicant’s condition (such as individuals over 60 years old, or those suffering from a serious illness or disability, or legal entities classified as “Inova Simples”) or to disputes involving the trademark (such as cases involving claims of prior use or ongoing litigation).

Expedite examination has proven to be an effective measure to significantly reduce the processing time of a trademark application. On average, the BPTO currently takes around 34 days to decide on a request for expedite examination.

According to Ordinance No. 66/2026, the BPTO has expanded the grounds for requesting expedite examination, including, among others, the following:

• Claim of prior use rights, raised by the applicant or by an interested third party in opposition proceedings;
• Trademark subject to lawsuit proceedings;
• Grant of the trademark registration as a condition for operating on a virtual platform;
• Grant of the trademark registration as a condition for obtaining public funding;
• Grant of the trademark registration as a condition for obtaining a permit, authorization or concession from public authorities;
• Trademark related to a product or service that is the subject of a patent application under expedite examination before the BPTO;
• Applicant classified as a start-up, as defined by law;
• Trademark subject to international certification via Madrid Protocol.

According to Ordinance No. 67/2026, a total of 3,000 (three thousand) expedite examination requests will be made available throughout 2026, limited to 1,500 (one thousand five hundred) per four-month period (from May 1 to August 31, 2026, and from September 1 to December 31, 2026), and to 10 requests per applicant.

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I- Normative Ordinance INPI/PR/DIRPA No. 01, dated March 4, 2026, which governs the procedures for withdrawal and abandonment of patent applications, renunciation of patents, and withdrawal of petitions before the BPTO; and

II- Normative Ordinance INPI/PR/DIRPA No. 02, dated March 6, 2026, which establishes guidelines regarding the processing and technical examination of patent applications before the BPTO.

Below we highlight the main aspects of the new regulations.

1-) Normative Ordinance INPI/PR/DIRPA No. 01/2026

Under the new regulation, a national patent application may be withdrawn by the applicant within 16 months from the filing date or the earliest priority date. After this period, the applicant may abandon the application at any time during its prosecution. This distinction is relevant: withdrawal aims to terminate the administrative instance without disclosure of the technical content of the application, whereas abandonment occurs at a later stage, when such confidentiality can no longer be preserved.

The Ordinance also provides that renunciation may be requested at any time during the term of the patent. Once approved, the patent will be deemed extinct on the date the renunciation request is filed, and the subject matter will fall into the public domain.

Other petitions filed in the course of the administrative proceedings may also be withdrawn at the request of the party who filed it, provided that the request is filed before the publication corresponding to the service requested.

It is important to note that the new regulation expressly prohibits withdrawal of the request for examination. This point is particularly relevant because, according to BPTO’s current practice, once examination has been requested, the applicant is no longer allowed to introduce voluntary amendments to the claims of the patent application.

2 -) Normative Ordinance INPI/PR/DIRPA No. 02/2026

The second Ordinance aims to standardize and enhance the transparency of internal examination procedures, governing the analysis of the main elements that compose a patent application, as well as the technical acts performed by the BPTO examiners during examination.

In summary, the new regulation consolidates guidelines regarding the conduct of the technical examination and the structuring of the examiner’s technical report, providing examples of how it should be organized, whether with respect to the assessment of the patentability requirements (novelty, inventive step and industrial application) or with respect to the citation of prior art references that may affect patentability.

The standardization of these acts is intended to increase the clarity of the BPTO’s decisions and facilitate the understanding of examiners’ communications by applicants and other interested parties, thereby contributing to greater legal certainty and predictability in the system.

The Intellectual Property team of Salusse, Marangoni, Parente e Jabur Advogados continuously monitors the BPTO’s regulatory updates and remains available to clarify any questions regarding the impacts of these new regulations on patent filing strategies and portfolio management in Brazil, through the e-mail pi@smabr.com or by phone +55 (11) 3146-2400.

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