The EPO Administrative Council has now made available the annual compendium of statistics on activity at the EPO and member state offices in 2024. The report provides a more in depth overview of patent figures, including a detailed breakdown of EPO Opposition figures.
EPO Opposition highlights include:
- 2.1% of patents for which the Opposition period expired in 2024 were opposed
- average of 1.28 oppositions filed per Opposed Patent
- 29% of oppositions rejected, 44% of patents maintained in amended form, 27% of patents revoked
- 20.5 months mean duration of opposition proceedings (from expiry of opposition filing period to date of opposition decision) for standard opposition cases (excluding cases with more than one opponent, participation of a legal member or re-scheduling of oral proceedings)
- Mechanical Engineering (total 619 patents opposed), and in particular Other Special Machines had the largest number of oppositions filed (131)
- Chemistry had the highest opposition rate (4.4%), in particular Food Chemistry (8.8%), the most oppositions being filed in Pharmaceuticals (90)
- Electrical Engineering (0.7%) had the lowest opposition rates
- For fields where at least 10 oppositions were filed, Computer Technology (64%), Digital Communication (57%), Telecommunications (50%), Pharmaceuticals (42%), Audio-Visual Technology (41%), had the highest revocation rates
- For fields where at least 10 oppositions were filed, Oppositions were rejected most in Other Special Machines (46%), Handling (45%), Civil Engineering (43%), Textile and Paper machines (39%), and Materials and Metallurgy (37%)
The full set of opposition rates and outcomes in each field of technology are reproduced below:
Further information, and the full report can be found here
