1. Intellectual Property Rights

In a society which can be described as being saturated with a large amount of information, technological reforms can progress very quickly. Today, this progress involves an international society, and in recent years, this progress has been based on what is known as intellectual rights such as patent rights, trademark rights, confidential business information, copyright, and other rights related to intellectual property (referred to as intellectual property rights). Intellectual property issues cause a number of problems which have attracted much interest in the present society.

To begin with, intellectual property represents an indication pointing out general trends relating to human creativity and management techniques. In concrete terms, this means that the results of intellectual activities of people are represented not only by original and creative ideas ("inventions") or ("utility models"), unique designs ("designs") , but also by music, novels, paintings or similar "works". These works are protected by laws such as the patent law, utility model law, design law, and copyright law. On the other hand, "trade names or trademarks", which represent an indication of business activities are names used in order to conduct a business. These trademarks are names created by the user in order to indicate what kind of services or products can be provided under the "trademark" name (also called a brand). Trade names are also protected by commercial laws and trademark laws. The (narrowly defined) rights which are based on these industrial property rights, such as trademark laws, representing an indication of a business, or design rights, utility model rights, and patent rights, are a result of intellectual acitivities in the industrial spheres, while copyright relates to activities in the cultural sphere.

In addition, new spheres which should be also protected are emerging among theses intellectual property spheres. Among these new spheres are for example biotechnology, electronics-information processing, and other so called high-tech fields which are experiencing a tremendous amount of development due for instance to development of computer programs (involving copyright laws), or semiconductor chips (involving laws protecting semiconductor chips), etc. Moreover, improper acquisition and use of trade secrets such as client lists or manufacturing technologies indicate attempts at production and sale of imitations of products purporting to contain a content or quality representing a trademark (such as a champagne, or a cognac, or another unique regional trademark). These business activities, which are tantamount to a false claim of authorship by another person to receive the benefits connected with a well known brand, also represent unfair competition and thus are subject to regulations relating to improper competition and laws designed to stop unfair competition. (Laws aimed at stopping unfair competition have been adopted in addition to narrowly defined industrial property rights, and in a broad sense, these laws are also related to intellectual property rights).

The fact that protection of intellectual property rights has been strengthened in recent years is due among other things to agreements reached between the WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization), WTO and TRIPS (an organization for intellectual property rights related to trade), which are specialized UN organs aiming at increasing the level of international consciousness about the effect of increased competitions among countries and industries in each country. These and other agreements have made it possible to create an integrated system designed to protect intellectual property rights in each country through treaties, various international meetings, and similar acitivities.


[ The Types of Intellectual Property Rights and the System for Their Protection ]

(1) Intellectual Creations

(a) Inventions

Patent Law

(b) Utility Models

Utility Model Law

(c) Designs

*designs	Design Law
*product form	laws to stop unfair competition

(d) Trade Secrets (manufacturing technologies,customer lists,etc.)

laws to stop unfair competition

(e) Integrated Semiconductor Circuits

laws for protection of semiconductor chips

(f) Copyright (novels, music, etc.)

Copyright Law

*rights similar to copyright

(for stage performance producers,record producers,broadcasters,etc.)

(2) Commercial Symbols

a. new varieties of plants

Seedling Law

b. trade names

Commercial Law

c. trademarks (including service marks)

*registered trademarks	Trademark Law
* unregistered (well known) trademarks	Unfair Competition Prevention Law

d. geographical indications (champagne or scotch brands)

Unfair Competition Prevention Law, Liquor Industry Law.

The quotation of American President Lincoln "The patent system added the fuel of interest to the fire of genius" can be seen at the entrance of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

b. Design System

Section 1 of the Design Law states the that:"The purpose of this Law shall be to encourage the creation of designs by promotng their protection and utilization so as to contribute to the development of industory".

Designs represent a quest for a better appearance or external form, resulting in enjoyment which is connected with the use of beautiful products. This external appearance is something that can be perceived uniformly by anybody. That is why designs can be easily copied, which poses obstacles to a healthy industrial development because ease of copying can be an invitation to unfair competition.

That is why a design system should be planned so that it would on one hand protect the assets of the creator of a new creative design, while on the other hand, the usage of the design should be also determined so as to encourage design creativity which also contributes to industrial development.

c. Trademark System

Seciton 1 of the Trademark Law states that:"The purpose of this Law shall be to ensure the maintenance of the business reputation of persons using trademarks by protecting trademarks, and there by to contribute to the development of industry and to protect the interests of consumers". Because it goes without saying that consumers benefit from satisfactory economic activities of various companies and other economic entities, a system determining different brands must be created so that consumers can expect a certain level of quality of products or services from certain brands by being eable to determine who is the manufacturer of a certain product or provider of a certain service which they come into contact with.

That is why a system of trademarks which are attached to printed on products or used to identify services must be established in order to protect these trademarks because such trademarks indicate a certain specific function of a product or a service identified by a trademark. The system thus on the one hand protects the interests of the consumer, and on the other hand it also contributes to the development of industries through a design maintaining confidence in the operations of persons using these trademarks for advertising functions or for functions aimed at protecting the quality of products.

(2) Subject matters of Protection under Industrial Property Laws

a. Subject matters of Protection matters the Patent Law

According Section 2 of the Patent Law, the subject of the protection of this law are Patents. Specifically, the purpose of the law is to protect a high level of creativity in technological concepts which use natural laws and rules. Consequently, calculation methods or encryption dtermined by arbitrarily defined rules, for instance for finance and insurance systems or taxation methods, which are not based on natural laws and rules, do not represent a protected subject. The discovery per se (for instance Newton's sudden discovery of a certain rule) is not a protected subject either.Finally, the created product must be characterized by a high level of technological creativity because a creation characterized by a low technological creativity level cannot be protected.

b. Subject matters of Protection under the Utility Model Law

According to Secitons 2 and 3 of the Utility Model Law, the subject matter of protection are forms of products, structures, or combinations of related items which were created using creative technological concepts based on natural laws and rules.

Consequently, methods relating to products are not a protected subject as long as they only relate to shapes and forms of products, etc.

In addition, a high level of creativity applied to creation of a technological concept is no longer required for protected subjects, although this is required for protected subjects under the Patent Law.

c. Subject Matters of Protection under the Design Law

Section 2(1) of the Design Law stipulates that E‘DesignEin this Law means the shape, pattern or color or any combination thereof in an article which produces an aesthetic impression on the sense of sight.E Designs are, therefore, inseparable from articles, or products, and structural functions that are not apparent from the external appearance of a product are not to be regarded as protectable under this Law. Design creations are as abstract as inventions in the Patent Law and devices in the Utility Model Law. However, inventions and devices are technical creations using the laws of nature. Based on this concept, the Patent Law and the Utility Model Law extends protection to inventions and devices respectively. The basic concept in the Design Law differs from these two laws in that it is aimed at identifying creations from the aspect of aesthetic impression and extending protection based on this concept.

d. Subject mattters of Protection under the Trademark Law

According to Section 2 of the Trademark Law, the subject of protections are letters, figures, or combinations thereof, used to certify produced commercial merchandize, or commercial merchandize of parties to which the use of a trademark was transferred, or the role which is played by the commercial activity identified by a trademark or by the party which is exercising this role. While in the past, parties engaged in the use of trademarks for commercial transactions such as manufacturing of goods, sales, etc., used these trademarks in order to identify the types of commercial products as merchandize manufactured by these parties alone, and only the public acknowledgement of the right to use a commercial product was protected, due to the rapid development in recent years of service products, it was determined that existing legislation for protection of other publicly acknowledged rights relating to other roles was no longer sufficient, and the Trademark Law (adopted on April 1, 1992) established the same type of protection as the protection which is applied to merchandize for marks used to identify a service in order to provide identification of the same type of service provided by the same provider for persons offering these services in areas such as broadcasting, finances, the restaurant business, etc.

What we now call the industrial property system is comprised of the four laws relating to industrial property of the Patent Law, the Utility Model Law, the Design Law, and the Trademark Law, which respectively extends protection to patents, utility models, designs and trademarks.
                                                                        (from Japanese Patent Office)

1. Application
(1)	Patents
	Patent application	16,000
	Application in foreign language	26,000
	Entry into the national phase in Japan (under the PCT)
	-for international applications filed on or after April 1, 2004   16,000   -for international applications filed on or before March 31, 2004   21,000
	Application for registration of an extension of the term of patent right	74,000
(2)	Utility Models
	(Note: Applicants are required to pay registration fees for the 1st-3rd years in a lump sum at the time of filing)
	Utility Model application	14,000
	Entry into the national phase in Japan (under the PCT)	14,000
(3)	Designs
	Design application	16,000
	Request for secret design	5,100
(4)	Trademarks
	Trademark application	6,000 + 15,000 per classification
	Defensive mark application	12,000 + 30,000 per classification
2. Request for Examination
(1)	Patents
	1) For patent applications filed on or after April 1, 2004 Request for examination 168,600 + 4,000 per claim -where the international search report has been established by the JPO (under the PCT) 101,200 + 2,400 per claim -where the international search report has been established by an International Searching Authority other than the JPO (under the PCT) 151,700 + 3,600 per claim -where the search report has been established by a designated searching organization 134,900 + 3,200 per claim   2) For patent applications filed by March 31, 2004 from January 1, 1988 Request for examination 84,300 + 2,000 per claim -where the international search report has been established by the JPO (under the PCT) 16,900 + 400 per claim -where the international search report has been established by an International Searching Authority other than the JPO (under the PCT) 67,400 + 1,600 per claim -where the search report has been established by a designated searching organization 50,600 + 1,200 per claim
(2)	Utility Models
	1) For utility model applications filed by December 31, 1993 from January 1, 1988 Request for examination 46,500 + 1,100 per claim   2) For Utility Model applications filed on or after January 1, 1994 Request for Registrability Report 42,000 + 1,000 per claim -where the international search report has been established by the JPO (under the PCT) 8,400 + 200 per claim -where the international search report has been established by an International Searching Authority other than the JPO (under the PCT) 33,600 + 800 per claim
3. Annual fee / Registration fee
(1)	Patents
	1) For patent applications filed on or after January 1, 1988 (For patent applications requested for examination on or after April 1, 2004) 1-3rd year: annually, 2,600 + 200 per claim 4-6th year: annually, 8,100 + 600 per claim 7-9th year: annually, 24,300 + 1,900 per claim 10-25th year: annually, 81,200 + 6,400 per claim (For patent applications requested for examination on or before March 31, 2004) 1-3rd year: annually, 13,000 + 1,100 per claim 4-6th year: annually, 20,300 + 1,600 per claim 7-9th year: annually, 40,600 + 3,200 per claim 10-25th year: annually, 81,200 + 6,400 per claim   2) For patent applications filed on or before December 31, 1987 (For patent applications requested for examination on or after April 1, 2004) 1-3rd year: annually, 1,700 + 1,100 per claim 4-6th year: annually, 5,400 + 3,300 per claim 7-9th year: annually, 16,200 + 10,000 per claim (For patent applications requested for examination on or before March 31, 2004) 1-3rd year: annually, 8,500 + 5,600 per claim 4-6th year: annually, 13,500 + 8,400 per claim 7-9th year: annually, 27,000 + 16,800 per claim 10-25th year: annually, 54,000 + 33,600 per claim
(2)	Utility Models
	1) For utility model applications filed on or after April 1, 2005 1-3rd year: annually,   2,100 + 100 per claim 4-6th year: annually,   6,100 + 300 per claim 7-10th year: annually,   18,100 + 900 per claim   2) For utility model applications filed by March 31, 2005 from January 1, 1994 1-3rd year: annually,   7,600 + 700 per claim 4-6th year: annually,   15,100 + 1,400 per claim
(3)	Designs
	1) For Designs applications filed on or after April 1, 2007 1-3rd year: annually, 8,500 4-10th year: annually, 16,900 11-15th year: annually, 33,800 16-20th year: annually, 33,800 Similar design registration: annually, 8,500   2) For Designs applications filed by March 31, 2007 1-3rd year: annually, 8,500 4-10th year: annually, 16,900 11-15th year: annually, 33,800 Similar design registration: annually, 8,500
(4)	Trademarks
	Registration fee (including defensive marks) :	66,000 per classification
	Renewal fee:	151,000 per classification
	Defensive mark renewal fee:	130,000 per classification
4. Others
	Request for extension of a period	2,100
	Notification of succession (Change in the name of applicant)	4,200
	Request for other certificates:
	-on-line   1,100   -over the counter   1,400
	Request for inspection of documents (paper)	1,500
	Request for inspection of documents (digital):
-on-line   600   -over the counter   900
	Request for inspection of the Register (paper)	300
	Request for inspection of the Register (digital):
	-on-line   600   -over the counter   800
	Request for copy of documents (paper)	1,400
	Request for issue of documents (digital):
	-on-line   1,000   -over the counter   1,300
	Request for copy of the Register (paper)	350
	Request for issue of the Register (digital):
	-on-line   800   -over the counter   1,100
	Fee for rewriting data into electronic format	1,200 + 700 per sheet
5. After Registration
	Registration of transfer of right:
	-Patents   15,000   -Utility models   9,000   -Designs   9,000   -Trademarks   30,000   -General successions (inheritance, etc)   3,000
	Change in the name of owner (excluding transfer)	1,000
Note: An applicant who has neither an address nor residence (office, if the applicant is a legal entity) in Japan is required to pay almost all of fees through an agent who has an address or a residence (office, if the applicant is a legal entity) in Japan.