Patent registration in Timor-Leste (East Timor). Timor-Leste, also known as East Timor, officially the Democratic Republic of East Timor is a country in Southeast Asia. Before and during colonial times, Timor-Leste was most famous for sandalwood. The country has a large and potential coffee industry, which often sells coffee to many Fair Trade retailers and on the open market. Accordingly, many businesses want to enter this market and one of the most important preparations a business needs to take before expanding to this country is to learn the procedure of patent registration in Timor-Leste.
Patent in Timor-Leste
As a new country, Timor-Leste is still in the process of drafting laws in various areas including the area of Intellectual Property Rights. Accordingly, the country currently does not have any formal regulations on intellectual property, meaning that there is no patent law as well as IP Law in Timor-Leste. Therefore, the applicant can’t obtain patent protection in Timor-Leste at this time.
The best method to obtain patent protection in this country is through Cautionary Notices publication in the Timor-Leste local press.
Although this doesn’t mean that the invention will obtain protection, it might serve as a legal basis in a future conflict, as well as a means to warn or inform third parties at the moment about the existence of such an invention.
Cautionary Notice in Timor-Leste
A Cautionary Notice in Timor-Leste usually has the following documents:
- Detailed information of the applicant/inventor;
- Title of patent, drawings, abstract;
- Copy of patent registration in the home country.
The Cautionary Notice needs to be in Portuguese.
Patent registration in Timor-Leste
Timor-Leste has a very small population, which means that the country does not have many businesses. This significantly reduces the competition in this market, which in turn makes it much easier to obtain patent protection when the law becomes active.
It also means that the development of the business owning a patent in Timor-Leste will be significantly quicker.
The official currency of Timor-Leste is USD. With this international standard currency, financial transactions will be greatly simplified. In addition, applicants will not need to pay additional currency conversion fees.
International treaties on IP
Like the countries of Suriname, Somalia, Eritrea, or the Maldives, Timor-Leste has no specific legislation regarding intellectual property law. As a result, Timor-Leste is not currently a party to any international treaties on intellectual property.
Note:
Timor-Leste is not yet a party to the Paris Convention, so all new patent rights will be governed exclusively by local law.
You can see a list of Timor-Leste IP firms here.