Protection of Utility Models in Poland: A Brief History and Perspective for the Future

This paper concerns mechanisms for the protection of utility models in Poland. These mechanisms are at present on the verge of substantial change as a new draft regulation was opened for public consultation in 2022. Select results of analyses of the utility model applications filed in the years 2001–2020 were reported. The analyses concerned possible routes for filing utility model applications in Poland, the most popular fields in which utility model protection is used, and the origins of utility models protected in Poland by the country of residence of the first applicant. It has been noted that a key strength of the utility models is the criteria granting exclusive rights. In terms of the advantages related to disclosure, the state-of-the-art protected utility model needs only to be novel; there is no requirement concerning the inventive step. This makes the assessment of validity relatively reliable and significantly reduces the risk that the enforced right of protection will be invalidated. This strength will likely be preserved in the review of the draft regulation that is about to abolish substantial examination and replace it with a registration system. The change is supposed to reduce the time of prosecution, thus making the conversion from refused/withdrawn European patent applications to Polish utility models more attractive.