Principally, Article 27 in Patent Act stated that “When filing a patent application for invention involving a biological material or utilization of a biological material, the applicant shall, no later than the filing date, make a deposit of the biological material with a domestic depository designated by the Specific Patent Agency. ”, the certificate of deposit issued by foreign IDAs cannot be recognized. However, it also stated that “In the event that, prior to filing the patent application for invention, the biological material concerned has been deposited in a foreign depository recognized by the Specific Patent Agency, and where the certificate of deposit issued by the designated domestic depository and the foreign depository has been provided within the time period prescribed in Paragraph 2 or the preceding paragraph, the applicant is exempted from the requirement of making a deposit no later than the filing date, as set forth in Paragraph 1.”
Exceptions are stated as “If an applicant has deposited the biological material in a depository designated by a foreign country in its territory with which the ROC recognizes the effects of deposits based on reciprocity, and if the applicant has submitted the certificate(s) of deposit issued by the said foreign depository within the time period prescribed in Paragraph 2 or Paragraph 3, the applicant is exempted from the requirement of making a deposit in the ROC.”As stated previously, the certificate of deposit issued by FIRDI are recognized by IDAs in Japan (since 18th of June, 2015), the U.K. (since 1st of December, 2017), and Korea (since 1st of September, 2020) and vise versa.
