On September 12, 2017, the Brazilian Nacional Institute of Industrial Property (“INPI”) has launched a new online system for the registration of computer programs called e-RPC, regulated by Normative Instruction No. 74/2017, published in the Industrial Property Magazine No. 2,435, of September 5, of 2017.
The program intends to facilitate the procedures for software registration. To apply for registration, it is no longer necessary to send the software’s source to INPI, being enough to encrypt it in the form of abstract digital hashing, hence ensuring the confidentiality of information.
With the deployment of the system, the fees for the services of a computer program have been updated and simplified, each corresponding to a single particular amount to be paid previously to the registration through Federal Payment Slip.
Additionally, the certificate of registration can be downloaded through “BuscaWeb,” a system available at INPI’s homepage, being protected for fifty (50) years as from January 1 of the following year of publication or creation.
Finally, the novelty is part of a plan to diminish bureaucracy that has been being implemented at INPI for software registration, which had a significant reduction in response time of 100 days in the year of 2016 to only 7 days in September of this year. The number of pending orders has also fallen sharply, from 5 thousand in the year of 2016 to less than 2 thousand this year, and the goal is to reach zero by the end of 2017.
The Corporate Department of Kestener, Granja & Vieira Advogados is available to provide any further information required on this subject.
Fabio Alonso Vieira
Phone: +55 11 3149-6111
This article is intended exclusively to provide information and does not contain any opinion, recommendation or legal advice from KGV Advogados in relation to the matters herein addressed. Copyrights are reserved to Kestener, Granja & Vieira Advogados.
