Patent Searches in Israel

In Israel, patent applications are filed at the Patent Authority in Jerusalem. Once the patent examiner has approved that the application adheres to the conditions of law, the inventor will receive a patent acceptance notice. After publication of the patent, the inventor will receive a patent certificate granting him the monopoly rights to the invention for twenty years. Registered patents are patents that already appear and have been published in the Patent Authority’s patent database.

Searching for patents in Israel can be done through the Patent Authority’s website or in their library, situated at the Patent Authority offices in Jerusalem, where copies of all registered patents can be found. Searching through Israeli patents in the Israeli patent database only provides results of patents registered in Israel, whilst it is possible that someone may have registered their patent in a different country, meaning that  the patent will not be located in the Israeli Patent Authority database. It is therefore advisable to search overseas patent databases using internet search engines at no cost. A free patent search carried out by the inventor himself can prove valuable to the inventor, as he can learn how others have solved problems in his area and how his invention can improve the current situation in the field.

In the Israeli patent database, patents that have not received an acceptance notice, i.e. patents in the application stage that have not yet been examined, and patents that have been examined, but the examiner has unanswered queries, do not appear in the search results when looking for information. Many inventors file an application for an Israeli patent as well as an American patent, and whilst the Israeli patent may not yet have been published, the American patent application may have been published before the Israeli or American patent is granted. it is therefore advisable to search the American patent database, to discover whether there is a patent application based on an Israeli priority date, but filed as an American patent.

Before carrying out the search, it is important to know what is being searched for. Therefore, it is advisable to do a principle concept design to define and describe the invention. After defining the principles of the invention, the inventor can carry out his own database search. In these matters, it is important to consult with a patent attorney for each and every case. There may be a particular reason that this particular invention requires different handling.