Can a Product Be Patented? What Inventors Should Check

A product is not patented; the invention inside it is. Nepal's Act asks only two questions of that invention: is it new, and is it useful to the general public. Everything else an inventor checks is preparation for those two.

Key takeaways

• Sec. 5 sets two tests only: a new invention, and useful to the general public.
• The words "inventive step", "obvious", "novelty" and "prior art" appear nowhere in the Act.
• A patent protects the working mechanism, not the name, the shape or the business idea.
• Sec. 6 lists the refusals, including harm to public health, conduct, morality or the national interest.
• Nepal is first-to-file, so a public launch before filing is the hardest mistake to undo.
• A registered patent is published in the Nepal Gazette under Sec. 7A(1), not in the trade mark bulletin.
• A patent runs seven years and may be renewed twice, so twenty-one years is the ceiling.

What does the Act actually ask of an invention?

Two things. Sec. 5(1) tells the Department of Industry to investigate, on expert advice where it thinks necessary, whether the invention in the application is a new invention, and whether it is useful to the general public.

That is the whole statutory test. The decision that follows is whether or not to register the patent, and Sec. 6 lists the separate circumstances in which it must refuse.

Read the Patent, Design and Trade Mark Act 1965 yourself rather than relying on any summary, including ours. The consolidated English text sits on the Nepal Law Commission site.

Is your product the invention, or the thing around it?

Separate the two before anything else. A water filter is not patentable because it is a useful household item; the filter arrangement, the valve sequence or the way it is manufactured might be.

Write one sentence beginning "the technical difference is". If you cannot finish it without mentioning price or packaging, you have a product, not yet an invention.

The rest of the product usually needs other rights. Our note on what can be patented in Nepal works through that boundary in more detail.

What does "new" mean in practice?

New means the invention is not already available to the public. Earlier patents, product manuals, catalogues, conference papers, videos and public demonstrations can all count against you, wherever in the world they appeared.

The Act neither defines the word nor describes a search procedure. Treat "new" as the Department's finding on the material before it, not a box you tick yourself.

That is a reason to search early. A search cannot guarantee registration, but it can stop you drafting claims around something already published.

What does "useful to the general public" mean?

It means the invention does something real and works as the application says. A machine that cannot function, or a claim with no stated purpose, fails here rather than on newness.

Read with Sec. 6, the phrase also carries a public-interest edge: a workable invention that harms public health or morality is refused on that ground instead.

Internationally the comparable phrase is "capable of industrial application", and treaty practice treats the two as interchangeable. WIPO publishes those texts.

Does Nepal apply an inventive-step test?

The Act does not impose one. Counting over the English text, "inventive", "obvious", "prior art" and "novelty" each appear zero times, so nobody can point you to a section that requires a non-obvious advance.

That is a statement about the statute, not your chances. An examiner weighing whether something is genuinely new may ask questions that look much like an obviousness enquiry.

So prepare as though the bar is higher than the words, and never quote inventive step as a Nepali statutory requirement. If it matters to your case, put the question to the Department or an advocate.

When must you stop showing the product?

Before the launch, the pitch, the expo stand and the social post. Nepal is first-to-file, so the filing date fixes your position, and a demonstration can put the very feature you wanted to claim into the public domain.

Use written confidentiality terms with manufacturers, prototype shops and investors where disclosure cannot be avoided. Keep dated drawings, test results and a record of who contributed what.

Those records are useful evidence of who invented what. They create no rights at the Department of Industry and are no substitute for a filing.

What will the Department refuse outright?

Sec. 6(1) lists four circumstances. The patent is already registered to someone else; the applicant is neither the inventor nor a successor in title; the patent would adversely affect public health, conduct, morality or the national interest; or registration would contravene existing law.

Note what is missing. No field of technology is excluded by name, so the arguments happen inside those four headings rather than in a list of banned subjects.

The companion piece, what cannot be patented in Nepal, goes through each limb with examples.

Which right fits which part of your product?

Most products carry more than one kind of value, and each has its own route, term and paperwork. The table below is the short version.

The classification systems differ too. A trade mark is filed in a class of the NICE classification, helped by our class finder, but no class system limits a patent claim.

If the value sits in the casing rather than the mechanism, start with our industrial design service instead. If it sits in the name, start with trade mark registration.

How do you check before you spend?

1. Write the invention down. The problem, the mechanism, and how it is made, operated or used.
2. Name the difference. One sentence stating what earlier products did and what yours does instead.
3. Search what already exists. Free public databases give a rough first answer about newness.
4. Check the refusal grounds. Read Sec. 6 against your own facts before drafting anything.
5. Decide the mix of rights. Mechanism, appearance and brand may each need their own filing.
6. Close the disclosure gap. Pause launches, pitches and posts until the application is lodged.
7. Draft, then file. The claims are the boundary of the right, so that is where the work belongs.

What does the filing itself need?

Sec. 4(2) requires the application to be accompanied by maps and drawings with particulars of the patent, together with the prescribed fee. The Department's own checklist also asks for the receipt proving that fee was paid.

Alongside it sit the description, the claim, the inventor's and owner's details, and a power of attorney where a representative signs for you.

One requirement surprises people. Sec. 10 makes the patentee lodge with the National Archive a copy of the design or model of the article made under the registered patent.

Where is a Nepali patent published?

In the Nepal Gazette. Sec. 7A(1) says patents registered under the Act, other than those kept secret in the national interest, are published there by the Department.

The word "bulletin" never appears in the Act. The Industrial Property Bulletin that our register search indexes carries trade marks, and a mark listed there is a published mark rather than a confirmed registration.

A page promising your patent a bulletin entry has confused two rights. Our application number lookup searches published trade mark entries only.

How long is the objection window?

Sec. 7A(3) gives 35 days, and the trap is where they start. They run from the date of seeing or copying the patent under Sec. 7A(2), not from the date of publication itself.

Designs and trade marks differ. Sec. 21A(2) runs 35 days from publication, and for trade marks the practical opposition period at the Department is 90 days from bulletin publication.

If you need to challenge someone else's filing, or defend your own, our opposition and enforcement team can look at the dates before the window closes.

How long does the protection last?

Sec. 8(1) gives seven years from the date of registration, which is the date on the registration certificate issued under Sec. 7. Renewal runs through Sec. 23B, which asks for the application within 35 days of expiry, with a six-month late window on payment of a fine.

The renewal term for a patent is another seven years, and Sec. 23B(3) allows not more than two renewals, so 21 years is the ceiling for a Nepali patent.

A trade mark is the outlier: the same subsection lets it be renewed any number of times. That difference often decides which right a founder secures first.

What does the Act not tell you about timing?

How long the Department will take. There is no examination deadline anywhere in the patent chapter, and the only period stated in it is the 35 days in Sec. 7A(3).

So a firm month figure for a Nepali patent describes somebody's experience, not a rule. We publish timing figures for trade marks, where we hold our own bulletin data, and not for patents.

Ask us what a case like yours has recently taken, through our patent registration service, rather than trusting a printed number.

Common mistakes

• Calling the product innovative without naming the technical difference in one sentence.
• Launching first. Nepal is first-to-file, and a public demonstration is hard to undo.
• Quoting an inventive-step test. The Act does not contain one, so do not argue as if it does.
• Expecting bulletin publication. Registered patents go to the Nepal Gazette instead.
• Copying a foreign specification that describes a different version of the product.
• Filing a patent for appearance alone, or a design for a working mechanism.
• Forgetting Sec. 10. The National Archive deposit is a real obligation, not a formality.

A worked example

This is an illustration, not a real case. A Pokhara engineer builds a gravity-fed water purifier for hillside homes, with a blue casing, a memorable name and a new sediment-control chamber.

Three questions follow. Is the chamber and valve sequence new and useful; is the casing distinctive enough for a design filing; is the name free as a trade mark.

Only the first is a patent question. The second belongs with our note on protecting product packaging and design, and the third with what a trade mark actually is.

She files before the trade fair, not after. That ordering is the only part of her plan she cannot fix later.

Who counts as the inventor?

Sec. 6(1)(b) refuses a patent where the applicant is neither the inventor nor someone who acquired rights from the original inventor. So the chain of title matters as much as the technology.

Record contributions as you go, and put assignments in writing where a contractor or supplier did part of the work. Reconstructing that history after a dispute is far harder.

The harder modern version of the question is covered in our piece on whether an AI can be named as an inventor.

In short

A product is patentable in Nepal when the invention inside it is new and useful to the general public, and when none of the four refusal grounds in Sec. 6 applies. That is the entire statutory test.

Everything else is preparation: name the difference, search, keep quiet, pick the right mix of rights, and file before you show it. Our registration checklist sets the rest out in order.

If you are unsure which category your product falls into, read what intellectual property law in Nepal covers first, or check the Department's own current requirements on its website.

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Tell us what your product does and which part of it is new, and our team can tell you which filing to start with.