The PCT: One Patent Application, Worldwide

The Patent Cooperation Treaty lets one application start the patent process in many countries at once. It grants nothing anywhere. And Nepal is not a member, so a Nepali applicant cannot file one and cannot name Nepal in one. A different plan is needed.

Key takeaways

• The PCT is a filing and searching system run by WIPO. There is no such thing as an international patent.
• WIPO's own treaty table, status 19 May 2026, lists 159 contracting states. Nepal is not one of them.
• Article 9(1) allows a filing by any resident or national of a contracting state. A Nepali applicant is neither.
• Where there are several applicants, only one needs to qualify, so a joint filing can open the route.
• The realistic Nepali path is a Paris Convention priority claim and direct national filings.
• Paris gives twelve months for patents from the first filing, not the thirty a PCT applicant enjoys.
• Nepal protection always means a direct application at the Department of Industry under the 1965 Act.

What does the PCT actually do?

It lets you file one application, in one language, at one office, and have that filing count as a filing in every contracting state at once.

An international searching authority then produces a search report and a written opinion on whether your claims look new and inventive.

That is the real product: time to think, and an expert opinion before you commit to filing country by country.

What does it not do?

It does not grant anything. In WIPO's own words, patents can only be granted by each of the national offices in the national phase.

It does not protect you while it runs. An international application is a queue ticket, not a right you can enforce against a copier.

And it does not reach a country that has not joined. That is the part that matters here.

Is Nepal a PCT contracting state?

No. We checked the treaty's own depositary table published by WIPO, marked "Status on May 19, 2026" and listing a total of 159 states.

Nepal does not appear anywhere in it. India, China and Sri Lanka do, with their accession dates printed beside them.

That table is republished as states join, so treat this as accurate at our last check rather than as a permanent fact. Nothing in it records any Nepali step towards joining.

Who is allowed to file an international application?

Article 9(1) of the treaty is one sentence: "Any resident or national of a Contracting State may file an international application."

A person who is only a resident and national of Nepal satisfies neither limb, because Nepal is not a contracting state.

There is also no receiving office in Nepal, so there is no counter in Kathmandu that could take the papers even if the rule allowed it.

So can a Nepali inventor ever use the PCT?

Only through a real connection to a member country, never by being Nepali. Three situations come up in practice.

You may be a national or resident of a contracting state as well, which many people with family or study history abroad are.

You may have a genuine business establishment in a member country that is the applicant, rather than you personally.

Or there may be several applicants, and WIPO states plainly that only one of them needs to meet the requirement. A co-inventor or partner abroad can therefore carry the filing.

All three turn on facts a foreign patent attorney must check before the first filing, not afterwards.

Which of Nepal's neighbours have joined?

The split across South Asia is sharp, and it explains why advice written in Delhi does not transfer.

India is also one of the offices appointed to carry out international searches, which is why Indian firms discuss the PCT as routine work.

What does a Nepali applicant do instead?

Use the Paris Convention, which Nepal has been party to since 2001. It does something narrower than the PCT but it is genuinely available.

Article 4C(1) gives twelve months from your first filing. File anywhere in the union, and later filings in other union countries keep that first date.

So the shape of the plan is: one first filing, twelve months of work, then direct applications in each country that matters. Our guide to filing patents abroad from Nepal goes through the options.

How does the twelve-month window differ from thirty?

It is the same idea with far less room. A PCT applicant decides countries at around 30 months from priority, and 31 at a few offices; a Paris applicant decides at 12.

That means the search and the commercial judgement have to happen early, because there is no international search report arriving to help.

Run your own prior-art search before the first filing rather than after. Our patent search guide covers the free databases.

What is the order of operations?

Decide the first filing before anything is shown publicly. Everything after that follows from the date it fixes.

1. Settle ownership. Name the inventors and the applicant, and record any assignment in writing.
2. Search. Find the closest earlier documents while the claims can still be changed cheaply.
3. Draft properly. A thin first filing cannot support the claims you want a year later.
4. File first, in the right place. Nepal if Nepal is the main market; a member state if the PCT route is open.
5. Diarise twelve months. Put the Paris deadline in a calendar that somebody other than the founder reads.
6. Choose the countries. Pick markets where you will actually sell or licence, not a wish list.
7. File each one directly. Appoint local agents and prepare certified priority documents.
8. File Nepal at the DoI. This step never disappears, whichever international route you use.

What does the Nepal filing itself involve?

An application under Sec. 4 of the Patent, Design and Trade Mark Act 1965, with drawings and particulars, submitted to the Department of Industry.

The DoI investigates under Sec. 5 whether the invention is new and useful to the general public, then issues a registration certificate under Sec. 7 or refuses it under Sec. 6.

A registered patent is then published in the Nepal Gazette under Sec. 7A, and an objection may be filed within 35 days of inspecting it.

A foreign applicant acts through a Nepali agent appointed by a notarised power of attorney, and a priority claim needs a certified copy of the earlier filing.

The statutory text is published by the Nepal Law Commission. Our patent application process guide sets out the documents stage by stage.

Can you designate Nepal in a PCT application?

No. Designation only reaches contracting states, so there is no box for Nepal and no Nepali national phase to enter later.

Nor can a Nepali application be converted into an international one. The first filing must already be at a competent receiving office.

If somebody tells you their PCT application "covers Nepal", they have misunderstood the system. How patent protection works explains why rights stop at borders.

What if somebody else files the same idea first?

Then they are ahead of you, and how long you had been working on it does not help. Nepal is first-to-file, like most systems.

A priority date is the only thing that settles a race, which is why the first filing should come before any demonstration or pitch.

A notebook, a prototype or a company registration is evidence of development. None of them is an application.

Does a PCT publication cause problems in Nepal?

It can, and this is the trap people miss. International applications are published at around 18 months from the priority date.

That publication is a public technical disclosure anywhere in the world, including here. It becomes prior art against a later Nepali application for the same invention.

So a Nepal filing should be made inside the Paris year, not dropped in after the international application has appeared. See what can be patented in Nepal for the novelty rule this depends on.

What does "patent pending" actually mean?

It means an application has been filed and not yet decided. It is a commercial signal, and one of the most misunderstood phrases in the whole system.

A pending application gives you a date. It does not give you anything to enforce, so a competitor copying you during that period cannot be stopped on the strength of it.

Do not describe a pending application as a granted patent in marketing. That is a claim about a right you do not yet hold, and customers and competitors can check.

Does the same apply to designs and trademarks?

Yes, and this is the wider pattern. We checked WIPO's tables for the other two systems on the same day: the Madrid tables, status 8 July 2026, and the Hague table, status 14 July 2026. Nepal appears in neither.

So there is no international shortcut for a Nepali brand or a Nepali product design either. Each right is a direct filing at the DoI.

The Paris priority period is shorter for those: six months, not twelve. Our guides to design applications and trademark applications cover each process.

How long does Nepal protection last once granted?

Seven years from the date of registration under Sec. 8, renewable twice in further seven-year terms.

That is shorter than the twenty-year norm most international material assumes, so a plan copied from a foreign template will have the wrong dates in it.

The free renewal calculator works the dates out, and our renewal guide explains the windows.

Is the PCT the right question for most Nepali businesses?

Usually not. The Economic Survey 2082/83 records about 90 patents in total on Nepal's register, cumulative to Falgun 2082.

Most inventions here have a domestic market, and for those the international machinery is an expensive distraction from one good national filing.

The figures are in our note on Nepal's patent statistics, and patents against utility models is often the more useful comparison.

Common mistakes

• Treating the PCT as a worldwide patent. It grants nothing, anywhere, ever.
• Assuming a Nepali passport is enough. Eligibility runs through a contracting state, not through the invention.
• Leaving Nepal off the calendar. The DoI filing is separate and easy to forget once foreign work starts.
• Disclosing before the first filing. A launch, a pitch or a trade fair can defeat novelty in every country at once.
• Filing a thin provisional. Later claims must be supported by what the first application actually described.
• Reading a foreign guide as local law. Terms, deadlines and refusal grounds all differ. What cannot be patented here is not the same list as elsewhere.

A worked example

This is an illustration, not a real case. A Lalitpur workshop develops a cold-store door seal that cuts ice build-up, and expects to sell in Nepal and India.

No founder holds foreign nationality or residence, and there is no overseas company, so the PCT is closed to them.

They file at the DoI first, which fixes the priority date, then use the Paris year to search, test and decide on India.

At month ten their Indian agent files directly, claiming the Nepali date. Two national applications, one priority date, no international phase at all.

In short

The PCT is a good system that Nepal is outside. It cannot be filed from here, it cannot name Nepal, and its publication can hurt a late Nepali filing.

The available tool is the Paris Convention's twelve-month priority, used deliberately: search early, draft properly, file first, then decide markets inside the year.

Start with our guide to registering a patent in Nepal and the free tools. When the drafting matters, our patent team prepares the specification and files at the DoI.

People also search for

• What affects the cost of a patent in Nepal
• A plain-English glossary of IP terms
• Industrial design or patent: which one fits?
• Trademark, copyright, patent or design?
• Patent infringement and enforcement in Nepal

Treaty membership changes, and eligibility turns on facts only a foreign attorney can confirm. If you are weighing an international filing plan, tell us your markets and we will map the route.