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Version 1.0
Editorial note
by the International Bureau published in December 1995
Titles of inventions in patent documents form a useful secondary source of information, provided that they are reasonably informative. They are as a rule printed on the first page of patent documents and normally also included in the entries in Official Gazettes.
Titles of inventions convey to the user of patent documents a first impression of the main content of the invention.
In order to give guidance for making titles of inventions as informative as possible, WIPO elaborated “Guidelines for the Wording of Titles of Inventions in Patent Documents”.
Titles of inventions are of considerable importance to users who are desirous of keeping abreast of patented developments in a particular art and who rely for that purpose on the titles listed in Official Gazettes. The informative value of the titles may also be very useful in Industrial Property Offices for indexing or preliminary classifying purposes.
The Guidelines for the wording of titles of inventions in patent documents and in announcements concerning published patent documents in Official Gazettes contain general indications on how titles of inventions could be made as useful as possible to readers. They have been prepared to provide guidance for Industrial Property Offices contemplating the establishment of rules in this respect.
The Guidelines are especially intended for applicants since the applicant is in general responsible for the first wording of the title of his purported invention.
The title of the invention should be meaningful.
The title should clearly, concisely and as specifically as possible indicate the subject to which the invention relates.
If the patent document contains claims in different categories (product, process, apparatus, use), this should be evident from the title.
The word “patent”, personal names, fancy names, trade names, trademarks or abbreviations or terms such as “etc.” which do not serve to identify the invention should not be used in the title.
Attention is drawn to the fact that several industrial property offices publish the title of an invention or give access to it by way of their public registers before the actual application itself is published. If that is the case, the said industrial property offices may choose not to apply these Guidelines for this kind of title.
When wording titles of inventions, it should be borne in mind that the title belongs to the bibliographic data, which in many cases will be transferred onto a machine‑readable data carrier. The title should therefore preferably only contain characters and signs which can be read and printed by computer.
A collection of good examples, based on titles appearing in Official Gazettes, to illustrate the principles stated in the guidelines and of non‑informative examples, not acceptable according to the guidelines, is appended hereto.
| Example N° | Good examples to illustrate the principles stated in the Guidelines | Non‑informative examples, not acceptable according to the Guidelines | Relevant paragraphs of the Guidelines for the rejection of the not acceptable examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Indwelling vein catheter assemblies | Medical assemblies | 4, 5 |
| 2 | Stuffed bendable dolls | Improvements in or relating to toys | 4 |
| 3 | Metal cold‑forming process and lubricant composition therefor | Metal forming | 4, 6 |
| 4 | Pressure intensifier unit for vehicle braking system | Pressure intensifier unit for the braking system of motor cars, lorries, etc. | 7 |
| 5 | Water‑insoluble monoazo pyridine dyes | Dyes | 4 |
| 6 | Process for preparing cyclohexanediones – (1,3) | Chemical process | 4, 6 |
| 7 | Process for coloring acrylic fibers | Treating fibers | 4, 6 |
| 8 | Needle bed for flat knitting machines | Knitting | 4, 5 |
| 9 | Method of removing tar sands from subterranean formations using wetting techniques | Mineral extraction | 4, 5, 6 |
| 10 | Gas storage well safety‑valve apparatus | Apparatus more specifically designed to improve safety valve devices when used in affording protection against leakage of gas when stored in a well | 5, 6 |
| 11 | Outlet diffusor for centrifugal compressors | Arrangements giving improvements in compressors | 5 |
| 12 | Method and apparatus for making artificial snow | The invention of “Arcticficial” | 7 |
| 13 | Ultrasonic apparatus for testing welds | Apparatus in which ultra‑sonic waves are used to assess the correct joining of components by welding | 4, 5 |
| 14 | Pilot operated mud‑pulse valves | Valves | 4 |
| 15 | Spacer damper for overhead power transmission line | Line spacer | 4 |
| 16 | Connecting devices for co‑axial cables | Cable connectors | 4, 5 |
[End of Standard]