January 2009
On 1 January 2009, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia became the 35th member state of the European Patent Organisation.
Any European patent application filed on or after 1 January 2009 may designate this country.
The list of EPO member states, which includes all 27 member states of the European Union, is now:
Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Turkey and the United Kingdom. A European patent can also be extended to Albania, Bosnia & Herzegovina and Serbia.
A full list of the PCT member states can be accessed from the links page of this site.
A European patent can now provide protection in a total of 38 countries – a market of about 570 million people.