First impressions Pre-Exam 2015?
To all who sat the Pre-Exam 2015:
What are your first impressions? Any general or specific comments?
Were the topics well balanced?
Was the Pre-Exam more difficult than in 2012, 2013 and 2014?
Were the Legal Questions difficult?
Were the Claims Analysis Questions difficult?
How many marks do you expect to have scored for the legal part, the claims analysis part and in total?
What is your expectation of the pass rate and the average score?
Was your preparation adequate?
We look forward to your comments!
Please do not post your comments anonymously - it is allowed, but it makes responding more difficult and rather clumsy ("Dear Mr/Mrs/Ms Anonymous of 27-02-2015 02:13 am"), whereas using your real name or a pseudonym is more personal, more interesting and makes a more attractive conversation.
You are invited to post your comments as to first and general impressions to the Pre-Exam as a whole to this blog as well as to any first and general impressions about the two parts (Legal; Claims Analysis) to this blog. Please post your comments as to specific questions and elements of (y)our answers to the respective blogs where we provide our (provisional) answers:
- Our (provisional) answers to the Legal Part of Pre-Exam 2015, and
- Our (provisional) answers to the Claims Analysis Part of Pre-Exam 2015
Comments are welcome in any official EPO language, not just English. So, comments in German and French are also very welcome!
Copies of the Pre-Exam 2015 paper in each of the three languages are available here (linked to the EQE Compendium website): English, French, German: enjoy!!!
And hope to see all of you in one of our main exam courses: for more information (details of the courses, provisional dates, locations throughout Europe, and for paper C and D also German and French language courses for EQE 2016 preparation) refer to our Training page with links to the various courses that we provide, and feel free to contact Mieke Zonjee, our course coordinator for additional information at TRAINING -at- deltapatents -dot- com.
The DeltaPatents EQE training team
SHARE:
I think the legal questions this year were much harder and where in some cases on parts not covered by earlier pre-exams, i.e. authorizations and signatures.
ReplyDeleteI agree. Also, I was surprised to see that the legal part started with the most difficult legal question - this may have made some candidates worried about the rest of the exam... Was that indeed the effect on some of you?
DeleteWe will discuss the various topics in details as the paralle blog "Our (provisional) answers to the legal part of Pre-Exam 2015"
I agree. I skipped the first question after 15-20 min and answered after question 20.
DeleteCorrectly. Yeah :-)
Very wise choice!
DeleteAdministrative fee in q1 halted me for too long. Couldn't find it anywhere... No wonder as it is abolished :)
ReplyDeleteClaim analysis part: A lot more reading compared to previous pre-exams.
Our methodology courses may get you the fun back in legal reasoning! ;-)
DeleteDates and locations will be announced on our website in March.
I found both parts more difficult than the past papers.
ReplyDeleteThe claim analysis questions relating to inventive step and problem solution in particular had less information in the question than usual... And what about all those claims there were no questions about?
All claims are used:
DeleteEach of the claims of Claim Set I (page 19) is used in one or more statements of questions 13-16.
Each of the claims of Claim Set II (page 27) is used in one or more statements of questions 17-20 - the use of claim II.6 is in question 20, feature c).
Hi Roel,
DeleteDid you see that statement 19.4 does not relate to any specific claim!? Only to Claim Set II as a whole (page 27, 1st line).
Although I think no candidate considered it not to relate to claim II.2, as 19.1-19.3 all relate to claim II.2.
When will the preliminary answers from Delta-patent be available? Legal part was a bit confusing. It took me much longer than while trying solving older pre-exams. Claim Analysis was also a bit tricky.
ReplyDeletea.s.a.p.
DeleteThe relative term "a.s.a.p." has no well-recognized meaning and leaves the reader in doubt as to the time frame to which it refers, thereby rendering the waiting for the results more difficult (Article 84 :-).
Delete
DeleteRoel van Woudenberg23 February 2015 at 19:57
Provisional answers available NOW - see http://pre-exam.blogspot.nl/2015/02/our-provisional-answers-to-legal-part.html.
Will be reviewed tomorrow morning for legal correctness and typos. And will be supplemented tomorrow morning with legal basis / Guidelines references.
Claims analysis answers now available!
DeleteFor the claim analysis, I thought the cardboard/paperboard situation was ridiculous.
ReplyDeleteOne document citing something like: "the material contains cardboard. The cardboard contains wood fibres." The next stating "the material contans fibres and can be, for example, cardboard"
What am I to make this in an exam situation, dear EPO? Did they mean to define some species-genus situation? Was the first document meant to define some general knowledge such as: if it is cardboard, it contains wood fibres? It is pretty frustrating if you are forced to speculate.
I agree. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to deal with this. In particular since this influenced the answer to several questions...
DeleteAgree also. Quite ridiculous. D1's says "the cardboard comprises would fibers" i.e. the cardboard of D1, not all cardboard. But can you really fault someone for making the leap that cardboard requires paper based materials? Perhaps cardboard in the field of fire doors means comprising wood fibers. Either way, this is far too much speculation that does not seem to test the subject matter. And to have 3 questions (iirc) which were all based on this distinction?
DeletePCT is back!
ReplyDeleteIndeed! Does that mean you have a copy of the paper already? I notice you guys were real fast in posting your answers last year!
DeleteYes - see link in the blog post itself (updated with a link to WeTransfer for the time being).
DeleteThe format of the EQE calenders has changed!
ReplyDeleteBut still, calendar op top half and EPO closure days per EPO filing office on bottom half of the page.
The change in format for the calendars was a bit annoying, not a hindrance to finding the relevant information but nevertheless an additional change. Was the new format announced before the exam?
DeleteYou did not really need the calendars that much. I did not find it too unsettling. I don't think it was announced before.
DeleteWe were not aware of any announcement. But, as Charlie indicated, the change was not radical at all - however, some candidates were a bit confused...
DeleteLet's hope the people sitting paper D tomorrow read this Pre-Exam blog still this evening so they know in advance!
(... well, maybe better they relax and get energized for tomorrow's paper D with a good night sleep!)
for the cardboard I had to read all three languages to make a decision. I concluded paper is made of wood and implicitly contains wood fibres. I am wondering if I was correct!?
ReplyDeleteI think the claim analysis questions were pretty hard. It seemed many of the answers were of the kind of "true, if..." and then you had to interpreted something from one document. And the claims you had to judge about were generalized compared to the application disclosure. And you had to speculate, which part of the general disclosure carries over to this part or does not?
ReplyDeleteI had a huge problem with the fact that the application said the side edges are stepped and the claims always only mentioned one side is stepped. But the next sentences only talk about the step. Now is this a valid disclosure for only one stepped side or not. You have to speculate
Hi Alexander,
DeleteDid you consider it important? If so, for which statement(s) and why?
it's worth noting that they also indluced a question on rule 6(3) which was revised only a couple of month ago. I did have the fgeeling that such recent law changes were much considered in the past exams
ReplyDeleteI am sorry - any person that did study well would (or as least should, certainly not only could) have know about all the changes in 2014!
DeleteIf not by yourself, then any (good) tutor will have informed their candidates about the changes, and about the certainty that some of the (many many) changes in 2014 would be tested.
The change was already announced in the OJ EPO of January 2014, and addressed in further notices as well as an extensive FAQ on the EPO website.
Our Q&A book "Basic Legal Questions for Pre-Exam and Paper D" was published in May 2014, and included all legal changes of 2014 already - and where not, the update on our website supplemented the book with later law changes. Also, in our Basic Legal and Pre-Exam legal courses, we expressly drew the attention to the changes. I am sure that coruses from other supplies must also have done so!
The Guidelines were also published reasonably in advance, and the EPO made a webpage available indicating which paragraphs had all changed.
So you had ample opportunity and time to become aware, study and know it.
Dont worry, I had the Delta Patents legal Question book with me and actually scanned through the Opposition-Answers in the exam until I found the right answer...sorry if the Nickname gave a wrong impression ;)
DeleteThx Mr "Studying with the Right Material is needed to Prepare You" ;-)
DeleteI come to a different answer in Q3.3 based on the Euro-PCT Guide, paragraph 292. It took me quite some time to figure it out! I hope it was worth the effort, otherwise your brings me down from 48 to 46 points (A veeery stupid mistake in Q3.1 costed me another two points.)
ReplyDeleteq3.3: you did not pay attention that the epo is the same as the ISA! it would have been T if the ISA is different from the office for national phase
DeleteTom, you are right! I paid attention to Rule 45bis.1 d), but I overlooked Rule 45bis9. b) That's the hard way to learn...
DeleteHi Manuel,
DeleteIf this is the only error (next to going wrong with 3.1) you made in the legal part, I would not worry!
By the way, what was what you called the veeery stupid mistake in 3.1?
Q1.3: I was sure 100 it was True. I checked the answer in Visser book befor writing the answer down.
ReplyDeleteI was surprised to see you gave it a False, till I read the question again and noticed that:
Q1.2: "...need a signed authorization...", and
Q1.3: "... need NOT a signed authorization..."
also two points lost just like that :-(
I am still pretty sure that the right answer to Q1.3 is True, as the supplementary publication to the Official Journal 1/2014 reads as follows: " (2) If the European Patent Office is
Deleteinformed of a change of representative
involving professional representatives
who are not members of the same
association, without
being notified that
the previous representative's
authorisation has terminated, the new
representative must file, together with
the notification of
his appointment, an
individual authori
sation (original and
one copy) or a reference to a general
authorisation already on file. If he does
not, he shall be requested to do so
within a period to be specified by the
European Patent Office. If the
European Patent Office is informed
before the end of the specified period
that the previous representative's
authorisation has terminated, such
request may be disregarded. "
Hi RIS,
DeletePlease be more specific as to WHY you conclude True from this long legal provision.
For me as for my colleagues this year examination were more difficult than past papaers. I think they are trying to preselect candidates for next year main exam. But the problem is that a lot of the questions are not clear at all, means there will be a lot issues to be discussed about.
ReplyDeleteDear anynomous of ous23 February 2015 at 23:28,
DeletePlease use a (nick) name to facilitate communication...
Which questions did you particularly find "not clear at all"? (And in which language version)
Regards, Roel
I fully agree with you, very unclear questions which is a bit of a failure for EPO from my point of view!
ReplyDeleteHi Caroline,
DeletePlease be more specific as to what you considered very unclear.
Although the Pre-Exam can only be answered with True-False per statement, a statement on the blog is not so valuable if not supported by any arguments and/or not specific...
I believe it was more tricky than I expected! I didn't find all the answers in Hoekstra etc. books and I didn't have one minute to go throw my answers and the questions I didn't know the answers of immediately!
ReplyDeleteHowever, there was a question about SISA and THAT I knew because of you Roel!! Thank you!
My opinion is that EPO really tried to find questions outside the areas they have been asked in the past years! And the application and prior art had a LOT of information to read. I am a little disappointed of the level of the exam, of course EPO should test the candidates of the law and claim analysis, but compared to previous years I think EPO complicated it too much for an attorney with 2 years of experience…
Totally agree. I realize that the main idea of the pre-exam is to get candidates to start studying earlier for the D-part. Yet, the level of the exam (and time reserved for it) should be in balance.
DeleteChange compared to the previous ones was just too big. EPO got me by surprise.
Well, did you know what the pass rates were of the earlier pre-exams?...
DeleteAny person could have expected it to become more difficult!!!! If not to serve the purpose of requiring candidates to study early, then at least for justifying that the Pre-Exam exists!
Dickens
Hi Dickens,
DeleteYes and no.
I agree that it was more difficult than the first three of 2012-2014, which were of similar level.
However, the Exam Committee indicated that they were happy with the level of difficulty and expressed that they did not have the intention to make the Pre-Exam more difficult.
The Tutor's Report (EQE2013) in epi information indicates: "EC: the difficulty level and the 0/0/1/3/5 marking scheme in 2014 will be the same as in 2013."
Also, the Tutor Report (EQE2013) in epi information 4/2014 indicates: "EC indicated that they are happy with the scores. Pass rate was 85%. Pass level will stay at 70 marks."
I found both the claims and legal questions much more difficult than expected. The claims especially had many new elements and the sheer quantity of information overwhelmed me, I struggled to read and contemplate it all, let alone answer some very vague questions. Sadly, I think this could be the year the pass rate drops.
ReplyDeleteThis Pre-Exam was in my view considerably more difficult than the first three of 2012-2014. Despite that, I consider it a very fair exam: poorly prepared candidates will probably have failed, as intended by the Pre-Exam system, whereas optimally prepared candidates will pass although challenged a bit more.
ReplyDeleteI was surprised, as my colleague tutors, amount the large amount of time limit calculations. Those are really easy marks to get (or at least, should be)!
I expect the pass rate to be in a range of 75 - 80%, and -hence- the fail rate to have doubled.
Overall I can only agree with the previous comments.
ReplyDeleteThe exam appeared to be more difficult than the previous ones and everyone I spoke to took longer than in practice (and as expected). I had all previous exams finished and double checked in about 2.5 h, yesterday I only finished after about 3 h and didn't have enough time to double check all the questions in the claim analysis part.
I would consider myself to have been well prepared but was taken aback by the exam and am not sure I passed. It'll all come down to the claim interpretation where a lot of times my answer was "grey" but I needed to make a decision between "white" and "black". Very frustrating overall, in particular the claim analysis part.
Let's hope you passed! We would appreciate if you indicate so once you have got your official results.
DeleteNB: If you finished after 3 hours, what did you do the 4th hour if you "didn't have enough time to double check all the questions in the claim analysis part"?
Hi Roel,
Deletein the last hour I started with double checking the legal questions, in particular checking the commentary and other materials for the questions where I was unsure. I also started to go through the claim analysis questions again but only got till question 14, then the remaining hour was up...
Aha, that explains ;-)
DeleteI am now working on the claims part, as does a colleague tutor -- lots of reading... And a surprisingly different structure with the long sets of claims on page 19 and 27... To be continued (on the claims analysis blog that we will start after lunch)
A lot of people comment on time management - I needed 4 hours and no time was left for going back. I think it's better to double check results right away and note the legal basis (or the relevant paragraph/claim) on the problem sheet (as in the D-part). In the end it seemed to work well.
DeleteI finished after 2 and 1/2 hours. On the first run I jotted down notes next to all the questions and some question marks where I had only checked in Visser and wanted to check in the Guidelines. However, I missed the holiday (May 25) and the double negative in one of the questions and found those mistakes in the second run. For me, this makes more sense because I was still too nervous in the beginning and I just knew that mistakes like that would happen. I also knew that it was very likely that I could go back and check. Moreover, since claim analysis is very unpredictable, I found it wise to proceed to that quickly so as not to underestimate time needed for the claim analysis. I managed to go through all questions again, but that took until 10 minutes (or 5, I'm not sure) before the end. I am also not a fan of taking too much time for a single sub-question if it's clear that it's unclear ;-) It's only a loss of 1 or 2 points (depending on how much you get wrong for that particular question).
DeleteI guess this strategy might not work for the main exam, though. What do you guys think?
I was glad that I started with the claims questions, although I got a bit worried when I got to the end of the first hour and was only at question 14. It took me a full 2 hours to do the claims section, and I still had some questions that I wanted to go back to. In the past papers/mocks I had not usually taken much more than an hour to do the claims section. I think partly I was slow because I was being very careful, but also due to the long sets of claims which required a lot of thinking and double checking to make sure that you had the right combination/dependency.
DeleteDear Anonymous of 24 February 2015 at 11:31 (do you have a name?),
DeleteI would recommend for the main exam's paper D that you initially skip the DI questions that you do not know or that would take you too much time to answer, and use the time "saved" to answer the DI questions that you can reasonably tackle and/or as additional time for the DII part and/or as check-correct-expand-your-answers time at the end of the 5h that you have available.
Rushing through in paper D does not work - you will miss many important hints. So, make sure you prepare will so that your legal knowledge is good (you need quite a step up from pre-exam level) so that you can answer at a good speed without making unneccessary errors -use our legal courses and Q&A books-, and that you practiced how to answer the paper and have a strategy as to time allocation and time management -enrol to our methodology courses-.
BR, Roel
@Roel: According to your results, I would have passed with 78 points.
DeleteBut, this remains to be seens, in particular in view of the uncertainties for some of the claim analysis questions... For now I can only wait and hope for my luck.
Imho, the amount of discussion and interpretation possible for some questions (in particular the claim analysis) and also that you guys are not certain about some of the answers point towards some ambiguous questions, which is unfortunate for a multiple choice test.
Hi Ela,
DeleteUnfortunately we cannot give guarantees, but you have 4 or more statements margin compared to our answer, so for you to fail, we must have at least 4 errors... But I will postpone my congratulations until the official answers are there! "Never sell the bear before you shot it", we say in Dutch (translated into En).
Comments are welcome in any official EPO language.
ReplyDeleteSo, comments in German and French are also very welcome!
As someone said earlier, I was confused that the independent claim seemed to be broader than the description (fibers vs. wood fibers). Since some of the claim combination to be examined regarding A123(2) were supported by the description, I really wasn't sure what to make of it. I also think that questions 18 to 20 had some statements that are debatable...
ReplyDeleteQuestions 1.3 and 9.1 were tough, as well. I didn't dwell on 1.3 after finding that Visser said something along the lines of "needs authorisation unless..." - at that point I decided not to spend any more time on the question since I felt that the question didn't contain enough information to be sure that the answer is correct. With question 9.1 I was entirely sure of my answer until I started reading the discussion on this blog on the definition of "Wissensstand". So probably I'm wrong because I considered only on a (as I now recognize) too shallow level, that with A83, other than inventive step, the application itself is taken into consideration, I didn't even check in the literature :-/ Question 10.2 was deliberately phrased so as to confuse the readers, that's unpleasant under examination conditions.
Please subscribe your comment with a name, instead of posting fully anynomous. We can then respond.
DeleteI do not agree that 10.2 was deliberately phrased to confuse. I see it rather as a successful attempt from the Exam Committee to get you to smile a bit during the period of stress.
DeleteMoreover, 10.2 is actually based on case law: T 798/93
hn 1. Article 99(1) EPC, which enables "any person" to institute opposition proceedings, establishes the presumption that the real opponent is the person who has lodged the opposition. The EPC and its attendant provisions make no stipulation as to the opponent's personal circumstances or motives for acting.
Requests that the opposition be declared inadmissible must therefore be refused if, as in the present case, they are based on objections regarding the opponent's personal circumstances, for example his profession (a professional representative before the EPO) or his field of technical expertise (different from that of the patent forming the subject of the opposition), or on objections concerning the opponent's motives for acting (statement by the opponent explaining that his only reason for acting was to supplement his professional training).
3. Admissibility of the opposition
3.1 It is accepted that the opponent is a professional representative before the EPO, and that he has followed this profession in the recent past, notably by filing several European patent applications.
3.1.1 In the present case, the appellant accuses the opponent of having filed an opposition without mentioning his occupation as referred to above and without appointing a professional representative to act on his behalf.
[...]
r. 3.1.6 By the same token, in the absence of any stipulation regarding an opponent's occupation, an opposition cannot be declared inadmissible purely because the opponent's technical training was in an area different from, or entirely removed from, the field to which the contested patent relates.
3.2 As explained in point 3.1 above, Article 99(1) EPC allows "any person" to institute opposition proceedings, and contains no stipulation as to an opponent's personal circumstances.
3.2.1 In addition to the fact that the EPC and its attendant provisions contain no stipulation as to the opponent's personal circumstances, the above-mentioned decision in T 635/88 also makes it clear that the opponent's interest in acting is not subject to any restriction. The opposition procedure was deliberately designed to be open and readily accessible, so that third parties - acting on their own behalf, and, above all, in the public interest - would be able to get a patent limited or revoked by a department of the EPO, via a procedure which offers the advantage of being centralised. The openness of the procedure also speeds up the handling of the case by relieving the Office of the complicated task of verifying the opponent's circumstances and motives for acting.
3.2.2 Contrary to the appellant's view, there is nothing to prevent a person from lodging an opposition with the sole purpose of supplementing his training in the relevant field, as would seem to have happened in the present case.
Dear Sir,
DeleteLike anonymous@11:30, I found the wording of question 10.2 quite troubling.
The question appeared, at first sight, not difficult in itself. The annotated EPC by Derk Visser actually mentions the decision T798/93 that you cited.
What I found confusing was the "resident in the EU" part. Why not simply writing "resident in an EPC contracting state" instead if such was the intent ?
Because of this, candidates may have been led to worry about possible issues regarding mandatory representation. Could there be EU states and/or overseas territories in which the EPC does not apply ? Are Aruba or Faroe Islands part of the EU ? I wasted valuable time checking the list in OJ 2014 A48 to make sure this was not some sort of elaborate trap.
Many of the legal questions - and in particular Q10 - were not that hard if you know the Visser by heart. It was just time consuming to verify all the answers. I wonder what level of stress the real paper D will produce...
DeleteHi Anonymous (please make yourself known with your name or use a nickname).
DeleteWhy were you confused that the independent claim seemed to be broader than the description? That is quite usual to get the client the broadest possible right by claiming in generic wording and describing one or more specific embodiment(s). Further, there is no room for any dependent claim if the independent claim would correspond to a/one complete embodiment and nothing less than that.
Art.123(2) does not apply when considering claims of the application as filed vs the description. It can be a problem under, in particular, Art. 83, Art.84, Art.56 or Art.57 when the claims are too broad - see GL (2014) F-III, 2; F-IV, 4.23; F-IV, 6.1; F-VII, 4.2, second but last paragraph,
I think that regarding preparation, in this case it was necessary to
ReplyDeletea) have a good overview over the topics and structure of the legal texts and your favorite legal comment or guidelines (particularly for the autorization question).
b) to have read just enough details to recognize when something was off to trigger looking it up rather than giving the expected answer.
I spent a lot of my preparation on fees, all kinds of deadlines, remedies, and very particular details on calculation of deadlines (e.g. staid proceedings, re-establishment) and felt way overprepared in that area. There were things that I neither knew nor found in my material, but I doubt that better preparation or bringing even more material would have changed that.
Hi, firstly thanks so much for giving us the preliminary answers.
ReplyDeleteMay I know, in order to stop refreshing the Website every few minutes, when will the preliminary answers for Claim analysis be posted ?
Thanks a lot.
If you subscribe to this blog using "Subscribe to: Post (Atom)" at the bottom of http://pre-exam.blogspot.nl/ , you can get new blog posts in your email.
DeleteIf, on a blog page, you subscribe to this blog using "Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)" shown at the bottom of the page, you can get all newly posted comments in your email.
I just dont get why they had to raise the level this year if they already raised the minimum number of points...it is not really fair compared to the previous exams...like this, only the re-sitters will be redistributed and I dont really think that this will reduce the costs of the exams or time which the EPO is spending on it. This just prolongates and increases the candidate flow through the eqe, imho.
ReplyDeleteAgreed.
DeleteWhile I passed all previous papers with 90 points in about 2 hours, I am not sure I will have passed this one. And I doubt that it is only the exam situation or nerves playing up...
I thought the aim was to force/encourage EQE candidates to be better prepared for the D part by starting earlier revising common materials. However, for this a well prepared candidate should be able to pass. I don't think this exam was set out to only fail candidates "only giving it a try", i.e. candidates that didn't studying much. On the contrary, from all comments above it seems that also candidates who have studied (and would have passed the previous years) might not pass this year around. This does not seem fair (it is suppose to be a PRE-exam after all), in particular since resitting will only be possible next year, i.e. you lose one year.
I for one would not know what else I could have done/prepared/read that would have prepared me better for this exam.
(FYI, I studied the guidelines, how to get a euro-pct patent, EPC, PCT, applicant's guide, Kley, old exams, EPI online training and quizzes, and met regularly with a study group)
I agree that it seems unfair and I'm also not happy about it (especially since I started working on April 1, so only by one month I missed the opportunity to take the earlier exam). However, the pre-exam hasn't been around for a long time and they are probably still figuring out a good way of testing more than just "look it up in a book"-skills and, at the same time, keep a reasonable easy level. It's probably particularly hard since they have to draw up a multiple choice test - I imagine that it is a bit more difficult to design.
DeleteOne more thing could have been to do at least the "selected questions" from our Q&A book "Basic Legal Questions for Pre-Exam and Paper D" (edition May 2014 for EQE2015 preparation)...
DeleteI think Martina is fully correct. The Exam Committee and Examination Board also indicated in the autumn meeting between the committees and the tutors that the Pre-Exam design is a work-in-progress. You shall not underestimate the enormous effort it takes to design these exams, and how well that has developed in only a few years: the 2014 version as well as this year's version showed how well it developed.
DeleteWe indicate that we consider 250 - 300 h study load as a realistic estimate for the required study load for Pre-Exam preparation to get to such a level that you are well on track for your main exam a year layer provided you expand your knowledge and ability to apply your legal knowledge to more complex cases via further study in that year.
DeleteA lower study effort may have gotten you through the Pre-Exam in 2012 and 2013 (with the pass level at 50) and already less easily for 2014 (when the pass level was raised to 70), but whether that would be enough to pass the main exam the year after is doubtful - see our earlier analysis on
http://pre-exam.blogspot.nl/2014/07/how-did-pre-exam-2013-do-at-main-exam.html
Q7.1:
ReplyDelete1. Present EP-C consists (not comprises!) of claims 1 to 3.
2. At least claim 1 of EP- C has no valid priority, see also Q7.2 and Q7.3.
3. Ergo present EP-C as a whole cannot claim priority from DE-C.
4. Thus Q7.1 is F!
7.1 does not state "can validly claim priority", but "can claim priority"... So it is True
DeletePlease post comments about specific questions on http://pre-exam.blogspot.nl/2015/02/our-provisional-answers-to-legal-part.html and USE A NAME, NOT JUST ANONYMOUS
Roel
I think you got this one wrong Anonymous as it was not the question whether EPC as a whole can validly claim priority from DE-C. The question was if it is possible at all to claim the priority of DE-C and this is the case.
DeleteWhen you sit the main exam's paper D next year, you need to be very careful in phrasing your argumentation on validity of priority. Most applications/ patents in the DII part have multiple claims, which usually have different priority dates and different prior art against it - explicitly and specifically discussing the (in-)validity of priority is key in DII.
DeleteWe address this in detail in our D Methodology courses, that we run from September to December at various locations in Europe, in English, -since a few years- German and -new for EQE2016 preparation- French!
Our provisional claims analysis answers are now also available on a separate blog thread!
ReplyDeletePlease post your comments relating to those to the separate blog.
When does the EPO generally publish the expected answers? The correct answers are fixed before the exam, right?
ReplyDeleteIn 2014, the results and the Examiner's report with the official answer became available last week of March and first week of April.
DeleteLast year, the official results letters were dated 28 March 2014, at least for the candidates that appealed in cases D3/14, D4/14 - I assume for all.
Delete~65 marks. I Would consider myself in a good position to start studying for D. Yet, I will not...
ReplyDeleteThis was the first and last eqe-exam for me. Thanks and good luck to all!
To That's it:
DeleteAs you can see on our analysis on http://pre-exam.blogspot.nl/2014/07/how-did-pre-exam-2013-do-at-main-exam.html, some Pre-Exam 2012 candidates that would have failed now (as they have a score between 50 and 70), passed paper D 2013 or at least got a compensable fail; and the same for Pre-Exam 2013 candidates sitting D 2014.
Despite this analysis, of which the figures were also submitted to the Meeting between the committees and the tutors, the pass level was kept 70.
See also the "Tutors’ report on the EQE 2014 papers" in epi Information 4/2014, available at http://www.patentepi.com/fileadmin/user_upload/download_area/epi_Information/EPI_Information_03-2014.pdf
Unfortunately, as long as you donot pass the Pre-Exam, you do not get an opportunity to pass paper D with the current two-staged EQE system.
@That's it: Are you a patent attorney trainee and give up now because of the exam or is the EQE for your job merely a bonus (patent attorney in a company, EPO examiner)?
DeleteAlso 65 points might nevertheless be enough. Delta Patents have indicated several times that their answers might not be correct and they "tend to say" T/F. The exam committee might therefore see some points different.
And if it is really tight (and you lost points at the "right" ambiguous questions, there is the option of appeal*
*I'm curious to see how many questions will be appealed
This may be a very speculative question, but would you assume that with 74 points with three (correct) answers on questions where you are not entirely sure I have a reasonable chance of passing?
Delete@curious: I'm also really curious regarding how many questions will be appealed. I'm pretty sure that the cardboard-questions will trigger appeals. Appeal fee is pretty high, though. I haven't really looked into this kind of appeal: Is it enough to convince them that the question was ambiguous and that both answers are to some extent reasonable? Is there any refund of the appeal fee?
DeleteLast year, 5 people having 68 or 69 points filed an appeal in view of statement 10.4, where the exam committee had an absolutely wrong answer according to the Displiplinary Board of Appeal - see decisions D2/14, D3/14,D4/14, D5/14, D 6/14 (only D3/13 in Engloish)- and the Board corrected their grade from FAIL to PASS axccordingly.
ReplyDeleteOne might well argue that this pre also had a major omission, in the sense that it should have been absolutely unambiguous whether cardboard must have wood fibers (but it lacked such clear definition as some people argued abovve) or whether wood-based cardboard is a specific type of cardboard (genus-species). C papers always have very explicit definitions where needed, or they define explicitly what is common general knowledge - which is a ncesssessary req to an EQE exam paper as the EQE Rules define that candidates can not bring any own knowledge.
So, let's see wwhat happens. In my view, the exam committee should not let it come to unnecessatry appeals - and would probably also not want it to come so far again (the Discipl Board was very harsh on them, saying that the exam board should have granted interloocatury revising and not have bothered the Discipl Board with such clear case of them being wrong and the candidates being right.
To prevent candiddates worrying whether to appeal or not it would be praised of the exam committee makes their position clear in the examiners answer so that it is directely clear whether appealling is needed. If you need to appeal you need to be careful that you do not have 2 months but only 1 month after notification of your results: Art.108 does not apply, but the REE and IPREE which have their own appeal procedure.
I am curious -as well as you Courious 2- to see what happens!
Wil
Has anyone received their official results letter? I understand they were dispatched on 27th March, but mine is nowhere to be seen.
ReplyDeleteAnxious