navigating the patent maze

IP Australia is undertaking to provide a patent data search facility that will eventually provide online access to all Australia patent data. (announcement)  Anyone who has tried to obtain Australian patents or search for patents becomes stone-walled by the paucity of data available.  Unfortunately, IP Australia has maintained patent data in a variety of systems and formats, including on microfiche for patent documents pre-1998.  The diagram illustrates the various systems.  View diagram

Looking forward in 2007, IP Australia plans to

• provide access to bulk patent bibliographic and status data with weekly updates;
• scan patent specification for ultimate production of searchable documents;
• set up a single access point for searching patent bibliographic and status data (currently access occurs through a web-based site for some data and a mainframe connection for other data).