Castro & Pal

Significant changes to the IP laws of Costa Rica went into effect on April 28, 2008.  These changes were enacted mostly to make Costa Rica compliant with CAFTA (the Central American Free Trade Agreement), of which Costa Rica was the last member state to ratify such Agreement.

Major changes to the patent laws include the enactment of laws and procedures to protect data used by the pharmaceutical and agrochemical industries when seeking marketing approval of newly developed products before the Ministry of Health and increases to the patent user fees, including a sharp rise in the filing fee and the establishment of an issue fee and annuities (i.e., annual maintenance fees).

Also notable is a law, which establishes that the 20-year term of any issued patent, filed as a PCT National Phase application, after the enactment date of the new patent laws, will be calculated from the date of filing of the PCT International application and not from any priority application of said PCT application, regardless if the priority application was an actual application for patent or as a provisional application as allowed under jurisdictions such as the US, Japan and the United Kingdom.  Original applications filed in Costa Rica will of course be calculated for the date of filing and applications filed directly under the Paris Convention will be calculated from the date of the earliest Paris priority application.

Changes to the Trademark laws also went into effect on April 28, 2008.  Notable under these new laws is the recognition of geographically descriptive marks and more flexible rules towards the Power of Attorney.For more information about all the changes to the IP laws of Costa Rica, we encourage anyone to call our office and speak to one of our IP attorneys or write to us at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it   All of our IP professionals are fluent in both English and Spanish.