Attorney LE Quang Vinh, Founding Partner – Bross & Partners

Following Vietnam’s 2025 IP reforms, patent applicants face three mechanisms with materially different effects. PPH gives priority treatment but no statutory examination deadline. A qualifying Form No. 12 request requires VNIPO to issue a substantive examination result within eight months. The legislation also creates a three-month Form No. 13 track for a narrow class of strategic or emergency inventions, although the dedicated expedited-examination fee is not yet stated in the current MOF tariff. None guarantees grant or displaces Vietnamese patentability standards.

A patent family is the map, not a fourth route. It identifies the relevant application relationship and possible foreign work product, but does not accelerate examination by itself. This article gives patent applicants and foreign counsel a practical framework for testing eligibility, identifying implementation gaps and choosing the appropriate mechanism by timing, claim alignment and the available foreign result.

1. The legal map from 1 April 2026

For patent applications governed by the new timetable, ordinary substantive examination is 12 months rather than 18 months. The transitional rule matters: the 12-month period also applies to earlier-filed applications published on or after 1 April 2026, while earlier applications published before that date generally remain governed by the law in force when filed. Article 119.2a IP Law adds a three-month examination period for eligible applications. Neither period is a promise of grant.

2. PPH: bilateral priority treatment, not Article 119.2a examination

Vietnam currently operates bilateral PPH pilots with the Japan Patent Office (JPO) and Korea’s Ministry of Intellectual Property (MOIP; the bilateral materials retain the name KIPO-IPVN). Phase 4 of the JPO-VNIPO programme runs from 1 April 2025 to 31 March 2028. VNIPO accepts up to 200 requests per programme year, with no more than 100 during the first half. The fourth KIPO-IPVN phase runs from 1 June 2025 to 31 May 2028, with a limit of 100 requests per year in Vietnam.

PPH was not created by Article 119.2a IP Law. It operates under bilateral pilot arrangements and their procedural guidelines, while the final assessment remains governed by Vietnamese substantive law. A request generally has to satisfy all of the following:

1. Eligible application relationship: the Vietnamese and JPO/KIPO applications must fall within a priority, PCT or divisional relationship recognised by the applicable Guideline. A commercial database’s “extended family” label is not enough.
2. Positive work product: at least one claim in the corresponding application must be expressly identified by JPO/KIPO as allowable or patentable. A final grant is not required.
3. Claim correspondence: every claim pending in Vietnam must sufficiently correspond to an allowable claim. Vietnamese claims may be of the same or similar scope, or narrower where the added limitation is supported; a different claim category or broader scope will normally fail.
4. Correct timing: substantive examination must have been requested, but VNIPO must not yet have begun substantive examination when the PPH request is filed.
5. Complete documents: the request form; relevant office actions and allowable claims with the required translations; a claim-correspondence table; and cited non-patent literature. Patent documents are generally supplied only if VNIPO cannot obtain them or requests them.

Acceptance assigns the application priority treatment; it does not import the JPO or KIPO conclusion into Vietnamese law. VNIPO may conduct an additional search, apply Vietnam-specific requirements on disclosure, clarity, unity, novelty and inventive step, require amendments or refuse the application. PPH has no examination service level in the IP Law. Because both programmes are quota-based, availability should be checked immediately before filing.

ASPEC sits outside this three-way comparison. It is an ASEAN regional work-sharing programme under which a participating office may use another ASEAN office’s search and examination results. Like PPH, it does not bind VNIPO; unlike Form No. 12 or Form No. 13, it creates no statutory eight- or three-month deadline. It may still be relevant where a favourable ASEAN result exists, but its separate eligibility and filing mechanics warrant separate treatment.

3. Foreign examination results under Article 24: the family is the map, not the mechanism

A patent family groups applications linked by priority or a common PCT filing. It is useful for reconstructing prosecution history and identifying foreign work product, but Vietnamese law recognises no procedure called ‘granting based on a patent family’. Article 114.3 IP Law permits VNIPO to use a foreign office’s substantive examination result for an application relating to the same invention. Article 24 Circular 10 then provides two materially different forms of reliance.

Level one: reference during ordinary examination

Under Article 24.1 and 24.2 Circular 10, VNIPO may refer to search reports, examination reports or office actions, patent publications and granted patents for a corresponding foreign application. Applicants may place those materials on record with Vietnamese translations and a claim chart. This may assist the examiner, but the application remains on the ordinary track: there is no queue-jump, separate deadline or obligation to follow the foreign conclusion.

Level two: a formal Form No. 12 request

Articles 24.3 to 24.5 Circular 10 permit an applicant to request that VNIPO use a foreign substantive examination result. If the request qualifies, VNIPO must issue a substantive examination result within eight months from receipt of the request. This is a time-bound regulatory route, but it is neither PPH nor the three-month track.

The main conditions are: the issuing national or regional office must be appointed as a PCT International Searching Authority or International Preliminary Examining Authority (ISA/IPEA); at least one foreign claim must have been found patentable; and the claims originally filed or amended in Vietnam must trùng – that is, match – the allowable claims. The filing package includes Form No. 12, the foreign examination result, the relevant claims and Vietnamese translations, cited documents when requested, and any required amendment documents and explanations. Any applicable fees under the general IP fee tariff must also be paid, although the current tariff does not prescribe a separate filing fee for Form No. 12.

Two features matter strategically. First, Article 24.3 Circular 10 defines the source office by its status as an ISA/IPEA; it does not limit the source to the IP5 or state that the relied-on work product must have been produced in the PCT international phase. WIPO currently lists 25 ISA/IPEAs. On the face of the provision, results from qualifying offices outside the EPO, USPTO, JPO, KIPO and CNIPA may therefore be eligible. This is a textual reading, not yet a substitute for confirmed VNIPO practice for an uncommon office or document type.

Second, Article 24 Circular 10’s standard is stricter than PPH’s ‘sufficiently correspond’ test. It should concern equivalent technical content and scope rather than literal word-for-word identity across languages. PPH, by contrast, expressly accommodates Vietnamese claims of the same, similar or narrower scope where the added limitation is supported. This difference can decide the route when the same JPO or KIPO result could support either PPH or Form No. 12.

4. The three-month track: a narrow domestic entitlement

Article 119.2a IP Law establishes accelerated substantive examination. For most routine foreign-origin filings, this will not be the primary option: it is reserved for strategic or emergency inventions that have already been commercially utilised and must be elected at filing. Article 14a Decree 65, added by Decree 100/2026, and Article 26 Circular 10 set out the gateway and procedure. A patent application must satisfy every one of the following conditions:

1. The invention is on the statutory list of strategic technologies or strategic technology products, or was researched and applied for an emergency involving national security, defence, natural disaster or epidemic response.
2. The invention has already been commercially utilised. Form No. 13 must be supported by evidence of utilisation arising within the 12-month period ending on the filing date.
3. Form No. 13 (the accelerated-examination request) and the request for early publication must be filed with the application. A pending earlier application cannot later be converted into this track.
4. The application has no more than 10 claims, including no more than two independent claims, and is neither a divisional nor a converted application.

The legislation also requires payment of an expedited-examination fee. However, Circular No. 263/2016/TT-BTC, as amended, does not currently state a rate for that fee, while Circular No. 64/2025/TT-BTC neither supplies one nor reduces examination fees. Applicants should therefore confirm VNIPO’s current collection and implementation practice before relying on Form No. 13.

The three months run from the statutory trigger in Article 119.2(a): publication if substantive examination was requested before publication, or receipt of the examination request if filed afterwards. Because Form No. 13 and the early-publication request must accompany the application, publication will ordinarily be the practical trigger once the application has passed formality examination. ‘Patent granted within three months of filing’ is therefore wrong twice: the period is not counted from filing, and it is an examination deadline, not a grant deadline.

The route is also fragile. The application returns to the ordinary timetable if the eligibility conditions are not met; a dispute, complaint or opposition arises; or the applicant voluntarily amends, supplements or divides the application. The opposition window is three months from publication, compared with six months for an ordinary patent application. An opposition filed within that window may therefore neutralise the timing advantage. Prior art, entitlement, inventorship and commercial-utilisation evidence should be stress-tested before filing.

5. A practical route-selection sequence

Route selection should start with filing timing, then test claim alignment and documentary readiness:

1. At filing: if Article 14a Decree 65 is satisfied, the invention has been commercialised and the claims can be fixed at no more than 10, consider Form No. 13. This gateway cannot be reopened later.
2. Before VNIPO starts examination: if JPO/KIPO has expressly allowed a claim and the application relationship satisfies the relevant guideline, PPH usually offers greater claim-correspondence flexibility, subject to quota.
3. Before VNIPO issues its examination result: if a positive result exists from an ISA/IPEA and the Vietnamese claims can match the allowable claims, Form No. 12 provides the clearer eight-month deadline.
4. Where no formal route fits: submit the foreign search, examination or grant material under Article 24.1 Circular 10 with Vietnamese translations and a claim chart. It is persuasive material, not a passport to priority treatment or grant.

Where the same JPO/KIPO result could support both PPH and Form No. 12, the choice should turn on claim scope, the remaining filing window, timing certainty and documentary readiness. The regimes are not expressly designed to be stacked. A primary route should be selected before attempting parallel requests.

6. Route-selection checklist for patent owners

1. Map the family, not just publication numbers. Record priority, PCT and divisional links, allowable-claim status, the Vietnamese publication date and whether VNIPO examination has begun.
2. Do not wait for grant if PPH is already available. An office action expressly allowing one or more claims may be enough.
3. Design global prosecution deliberately. Early allowance at JPO/KIPO may create a PPH option; a positive result from another ISA/IPEA may support Form No. 12.
4. Do not trade enforceable scope for speed mechanically. Claim alignment may accelerate examination but unnecessarily narrow an asset needed for enforcement, licensing or investment.
5. Build the evidence before selecting Form No. 13. Commercial utilisation, inventorship, filing entitlement and prior art must be ready for a compressed opposition window.
6. No route guarantees grant. PPH, Form No. 12 and Form No. 13 prioritise or time-limit examination; Vietnamese patentability standards still control the outcome.

A useful route assessment begins with three questions: what is the exact application relationship, which foreign claims have been allowed, and what procedural step has VNIPO already taken? Bross & Partners assists applicants and foreign counsel with route selection, claim mapping, Vietnamese translations and filing under JPO/KIPO PPH, Form No. 12 and Form No. 13.

Bross & Partners, a Tier 1-ranked intellectual property law firm by Legal 500 Asia Pacific, has extensive experience in patent prosecution, IP litigation including cross-border enforcement. Please contact:
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