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Classification list

Posted: Wed Aug 16, 2017 12:02 am
by pedrocdm
Dear Espacenet Team,

I´m working on IPC symbols given to patent applications. I observed the IPC symbols list on “Classification - International” are not exact equal to what one can find on EPO publications (EPO publications associated to an application).
1) Where can I find a definition for the “Classification - International” field?
Is this a comprehensive list of all IPC symbols given to all publications of ALL members of a patent application's DocDB family?
2) Why one can found in the same list IPC symbols of different levels (subgroups and its group and its subclass)?

For example:
For EP20140184480 (application number) the "Classification - International" field has the following IPC symbol list: C22C 14/00; C22C 19/00; C22F 1/00; C22F 1/10 and C22F.

On the EPO Publications only C22C14/00 and C22C19/00 are found. Looking on publications of other family members, other IPCs symbols could be found. But not all of them! I didn’t find the subclass C22F! And other different IPC symbols were found too! For example, C22F 1/18 on the US and Russia publications!

Beside that, why the C22F subclass and the C22F 1/00 group are given in the same list where one find the C22F 1/10 subgroup ?

How is the "Classification - International" IPC symbols list constructed? :?:

Thanks for your help! :)
Best regards,
Pedro

Re: Classification list

Posted: Fri Sep 01, 2017 10:41 am
by EPO / Innovation Networks
Hi Pedro,

Following our answer to your query via e-mail, here the information again to share with our forum users!

Our database shows the following:

The publication (EP2818568) itself has 2 IPCs added in 2014 (frontfile as source)
• on Advanced level: C22C14/00, C22C19/00
And on its family, 5 IPCs added from 2005 – 2007 (with IPC to IPC or ECLA to IPC as source),
• on Advanced level: C22C14/00, C22C19/00, C22F1/00, C22F1/10
C22C14/00 is the IPC given on the WIPO publication (see first biblio page).
C22F1/10 is the IPC given by the USPTO on their first publication (see first biblio page).
• ‘S’ level: C22F

All have EP as originating office.

“S” is a quite unusual attribute which stands for “subclass level”:
some very small national offices are entitled to apply an IPC allocation at subclass level only and by the way, “C” reads nowadays: “main-group level” (formerly “core level”).


Espacenet displays the IPC family picture, not the IPC document picture.

Here you can see that the data in DocDB matches exactly what is displayed in Espacenet https://worldwide.espacenet.com/publica ... 5A1&KC=A1#

Publication EP2818565/A1 in DOCDB: Here is the IPC classification that DOCDB has and this also
shows what IPC is stored at Publication and Family levels.

|PUB_APPL_FAM_ID....|LEVEL|SEQUENCE|REFORMED_IPC.......|VERSION_DATE|CLASS_LEVEL|FIRST_LATER|CLASS_VALUE|ACTION_DATE
|EP 2818565A1|Publ | 1|C22C 14/00 |2006-01-01 |A |F |I |2014-11-25
|EP 2818565A1|Publ | 2|C22C 19/00 |2006-01-01 |A |L |I |2014-11-25
|33310255 |Fam | 1|C22C 14/00 |2006-01-01 |A | |I |2005-11-10
|33310255 |Fam | 2|C22C 19/00 |2006-01-01 |A | |I |2005-11-10
|33310255 |Fam | 3|C22F |2006-01-01 |S | |I |2006-05-06
|33310255 |Fam | 4|C22F 1/00 |2006-01-01 |A | |I |2007-07-21
|33310255 |Fam | 5|C22F 1/10 |2006-01-01 |A | |I |2005-11-10

The combination (or “union”) of both levels give the overall IPC classification for a Publication. The
IPC classification stored at Publication level is the one that DOCDB received through the FrontFile loading
of biblio data. It is the IPC that is printed on the image of the original document (screenshot below). The
IPC classification stored at Family level is from the original IPC backfile load.


We hope this information was helpful.