page_title: European Patent Office
section_title: Function, status and location
hierarchical_section_title: European Patent Office / Function, status and location
caption_attribution_description: English: The European Patent Office (EPO) in Munich in 2014. Deutsch: Das Europäische Patentamt in München im Jahr 2014.
context_page_description: The European Patent Office is one of the two organs of the European Patent Organisation, the other being the Administrative Council. The EPO acts as executive body for the organisation while the Administrative Council acts as its supervisory body as well as, to a limited extent, its legislative body. The actual legislative power to revise the European Patent Convention lies with the Contracting States themselves when meeting at a Conference of the Contracting States.
  Within the European Patent Office, examiners are in charge of studying European patent applications, filed by applicants, in order to decide whether to grant a patent for an invention. The patents granted by the European Patent Office are called European patents.
context_section_description: The European Patent Office (EPO) grants European patents for the Contracting States to the European Patent Convention. The EPO provides a single patent grant procedure, but not a single patent from the point of view of enforcement. Hence the patents granted are not European Union patents or even Europe-wide patents, but a bundle of national patents. Besides granting European patents, the EPO is also in charge of establishing search reports for national patent applications on behalf of the patent offices of France, Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Italy, Turkey, Greece, Cyprus, Malta, San Marino, Lithuania, Latvia and Monaco.
  The European Patent Office is not a legal entity as such, but an organ of the European Patent Organisation, which has a legal personality.
  The EPO headquarters are located in Munich, Germany. The EPO also has a branch in Rijswijk, The Netherlands, which is near The Hague, sub-offices in Berlin, Germany, and Vienna, Austria, and a "liaison bureau" in Brussels, Belgium. At the end of 2009, the European Patent Office had a staff of 6818 (with 3718 based in Munich, 2710 in Rijswijk, 274 in Berlin, 112 in Vienna and 4 in Brussels). The predecessor of the European Patent Office was the Institut International des Brevets or IIB.
  The premises of the European Patent Office enjoy a form of extraterritoriality. In accordance with the Protocol on Privileges and Immunities, which forms an integral part of the European Patent Convention under Article 164(1) EPC, the premises of the European Patent Organisation, and therefore those of the European Patent Office, are inviolable. The authorities of the States in which the Organisation has its premises are not authorized to enter those premises, except with the consent of the President of the European Patent Office. Such consent is however "assumed in case of fire or other disaster requiring prompt protective action".
caption: EPO headquarters in Munich, Germany
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