Revision of the PACE Programme
The European Patent Office (EPO) has announced changes to the programme for accelerated prosecution of European patent applications (PACE) that will take effect from 1 February 2026.
Under the existing PACE programme, an applicant is permitted to file a request for participation in the PACE programme once during each stage of the procedure (i.e., search proceedings and examination proceedings). In contrast, under the revised PACE programme, it will only be possible to file a PACE request during examination proceedings, and the PACE programme will no longer apply to search proceedings.
This change to the PACE programme has been made in response to the EPO’s successful commitment to reducing the time to issue the extended/partial European search report for European patent applications (including PCT applications entering the European phase where the EPO did not act as (S)ISA) to within six months of the filing date or of expiry of the period under Rule 161(2) EPC. In 2024, the mean time to issue the extended/partial European search report was reduced to five and a half months.