A slothful economic repossession and sustained budget forces the IP departments to find new cost-cutting ways for patent translation. Translations are difficult and therefore, cost a lot. On average they account for up to 50% cost of national stage entry. Thus, cost-cutting could really make a difference in our pockets for such a money-oriented task. In this article, we will enlighten you with top strategies to cut costs on patent translation. These strategies will ensure a quality-oriented strong patent portfolio, which will not disappoint you.
Also Read: Human Translation or Machine Translation? Which Option is Better?
What are the Ways to Cut Costs on Patent Translation?
There are several ways to save a significant amount in your pocket from the process of Patent Translation. However, you must stick to some significant methods and steps. These are the most effective ways to cut costs on patent translation:
Stick to the basic language:
The best and most common way is to create an application in common languages. Thus, you may skip the translation process. It directly cuts the cost of hiring a translator. And English is the most common language that can be used for this process. This means you can now file your patent application in countries where English is an acceptable language. Also, it is an opening option for filing in most countries, such as United States, Canada, India, Australia, Israel, etc. However, cost-cutting you from filing in countries, such as Brazil, China, Japan, Russia, etc. Also, it depends upon your requirements. You must understand the other points for filing broader patent protection.
Cover regional blocs:
Covering the regional blocs is one of the most effective ways to cut costs on patent translation. Thus, one translation is valid for more than one country. For example, translation in Arabic opens an opportunity for you to file a patent application in GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council). GCC not only validates the same translation in the covered countries but also allows it to file in Egypt and Jordan. Combining both English (point 1) and other than English (point 2) language is another important aspect. It helps to gain significant worldwide protection in both English speaking and non-English speaking countries.
Also Read: Poor Patent Translation: Why you must avoid it?
Reuse older translations:
Another cost-cutting way is to file in a region and then revise the same translation to file in related countries. This is helpful if you file in languages like Brazil and Portugal to get one translation and then to convert it for additional filing into some other country. The cost of making changes to an older translation is less than framing/ordering a new translation.
Analyze text in similar previous translations:
The translation cost of reusing older ones is significantly lesser than creating a new one. Thus, always make sure to perform repetitive text analysis. This can be done in cases when you need to translate a number of patents into the same language. Therefore, the older texts can be used to create word-to-word translations which have to be finally proofread to make sure the translations are correct. This will help reduce the overall cost by using some terms from the older translations and creating only the rest of the part as a new translation.
Perform a market survey to look for an efficient patent translator:
You can search the best in town patent translators without comprising the quality, and also, estimate the costs of several translation vendors. Store the details as a single comparison sheet to choose the best translation as well as the translator. Then assign them according to your budget and requirements could save a lot in your pocket.
Also Read: Why Always Select A Trusted Patent Translation Vendor?
Keep an eye to ensure quality in translation services:
Make sure you not compromise on the quality to translate applications according to your budget. The whole patent prosecution process is time-taking and involves a lot of investments in every stage. Any mistake (if caught), can put your application into the risk of getting abandon.
Also Read: How Important is Computer-Assisted Translation?
Cutting overall translation costs is an effective way to do an efficient investment for your patent application. Just make sure that you are saving wisely and without any deterioration in terms of quality. The end product of getting a patent is expensive. However, it is not a good trade-off to compromise with the quality of patent translation while using cost-cutting ways.
Also Read: Bad Quality Patent Translation Can Bring Loss of Millions!
Ways to cut costs on Patent Translation: Summary
The Translation cost depends on 3 circumstances:
- Filing a patent application in the patent office where English is not the official language.
- Grant of the European patent.
- Validating a European patent in selected EPO member states. (members that did not sign the London Agreement)
The approximate translation fees for an application into Chinese, Korean, Russian and Japanese are between USD 3,000 to USD 6,500. This is up to 75% to 80% of the total filing fees.
However, the translation cost is manageable. One may reduce it by focusing on the English language blocs or jurisdictions sharing an official language. Moreover, you may reduce the translation costs further with the help of effective patent drafting. Another helpful step is to remove any sort of unnecessary text from the patent specifications.
Also Read: Patent Translation and Filing Cost: How To Manage?
Assistance from the Patent Translation Express:
Our dedicated and skilled team at the Patent Translation Express work diligently to give you the best results. We own a team of native experts of the languages and provide you the most accurate translations. You just need to provide the input data in the form of text, pdf, jpg, gif or any other format. We will update you with received confirmation and you can check the work progress any time. Moreover, we provide you the translated document within 1-4 working days and you can download the result online. To get to know more about our services, do visit Patent Translation Express.
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