Patent Assignment in Nepal: Recording the Transfer at the DOI
Patent assignment in Nepal: the written deed, the recordal at the Department of Industry (NPR 5,000), why recording matters, and the timing around maintenance fees.
A patent changes hands in two steps in Nepal: the deal — a written assignment — and the recordal at the Department of Industry that moves the register. Skip the second step and the patent legally points at the wrong owner: renewal notices route nowhere, licensees cannot verify the chain, and a sale negotiation stalls on a document that should have cost NPR 5,000.
This guide walks the transfer: what the deed must say, how the recordal runs, and the timing traps the annual maintenance calendar creates.
In short
A patent assignment in Nepal needs a written deed identifying the patent, the parties and the rights transferred — signed by the registered proprietor — followed by a recordal at the Department of Industry (NPR 5,000 in current practice) that moves the register to the new owner. Recording matters because the register is what the system reads: renewals (NPR 5,000/year in years 7–14, NPR 7,500/year in years 14–21), licences, enforcement and diligence all attach to the owner of record. Time transfers against the maintenance calendar — an unrecorded assignment plus a missed annual fee is how purchased patents die — and record employee-invention assignments before the patent is commercialised.
The patent assignment deed: what it must say
Two chain rules carry most disputes. The chain must be continuous: each transfer runs from the current owner of record, so an earlier unrecorded assignment must be recorded before the next one can be. The seller must be the register's owner: a founder selling 'the company's patent' is selling nothing unless the company's ownership was itself papered — which is why employee and founder assignment agreements come first, not at the exit.
| Element | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Identification of the patent | Number, title, registration date — the register entry being transferred |
| Parties, in full legal names | The registered proprietor as seller; the exact entity as buyer |
| Scope of the transfer | Whole patent or defined share; fields of use if split |
| Consideration | The commercial terms the deed evidences |
| Signatures with authority | The owner of record signs — an unrecorded intermediate owner cannot |
The recordal at the Department of Industry
The recordal application goes to the Department of Industry with the deed and the fee — NPR 5,000 per patent in current practice — and on acceptance the register shows the new owner. From that point the system's mechanics follow the new proprietor: renewal notices and correspondence route to the recorded owner, future licences and assignments chain from them, and any enforcement or transaction stands on a register that agrees with reality.
The design route runs the same way at NPR 3,000 per design, and trademark assignments at NPR 2,000 per mark — the fee schedule's consistent message being that recordals are cheap by design, because a stale register is a problem Nepal's system refuses to subsidise.
Timing against the maintenance calendar
The deed should allocate the annual fees explicitly — who pays the current year, who pays from the next anniversary, and what happens if a deadline falls between signing and recordal. The alternative is the classic failure: a patent bought in good faith, its maintenance assumed handled, its 35-day window missed — cancellation automatic, and with the specification published, no way to refile. A NPR 5,000–7,500 annual fee against a lapsed acquisition is the sector's worst exchange rate.
| Event | When | The transfer trap |
|---|---|---|
| Annual maintenance | Every year inside each term | Who pays the year of transfer? Say so in the deed |
| First renewal | Year 7 (+35 days; 6-month grace) | A transfer during grace is a transfer of a dying patent |
| Second renewal | Year 14 (+35 days; 6-month grace) | The last decision point before the final term |
| Ceiling | Year 21 | Pricing a patent near expiry is pricing its remaining terms |
Where patent assignments go wrong at the DOI
- Name mismatches — the deed names an entity that differs from the register's owner in spelling, suffix or legal form; the recordal stalls until the papers agree
- Chain gaps — an intermediate transfer nobody recorded, so the current seller is not the register's owner and cannot convey
- Authority gaps — the deed signed by a director without board authority, or by the founder of a company that owns the patent
- Scope ambiguity — 'the patent' when the portfolio held several, or a field-of-use split nobody defined in writing
Recording the transfer: the sequence
Verify the register first
Confirm the seller is the owner of record and the patent's maintenance is current — both facts change the deal, so both are checked before signing. The term's fee arithmetic (NPR 5,000 and NPR 7,500 per year, by term) is the site's patent-term guide's territory.
Sign the deed
Written, signed by the registered proprietor, scoped precisely — the document the recordal rests on.
Record, then update the file
File the recordal with the fee, confirm the register shows the new owner, and update the portfolio's records and renewal calendar to the new proprietor's details the same week.
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This article is general information, not legal advice.