14 September 2026
IPOS Extends Search & Examination EOT Pilot and Resumes Patents and Trade Marks Fast Programmes
Fee Waiver Pilot for Search & Examination Extensions of Time (EOT) Extended by One Year
The Intellectual Property Office of Singapore’s (IPOS) EOT fee waiver pilot initiative, which waived the official fees for extensions of time to request a search and examination report or examination report (the “EOT Pilot”), has been extended by one year. The EOT Pilot originally applied to examination deadlines falling on or before 31 August 2026 and now extends to deadlines falling on or before 31 August 2027 (Patents Circular No. 4/2026). The EOT Pilot is intended to give applicants additional flexibility to align prosecution of their Singapore patent applications with broader patent filing and commercialisation strategies.
Under the Patents Rules, the deadline for filing a request for combined search and examination or a request for examination (“examination deadline”) is 36 months from the earliest priority date (or, where no priority is claimed, 36 months from the date of filing, or in the case of a divisional application, 36 months from the lodgement date). An applicant may file an EOT to request for examination, up to 18 months after that examination deadline.
The EOT Pilot is currently only applicable to Singapore patent applications whose examination deadlines fall between 1 September 2024 and 31 August 2027 (both dates inclusive). 31 August 2027 is the last eligible examination deadline rather than the last date on which a request may be made. With the official fee of S$200 per month of extension waived for each eligible Singapore patent application, a full 18-month extension represents a saving of up to S$3,600 for each eligible application.
Request(s) for EOT may be filed any time before the expiry of the examination deadline (in anticipation) or during the 18-month extension from the expiry of the examination deadline (retrospectively). However, if no request for examination is filed by the examination deadline, the application would be deemed abandoned and its status on the patent register would be reflected as “Abandoned (EOT possible)”. As such, if an applicant wishes to maintain the status of the patent application as “Pending” on the patent register, the request for EOT should be made before the expiry of the examination deadline. Applicants should treat the EOT Pilot as time-limited; there is currently no indication that it would be extended again or made permanent. Requests for EOT are therefore best made sooner rather than later.
Resumption of Patents and Trade Marks Acceleration Programmes in Singapore
IPOS resumed the SG Patents Fast and SG Trade Marks Fast programmes on 1 September 2026. The programmes had been closed to new acceleration requests from 4 January 2026 pending a review, and their resumption provides applicants with more options to accelerate the examination of their patent and trade mark applications.
Acceleration is available in respect of requests for search and examination, or for examination, made on or after 1 September 2026. A pending patent application may therefore still be accelerated provided that search and examination or examination has not yet been requested. On the trade mark side, however, only applications filed on or after 1 September 2026 qualify.
The circulars announcing the resumption (Patents Circular No. 5/2026 and Trade Marks Circular No. 3/2026) do not introduce any change to the qualifying criteria, official fees or target timelines, which remain as set out when the programmes were launched on 20 May 2025.
SG Patents Fast
The SG Patents Fast programme accelerates the issuance of office actions. In particular, 2 acceleration options are available:
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SG Patents Fast 4: Receive a first office action within four months of successful acceleration request; and
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SG Patents Fast 8: Receive a first office action within eight months of successful acceleration request.
Successful SG Patents Fast applications will qualify for acceleration of subsequent office actions, which will be issued within four months.
The following official fees for acceleration are applicable:
Search and examination options
Accelerate search and examination
Accelerate examination
Accelerate response to examination objections S$ 150
Fee for SG Patents Fast 4
S$ 1,800
S$ 1,200
Fee for SG Patents Fast 8
S$ 900
S$ 600
To qualify for SG Patents Fast, the following conditions must be met:
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The patent application must not be a divisional application in Singapore;
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The acceleration request must contain 20 or fewer claims; and
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The acceleration request must be made at the time of filing the request for search and examination or the request for examination.
There is a monthly cap of 5 requests per entity (individual or corporate). This cap does not apply to requests for acceleration of subsequent office actions.
SG Trade Marks Fast
Under the SG Trade Marks Fast programme, applicants receive the first examination report (or notice of publication, as applicable) within three to six weeks of filing.
Notably, the application does not require:
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A related patent application; or
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Full adoption of pre-approved descriptions of goods and services from IPOS’ Classification Database.
However, if the descriptions are pre-approved, this will eliminate potential objections on the specification of goods/services.
The qualifying criteria and application process for the SG Trade Marks Fast programme are as follows:
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The application is:
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A national trade mark application (i.e. filed directly with IPOS); and
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Not a certification or collective mark; and
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The acceleration request must be made at the point of filing, with the payment of the acceleration fee.
For trade mark applications with multiple classes, the acceleration request will automatically apply to all classes in the application.
The following official fees for acceleration are applicable:
Trade mark application
Request for acceleration
For classes that fully adopt IPOS pre-approved descriptions
S$ 200 per class
For classes that partially or do not adopt IPOS pre-approved descriptions of goods
S$ 250 per class
To qualify for SG
The acceleration fees are in addition to the applicable official trade mark filing fees payable to IPOS.
Please get in touch with us if you wish to find out more about the EOT Pilot or acceleration programmes available at IPOS.
Senior Patent Attorney
IP Protection & Management
(65) 6303 8190
This article is intended to provide general information only and should not be relied upon as an exhaustive or comprehensive statement of law. Should you have any specific questions, please speak with one of our above contacts, or your usual contact at Amica Law LLC.
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