22 December 2025

PATENT ALERT 

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Post Grant Opposition 

A new patent opposition procedure in Malaysia will come into effect on 31 December 2025. The new procedure provides a 6-month opposition period from the date of publication of the grant of a Malaysian patent for a third party (“opponent”) to file an opposition to the grant of the patent. 

The grounds for opposing a patent are limited to novelty, obviousness, patentable subject matter, and sufficiency. To commence an opposition, the opponent must file grounds of opposition.  The patent holder then responds with a counterstatement, which may include amendments to the claims. The opponent can subsequently file a response to this counterstatement. Both parties may be invited to file a further submission after which an ad hoc Opposition Committee will consider the arguments from both parties and determine if the opposed patent should be maintained (with or without amendments) or invalidated. 

It should be noted that the Opposition is based on written submissions only and there is no oral hearing unlike the European patent office’s opposition proceedings. The Registrar may award costs and the opponent may need to provide a security deposit. 

A post grant opposition procedure provides a cost-effective option for a party to invalidate a competitor’s patent and clear the entry to the market. However, the short opposition period may require active monitoring of a competitor’s patent portfolio. 

Sequence Listing

Effective December 31, 2025, Malaysian patent applications must submit sequence listings in PDF format, adhering to the ST26 standard format under the PCT. This update aligns Malaysian patent practices with PCT requirements. The change primarily impacts initial and convention filings in Malaysia, particularly if the ST26 format has not been prepared for those specific application types. PCT national phase applications will not be significantly affected, as they typically already include sequence listings in the ST26 format.   

If you wish to find out more about the updated patent regulations in Malaysia, in particular the patent opposition, please do not hesitate to contact us.