Who can afford an in-person EQE ?

By DALL·E, OpenAI

The EPO makes Adminstrative Council documents public to increase transparency. Unfortunately, they do not have older documents. I have made CA/139/08 available here because it provides important background for the many changes made to the EQE during the last years. 

There are a lot of people arguing that we should go back to the in-person exam. But that can only happen if some organisation is willing to organise it and/or pay for the organisation. The EPC is silent about who should bear the costs for the EQE, so it has been a struggle between the EPO and the epi / national offices as the EQE has grown from tens of candidates candidates to a couple of thousand. The system is very dependent on the many people who kindly sacrifice their free time organising / making / marking exams. 

For example, the figures in 2007 were:
"All in all, the cost of the 2007 examination came to EUR 7 167 000.
Of this, EUR 2 681 000 (estimate based on EPO cost levels) was contributed through the working time of professional representatives made available free of charge and EUR 108 000 (estimate based on EPO cost levels) through kind support from national patent offices in the form of premises and staff.
Receipts from fees amounted to EUR 652 000.
The remaining costs totalling EUR 4 378 000 were borne by the EPO."

This was the main reason to introduce the Pre-exam - with the increasing number of resitters in the system, the EPO calculated that their costs would rise to 8 500 000 in 2018. 

Whether you want it or not, the EQE will change. I have no idea what the current online exams cost, but it must be a lot less than in-person, so it will stay online.
Longer exams do not work online, and there are many countries that have health and safety rules which oppose having to be present for 90 minutes without a bathroom break. So, they have to move to shorter exams.
Also, it is getting harder to find enough volunteers, so they have to move to exams that are less time-intensive to make and less time-intensive to mark. 

New e-EQE has major improvements

By DALL·E, OpenAI

The EPO and epi recently published their extensive proposals for the new e-EQE, including mock exams to get a better feel for the changes.

It will be a major improvement for candidates, but it will also depend on how the modules will be made.

IP.appify Blog: New e-EQE has major improvements

Sign up to try the NEW e-EQE

After a lot of work behind the scenes, the EPO and epi have published their extensive proposals for the new e-EQE. There are even mock exams for you to try. And they want your feedback …

The proposal documents are on the New EQE pages of the EPO website. The consultation will run from the second half of May until 15 July 2022. The mock papers will be accessible in WISEflow, but you must sign up separately, even if you already have an account.

The proposal consists of 2 foundation and 4 main modules that gradually progress from acquiring legal and procedural knowledge towards its practical application.

The new format is adapted to online exam taking – the time on the computer during the exams will be shorter, and there is a combination of autoscoring (multiple choice) and open questions. The material that can actually be tested in each exam is therefore reduced, but that is compensated by having a broader range of situations that need to be prepared. These situations have all been explicitly mentioned in the proposal, so you can see exactly what you need to know.

I am already a big fan of M4 (Advising the Client) because it includes:

6. Understand and know infringing activities (in comparative patent law),
   thus being capable of determining the rights conferred by a patent, their duration
   and which acts need to be performed to be able to enforce them.

Feedback can be provided by questionnaire once the mock papers are available. The earliest that these changes could be introduced is EQE 2024. They have already indicated that EQE 2023 will follow the current regulations and formats.