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Expired European patentEurope

Coupling for tubular-shaft instruments

EP 0820256 B1 · Applicant: Karl Storz GmbH & Co. KG

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Overview

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Listed from its EPO record in Patent Yard's archive of European patents past their term. Its claims, description and drawings are in the EPO PDF and on Google Patents, and the Claude kit works from them.

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Why it's free to use

  • Filed April 15, 1996 and granted July 24, 2002. A European patent lasts at most 20 years from filing, so its term ended April 15, 2016.
  • A supplementary protection certificate, which can extend a medicine or crop-protection patent, adds at most five and a half years, so even that would have ended by October 15, 2021.
  • We check European rights only. A US or other national patent in its family could still be in force: check its family on Espacenet or Google Patents.
FiledApril 15, 1996
PublishedJanuary 28, 1998
GrantedJuly 24, 2002
Term endedApril 15, 2016
Application numberEP 96909046
Classification (CPC)A61B17/00 +1 more

Timeline

Timeline From EPO dates

1997199920012003200520072009201120132015Application filedApril 15, 1996PublishedJan 28, 1998Patent grantedJuly 24, 2002Term endedApril 15, 2016

Sources & verification

Official EPO records

Full published documentClaims, description and drawings as a PDF.EPOEuropean Patent RegisterProcedure, status, file inspection and legal events.EPOLinked open EP data recordThe bibliographic record this page is built from.EPO

Cross-check elsewhere

Google PatentsFull text, worldwide family, citing patents and legal events.patents.google.comEspacenetNational family members and their legal status.European Patent Office

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