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Expired European patentEurope

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EP 1031968 B1 · Applicant: Hitachi, Ltd.

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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 July 14, 1997 and granted February 18, 2004. A European patent lasts at most 20 years from filing, so its term ended July 14, 2017.
  • 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 January 14, 2023.
  • 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.
FiledJuly 14, 1997
PublishedAugust 30, 2000
GrantedFebruary 18, 2004
Term endedJuly 14, 2017
Application numberEP 00108553
Classification (CPC)G11B19/20 +2 more

Timeline

Timeline From EPO dates

1998200020022004200620082010201220142016Application filedJuly 14, 1997PublishedAug 30, 2000Patent grantedFeb 18, 2004Term endedJuly 14, 2017

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

Everything on this page comes from the EPO record linked above. EPO data used under CC BY 4.0.