试论专利法上构成“使用公开”的销售

Disclosure by Sale for the Determination of Prior Art in Patent Law

现有技术是专利申请日之前公众可以获得的技术,它是专利申请新颖性和创造性审查中的事实依据。使用公开是通过将技术付诸具体实施而让公众可以获得。构成使用公开的销售,应指已经制造完成的产品处于向公众出售的状态,因为专利法上的公开指的是产品处于公众可以获得的状态。因此,一方面,产品下线之前的销售广告甚至合同行为都不能证明销售使用公开,而产品下线后的销售宣传或合同签订行为均可证明使用公开而不需要产品的实际交付;另一方面,具体的销售交易并不等于使用公开的销售,前者是证明后者的辅助事实,只有具体交易的买方不是负有保密义务的特定人,这一证明才能完成。负有保密义务是定义特定人的唯一条件,买方为获得技术而要满足的任何其它条件均不能使其成为特定人。专利无效宣告程序中,保密义务的存在应由主张者举证。

Prior art is composed of all technology available to the public before the filing date of a patent. A technology can be made available to the public through sales of products. For this purpose, disclosure by sale occurs only when final products are on sale to the public. Therefore, without products in store, disclosure by sale does not occur even with advertisement or signed sale contract, while with products in store, it does occur even if products in the contract have not been delivered. On the other hand, when concrete deals do not make products available to the public, it is the buyer who is bound by an obligation of confidentiality. In patent invalidation procedures, the demanding party bears the burden of proof for existence of such confidentiality obligation.