EPO, Google Launch ‘Patent Translate’ To Remove Barriers in Patent Processing

The European Patent Office on Feb. 29 launched Patent Translate, a new machine translation service to improve access to patent documentation.

Using Google Translate technology, the service enables translation from and to English, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, and Swedish, effectively covering approximately 90 percent of all patents issued in Europe. By the end of 2012, the service will be able to translate patents from and into all 28 languages of the EPO member states as well as Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Russian.

“The launch today is a landmark towards the removal of language barriers worldwide from patent documentation,” EPO President ...