– Law on the Legal Protection of Topographies of Semiconductor Products, in force since December 1, 1998, amended on June 8, 2006, November 8, 2012 and March 30, 2017.

– Convention Establishing the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), since April 30, 1992.
– Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, Stockholm Act, since May 22, 1994.
– The Hague Convention Abolishing the Requirement of Legalization for Foreign Public Documents (Apostille), since July 19, 1997.
– WTO’s TRIPS Agreement, since May 31, 2001.

Applicant: any natural person or legal entity or a collective of natural persons and/or legal entities.

Foreigners: natural and legal persons of foreign States who do not permanently reside in the Republic of Lithuania or who do not have a head office, a registered branch office or representative office in Lithuania, or in another member State of the European Union, or in any other member State of the European Economic Area, shall file applications at the State Patent Bureau and perform all actions relating to the registration of a topography with the State Patent Bureau, including representation at the Appeals Division of the State Patent Bureau, through a patent attorney whose name appears on the list of Patent Attorneys of the Republic of Lithuania.

Novelty: the application must be filed at the State Patent Bureau within two years of the first commercial exploitation of the topography anywhere in the world.

Filing requirements for an application (to be sent to resident agent):
1. Request for registration with the date of first commercial exploitation of the topography where it precedes the date of the application for registration;
2. Description of the topography and all the material identifying or exemplifying it;
3. A statement as to the date of first commercial exploitation of the topography where it precedes the date of the application for registration;
4. An authorization if the application is filed by a representative of the applicant;
5. An application for authorship or a document proving transfer of the author’s rights.

Note: the request for registration must be filed in Lithuanian. If the accompanying submitted documents are not in Lithuanian, their translation into Lithuanian must be submitted to the State Patent Bureau within three months from the date of filing the application.

Applications kept secret: the State Patent Bureau shall ensure that the materials submitted for the registration of the topography shall not be made public if the applicant states that it is a commercial secret. This provision does not prevent from submitting the material if this is an urgent request of judicial or any other competent authority.

Formal examination: the State Patent Bureau only conducts a formal examination of the requirements of the application.

Appeals: decisions can be appealed at the State Patent Bureau’s Appeals Division.

Granting: the topography is entered in the Topographies Register of the Republic of Lithuania and published in the Official Bulletin of the State Patent Bureau after the payment of a registration fee.

Opposition: any interested party, in accordance with the provisions of Article 3 of the Law on Legal Protection of Topographies of Semiconductor Products, may file an opposition against the registration of the topography within three months from publication of the registration of the topography.

Duration: the exclusive rights start as of the following dates: (1) the date when the topography is first commercially exploited anywhere in the world; (2) the date when an application for registration of the topography has been filed with the State Patent Bureau. The exclusive rights to the topography are terminated ten years from the earlier of the following dates: (1) the end of the calendar year in which the topography or a semiconductor product manufactured using the topography is first commercially exploited anywhere in the world; (2) the end of the calendar year in which the application for registration of the topography has been filed with the State Patent Bureau.

License: the owner of the topography may be entitled to grant to another person an exclusive or non-exclusive license for the exploitation of the topography. The license agreement can be entered in the Topographies Register of the Republic of Lithuania at the request of the contract parties.

Invalidation: disputes relating to the registration of the topography before the issuance of the certificate are handled by the Appeals Division of the State Patent Bureau; and the disputes relating to the decisions of the Appeals Division of the State Patent Bureau and other disputes after the issuance of the certificate are handled by the Vilnius County Court.