– Decree-Law No. 290 for the protection of Inventions and Drawings and Industrial Models, published on February 1, 2012, in force since April 1, 2012.
– Decree No. 342 of February 28, 2018, establishing Regulations of Decree-Law No. 290, in force since October 10, 2018.

– Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, Stockholm Act.
– Strasbourg Agreement Concerning the International Patent Classification.
– Agreement for the Legal Protection of Inventions, Industrial Models and Utility Models and Trade Marks in the fulfillment of Economic and Technical-Scientific Collaboration, signed in Moscow (1973).
– Agreement on the unification of requirements for the preparation and filing of invention applications (1975).
– Convention Establishing the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), since March 27, 1975.
– Agreement for mutual recognition of authorship certificates and other protecting documents for inventions, signed in Havana (1975).
– Budapest Treaty on the International Recognition of the Deposit of Microorganisms, since February 19, 1994.
– WTO’s TRIPS Agreement, since April 20, 1995.
– Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT), since July 16, 1996.

Applicant: inventors; their successors; a representative.

Foreigners and nationals not living in the country: must appoint a local agent.

Protection of foreigners: the same as for nationals.

Naming of inventor(s): obligatory.

Notion of invention: the technical solution in any technology field enjoying novelty, inventive activity and industrial applicability. 

Novelty: international.

Exceptions to protection: (not considered as inventions): (a) schemes, rules and methods for performing mental acts, playing games or doing business; (b) projects and schemes for construction plans; (c) discoveries consisting in disclosing laws, phenomena and properties of the material universe; (d) the material existing in nature, discovered or isolated, including the biological and genetic material, its parts, substances and replicas (retorts) except microorganisms; (e) principles and scientific theories; (f) mathematical methods; (g) forms of presentation of information; (h) topographies of integrated circuits; (i) computer programs; (j) scientific,  artistic or literary works and esthetic creations; (k) essentially biological processes; (l) the human body, at any stage of its formation and development, the discovery of its elements or its parts and replicas, including gene sequences, or partial gene sequences, including the one produced by a technical process; (m) products previously patented whose use is distinctively different to that included in the original patent; (n) inventions contrary to scientific principles and well established natural law; (o) the changes of shape, dimensions, proportions or materials of an object unless it essentially modifies the properties thereof; (p) juxtaposition of known inventions or mixtures of known products, or alteration of the form, use, dimensions or material thereof, except where they are combined or managed in such a way that their qualities or characteristic functions have been so modified as to produce an industrial result not obvious; (q) uses of products and processes; (r) products and processes based on uses. (unpatentable inventions): (a) animals and animal breeds; (b) plants and plant varieties; (c) methods for treatment of the human or animal body; (d) surgical, therapeutic and diagnostic methods for treatment of humans or animals; (e) inventions the commercial exploitation of which shall be necessary forbidden to protect human, animal or plant life or health or to avoid serious prejudice to the environment, provided that such exclusion is not made merely because the exploitation is prohibited by any law in force; (f) inventions the commercial exploitation of which shall be necessary forbidden to protect social interest, public order or morality; (g) processes for cloning human beings, organs, tissues, and parts or elements thereof; (h) processes for modifying the genetic identity of the human being; (i) the uses of human embryos for industrial or commercial purposes; (j) processes for modifying the genetic identity of animals which are likely to cause them suffering without any substantial medical benefit to humans or animals, and also animals resulting from such processes. 

Kinds of protection: patents of invention.

Confirmation or importation patents: not provided for.

Secret patents: applicants may not apply for secret patents of their own accord, but the Cuban government may decide to keep any application for a patent secret in the interest of national defense or public order.

Priorities: single or multiple priorities, partial priorities.

Unity of the invention: each application should be related to one object of invention only. 

Territory covered: the territory of the Republic of Cuba.

Filing requirements for an application (to be sent to resident agent):
1. Power of attorney or letter of authorization, not legalized;
2. Specification in Spanish, in duplicate;
3. Drawings in duplicate;
4. If priority is claimed, a certified (not legalized) copy of the foreign application supporting the claim for priority, with a Spanish translation;
5. Evidence concerning the depositing of a culture of a microorganism in an officially recognized collection, if the application relates to the use of a new microorganism culture.

Filing without one or more requirements: possible.

Filing of priority certificate: this document must be submitted not later than three months after the date of the Cuban application. A Spanish translation of the document is required.

Electronic signatures: are not accepted.

PCT applications: time limit for entering national phase: the translation into Spanish must be filed within 30 months (for both Chapters I and II).

Special requirements of the Cuban Office: instrument of assignment or transfer where the applicant is not the inventor; instrument of assignment of the priority right where the applicants are not identical; evidence concerning non-prejudicial disclosures or exceptions to lack of novelty, such as disclosures resulting from abuse, disclosures at certain exhibitions and disclosures by the applicant during a certain period of time; verified translation of the international application to be furnished in one paper copy; verified translation of the priority document.

Amendment of application: possible only if the essence of the initial application is not changed.

Examination: formal and substantive examination with regard to all the previous art related.

Division: possible.

Provisional registration: not provided for.

Publication: after a formal examination will be published after eighteen months starting from the filing date or from the priority date if it is claimed. 

Opposition to application filed: possible within sixty days from publication.

Dispute about ownership: must be brought before the courts.

Dispute about novelty: a nullity action can be filed before the Cuban Patent Office based on violation of the requirements established by the Patent Law. A judicial procedure can be filed against the final Resolution before the Provincial Court, within the term of thirty days counted from the date following the notification of the Resolution.

Delivery of document: the patent certificate is delivered to the applicant about three or four years after filing the application.

Beginning of protection: from the date of granting of the application.

Duration: for a patent of invention the validity period is twenty years, starting from the date of filing.

Annuities: the payment of an annual fee, of increasing amount, starting from the date of filing of the application up to the termination of its life, is obligatory.

Annuity grace period: six months at double the cost.

Marking of patented goods: not obligatory but advisable.

Amendment of issued patent: not possible.

Assignment: possible, but must be recorded at the Cuban Patent Office. Filing the assignment document, duly signed by both parties.

License of exploitation: possible. The contract or relevant document granting a license should be recorded at the Cuban Patent Office.

Working: compulsory. An obligatory license may be granted at the request of a third party by the Director of the Office if the patent has not been worked during a period of three years after the grant or four years counted from the application date. The exploitation of a patent must be the utilization or continuous manufacture of the invention in Cuba.

Right of prior user: any person or legal entity who has used a similar invention in Cuba before the filing of a patent application, or has taken substantial steps for its utilization, will keep gratuitously the right to utilize it. This right should be registered in the application filed at the Patent Office by the interested party.

Opposition to granted patent: possible before the Patent Office with a nullity action. A procedure can be filed against the final Resolution before the Provincial Court of Havana City, within the term of thirty days counted from the date following the notification of the Resolution.

Compulsory licenses: the Director of the Office, at the request of a third party, has the right to grant an obligatory license for the exploitation of an invention protected by a patent of invention if it is not being exploited, if it is important for the national economy, and if it has not been possible to arrive at an agreement with its owner. No use will be made of the obligatory license before the three-year period following the date of grant or the four-year period following the application date, whichever expires last. 

Nullity: when: (1) the patent was granted for a solution that is not an invention or for an invention that is not patentable or for an invention not having novelty, inventive step or industrial applicability, or for an invention that is not sufficiently disclosed; (2) there has been a violation of the prerequisites established by the Law; (3) the patent was granted with false, inexact or omitted elements. 

Cancellation: two years after the granting of a compulsory license, if the abuse remains.

Infringement and penalties: if there is an infringement of rights, the owner or the licensee may file a claim before the competent appeal court of Havana. In case of joint ownership, one of the owners can establish the claim. The prosecutor can also act when the state or social interest is affected. The deadline for filing the action expires in one year, starting from when the owner or licensee was able to exercise it.