Who can sign on behalf of a legal entity in an international patent application?

When signing an international patent application on behalf of a legal entity, certain individuals are presumed to have the authority to sign, as explained in MPEP 1820:

“An officer (President, Vice-President, Secretary, Treasurer, Chief Executive Officer, Chief Operating Officer or Chief Financial Officer) of an organization is presumed to have authority to sign on behalf of that organization. The signature of the chairman of the board is also acceptable, but not the signature of an individual director.”

For foreign juristic applicants, there’s an exception:

“In foreign countries, a person who holds the title ‘Manager’ or ‘Director’ is normally an officer or the equivalent thereof; therefore, those terms are generally acceptable as indicating proper persons to sign applications for foreign applicants.”

If a person doesn’t have apparent authority to sign, proof of authority may be required:

“Proof that a person has the authority to sign on behalf of a legal entity may take the form of a copy of a resolution of the board of directors, a provision of the bylaws, or a copy of a paper properly delegating authority to that person to sign the international application on behalf of the legal entity.”

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Tags: authority to sign, Corporate Signature, international application, Legal Entity Signature, PCT