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(1) The German Patent and Trade Mark Office shall, on request, determine the state of the art that is to be taken into account in assessing the eligibility for protection of the subject matter of the utility model application or the utility model (search).
(2) The request may be filed by the applicant or the person registered as holder, and by any third party. It must be filed in writing. Section 28 applies accordingly.
(3) The receipt of the request is published in the Patent Gazette, but not before registration of the utility model. Where a third party has filed the request, the receipt of the request is additionally communicated to the applicant or the person registered as holder. Anyone is entitled to give the German Patent and Trade Mark Office indications as to the state of the art that is to be taken into account in assessing the eligibility for protection of the subject matter of the utility model application or the utility model.
(4) Where a request under paragraph 1 has been received, later requests are treated as not filed. Section 43(4), second and third sentences of the Patent Act applies accordingly.
(5) Where a request filed by a third party proves, after the communication to the applicant or the person registered as holder, to be ineffective, the German Patent and Trade Mark Office shall communicate this, in addition to the third party, also to the applicant or the person registered as holder.
(6) The German Patent and Trade Mark Office shall communicate the state of the art determined under paragraph 1 to the applicant or the person registered as holder and, where the request was filed by a third party, to that party and to the applicant or the person registered as holder, without guarantee of completeness, and shall publish in the Patent Gazette that this communication has been issued.