Termination of the Production of ESPACE WORLD CD-ROMS

Since 1993, WIPO and the European Patent Office (EPO) have been collaborating to produce CD-ROMS containing material related to PCT applications, namely, the ESPACE WORLD series (containing bibliographic data and images of published PCT international applications).  When the CD-ROMS were first produced, they were considered to be a great technological development which ensured that a significant portion of patent information became available to users in a commonly accepted electronic format.  However, with the increasing popularity of the Internet as an information resource, and a corresponding decrease in the interest in the use of CD ROMS, WIPO and the EPO have decided to cease production of the ESPACE WORLD product at the end of 2009.

It is recalled that WIPO offers free online access to all published PCT international patent applications and their related documents through its PATENTSCOPE® search service at:

http://www.wipo.int/pctdb/en/index.jsp