St. Maarten Patent Guide

Registration
Following the dissolution of the Netherlands Antilles on 10 October 2010 St. Maarten became an autonomous country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

St. Maarten does not have its own patent law and it is not possible to register a patent. The only way to obtain protection for a patent is by filing either a European patent application with the Netherlands Patent Office, a department of the Netherlands Enterprise Agency, pursuant to the Kingdoms Patent Act or an International application under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) which is followed by entry into the European Phase of the application pursuant to the European Patent Convention. Registration of a patent via either of these two routes automatically provides protection in St. Maarten.