The so-called invalid patent right means that after the patent right is granted, it is found that it does not meet the conditions for granting patent rights in the Patent Law and its implementing regulations, and the patent reexamination board confirms and declares it invalid. In this case, the patent right that is declared invalid is deemed to have never existed from the beginning. After a patent is granted, if anyone thinks it is illegal, he or she can file an invalidation request with the Patent Reexamination Committee (Reexamination Committee) of the State Intellectual Property Office to invalidate the patent. In response to the invalidation request, the reexamination board may make a decision to maintain the validity of the patent right or declare all or part of it invalid. When will the review board's invalidation decision take effect? There is no clear provision in laws and regulations. The effective time of typical administrative actions can be divided into immediate effect, notification effect, receipt effect and (if conditions are attached) conditional effect. If the review board's decision to invalidate is considered an administrative act, when will it take effect? Since there are no conditions attached to the invalidation decision, there are three dates, namely the date the invalidation decision is made, the date it is issued, and the date it is delivered, which respectively correspond to the above-mentioned immediate effectiveness, notification effectiveness, and receipt effectiveness. The Supreme Court once held in an earlier case ((2012) Minti Zi No. 110) that the invalid decision should take effect from the date it is made. The reason is that the date of issuance and delivery may change due to human factors, and sometimes may be much later than the date of creation. If the invalid decision takes effect on the date of issuance or service, the period from the date of issuance to the date of issuance or service may be maliciously exploited by the parties, which may result in unreasonable results. Taking the date of creation as the date is time-sensitive and certain, so that the result can be fair. But on the other hand, the review board's process of making invalid decisions is more similar to judicial adjudication rather than typical administrative actions. For example, the invalidation procedure includes judicial features such as oral examination, cross-examination, and challenge; in addition, the invalidation procedure involves the participation of both parties, and the collegial panel makes an intermediate judgment; the responsibility of the collegial panel is not to comprehensively examine the validity of the patent, but mainly to determine the request of the petitioner. Whether the evidence and reasons for invalidating the patent are established. (At the same time, the collegial panel has limited authority to review ex officio.) If the invalidation decision made by the review committee is regarded as a quasi-judicial act, then its effective date cannot be the date of making. Instead, it takes effect when the prosecution period has elapsed or the court substantially upholds the decision (in practice, the court decides to reject the plaintiff's claim). Articles 29 and 30 of the "Interpretations of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Patent Infringement Dispute Cases (II)" indirectly support this proposition. Articles 29 and 30 respectively provide for the decision to declare the patent invalid ( The invalidation decision has not taken effect) and the decision to invalidate the patent right has not been brought to court within the time limit, or the decision has not been revoked by the effective judgment after the prosecution (the invalidation decision has taken effect). This means that at the court level, the patent invalidation decision will not take effect until the prosecution period expires or the effective judgment is not revoked. In practice, the Reexamination Board believes that the time when the patent invalidation decision takes effect is the date of announcement of the decision, which seems to be in order to echo the provisions of Article 39 of the Patent Law that the invention patent right shall take effect from the date of announcement. Since it takes at least half a year from the decision to the date of announcement of the decision, and if the party files a lawsuit against the invalid decision, the invalid decision will not be announced. Therefore, there is no contradiction between the review board’s identification standards and the court’s above-mentioned identification standards. In addition, according to Article 46 of the Trademark Law, if the statutory time limit expires and the party does not sue against the Trademark Review and Adjudication Board’s decision or ruling, the Trademark Board’s decision or ruling shall take effect. Let us look forward to the Fourth Amendment to the Patent Act.