For the purposes of this Regulation, the following definitions shall apply:

‘Participating Member State’ means a Member State which participates in enhanced cooperation in the area of the creation of unitary patent protection by virtue of Decision 2011/167/EU, or by virtue of a decision adopted in accordance with the second or third subparagraph of Article 331(1) of the TFEU, at the time the request for unitary effect as referred to in Article 9 is made;

‘European patent’ means a patent granted by the European Patent Office (hereinafter ‘EPO’) under the rules and procedures laid down in the EPC;

‘European patent with unitary effect’ means a European patent which benefits from unitary effect in the participating Member States by virtue of this Regulation;

‘European Patent Register’ means the register kept by the EPO under Article 127 of the EPC;

‘Register for unitary patent protection’ means the register constituting part of the European Patent Register in which the unitary effect and any limitation, licence, transfer, revocation or lapse of a European patent with unitary effect are registered;

‘European Patent Bulletin’ means the periodical publication provided for in Article 129 of the EPC.