On 3rd May 2011, Qatar deposited its instrument of accession to the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT), and on 3rd August 2011, will become bound by the PCT. Consequently, Qatar came to be the 143rd PCT Contracting State.

Along with Qatar, there are now eleven Arab member states in the PCT. Along with Qatar, these are Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia and the United Arab Emirates.

Qatar issued its first patent law in 2006 by Decree Law No. 30 for 2006. The Ministry of Economy and Commerce is entitled to enforce this law, however this law has not yet come into force and there are no implementing regulations and no active patent office.

The Qatari patent law grants patents a term of protection for 20 years as from the grant date in Qatar, which looks a long term compared to the other PCT contracting states. The same law provides protection for all sorts of technologies, except the following: