Posted by: Zeev Fisher in Untagged on
Jan 20, 2009
Israeli patent commissioner determines that from now on, publication of a design over the Internet which can be accessed from Israel will be considered a publication in Israel.
For the full circular text, click
Posted by: Zeev Fisher in USPTO on
Jan 11, 2009
An interesting Pateltly-o study shows that the number of appeals on examiners' decisions to the BPAI doubled within the past 3 years from less than 3,000 on 2005 to more than 6,000 on 2008. Naturally, the BPAI backlog also grew.
However, the number of complete reversals of the examiners decisions went down from 40% to 20%.
This is a very interesting piece of information. The main question here is whether applicants were appealing more because of the high success rate hence bringing to the BPAI table bad appeals (and thus lowering the success rate) or whether the BPAI merely decided to reverse less (or maybe the USPTO imrpoved examination dramatically as it likes to argue).
For the full Patently-O post, click here: BPAI Appeal Statistics: The Plummeting Reversal
Posted by: Zeev Fisher in USPTO on
Jan 04, 2009
An interesting story by patently-o.
Mr. Asokkumar Pal was a happy USPTO employee for 25 years. His performance was evaluated "outstanding" for 22 times.
Mr. Pal, who is a registered patent agent trained junior examiner's and taught the MPEP. He was everybody's pal.
Until 16 of his cases which was randomly selected were examined. It turned out that he erred in 35% of them.
Mr. Pal was fired, after an "unacceptable" performance evaluation. Simply put, the court ruled that the USPTO can fire its employees.
This is a sad story but it also tells us something. Quality assurance specialists is one of the main things that drive examiners and one of the main reasons for the extremely long and tough prosecution we encounter more and more recently.
The USPTO is going down on the QA specialists; they
Posted by: Zeev Fisher in EPO on
Dec 31, 2008
The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia has ratified the European Patent Convention and will become a member of the European Patent Organisation on 1 January 2009.
"The accession of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia means that companies and individual inventors can extend the protection of their intellectual property even further in the dynamic region of southeast Europe," said Alison Brimelow, President of the European Patent Office (EPO), the executive arm of the European Patent Organisation. "Patents play a vital role in helping firms to be innovative and competitive."
"From seven founding states to 35 members today, the Organisation has proved a success story of international cooperation and European integration; and it continues to grow," Brimelow added.
The European
Posted by: Zeev Fisher in PPH, CIPO on
Dec 26, 2008
On January 28,2008, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) commenced a Patent Prosecution Highway pilot program (PPH) which enabled an applicant whose claims have been determined allowablelpatentable in an applicatioil filed in the Canadian Intellectual Property Office (CIPO) to have the conesponding application filed in the USPTO be advanced out of turn for examination. See notice entitled "Patent Prosecution Highway Pilot Program bctween the United States Patent and Trademark Office and the Canadian Intellectual Property Office," 1327 Off Gnz Pat Office 45 (February 5,2008).
The USPTO indicated that the pilot prograin would last for a period of one year ending on January 28,2009, but may be extended for an additional time period thereafter.
In order to adequately assess
Posted by: Zeev Fisher in USPTO, US, United States, PPH on
Dec 20, 2008
Hi all!
Pendency periods in the USPTO have been awful within the last few years. It is a repeating scenario for all of us to sit in front of a client who never filed a patent application and advise him that he should expect 2-4 years before the first office action. Some clients are shocked. Some merely accept that this is a fact of life.
Lately, things are changing. While there is no improvement what so ever in pendency periods, the USPTO has replaced the old "petitions to make special" system and is trying various programs to improve examination. The candy is acceleration - your application steps out of the line and becomes first.
Applicant's age or health
Out of the old system, the only "survivors" are petitions to make special (to accelerate) based on the applicant's age (above 65) or
Posted by: Zeev Fisher in USPTO, PPH, EPO on
Dec 14, 2008
Revised Requirements for Requesting Participation in the Patent Prosecution Highway Pilot Program in the USPTO (Between the USPTO and the EPO)
On September 29,2008, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) commenced a Patent Prosecution Highway pilot program (PPH) with the European Patent Office (EPO), which was scheduled to last for a period of one year ending on September 29, 2009, but extendible for an additional year. A notice entitled "Patent Prosecution IHighway Pilot Program between the United States Patent and Trademark Office and European Patent Office" was published on October 21,2008 at 1335 Ofl Gaz. Pal. Office 196 providing the details of the PPH pilot program.
In view of suggestions recently received from our users, the USPTO has decided to modify the
A new decision by the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences states that a business method that uses a computer to manage a process is not patentable, when the "transformation" is of legal rights.
To read the full Ex parte Halligan decision, click here.
In addition, BPAI states again that a general purpose computer is not a "machine" for the purposes of bilski.
While it seem evident that the BPAI grows more and more anti-patent, I am not sure bilski really went so far, and it will be interesting to see what happens of this case or a similar case reaches the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.
For the time being, we are expecting even more difficult prosecution of software patents in the United
Posted by: Zeev Fisher in patent, Europe, EPO on
Nov 28, 2008
The Enlarged Board of Appeal (EBoA) of the EPO has made a ruling in an appeal connected to the so-called WARF/Thomson stem cell application.
The ruling contains clarifications to questions posed by a Technical Board of Appeal dealing with the patentability of the WARF application. This application describes a method for obtaining embryonic stem cell cultures from primates, including humans, and was filed by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF) in 1995.
No patent due to human embryo destruction
In 2006, the Technical Board competent for the case referred legal questions to the EBoA, in order to obtain clarity on a number of points.
Decisive in the EBoA ruling was the application's claim regarding human stem cell cultures. The EBoA decided that under the EPC it is not possible to
Posted by: Zeev Fisher in USPTO on
Nov 27, 2008
The USPTO has issued a clarification on a final rule that amends the rules governing practice before the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences (BPAI), which is to take effect on December 10, 2008. The final rule shall apply to all appeals in which an appeal brief is filed on or after this effective date. However, the Office will also accept appeal briefs in the new format before the December 10 effective date.
The Office recently discovered that several appeal briefs that had been filed in the new format have been held to be non-compliant because they were filed prior to the effective date of the new rule. This was not the intent of the rule and the Office seeks to clarify that it will not hold an appeal brief as non-compliant solely for following the new format even though it is
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