The USPTO announced on April 13, 2009, the continuation of the patent prosecution high-way (PPH) with IP Australia. The PPH with IP Australia, dated April 14, 2008, allows an applicant whose patent has been granted in IP Australia, to have the corresponding application flied in the USPTO to be advanced out of line for examination.

The PPH has been extended in order to allow the USPTO to adequately assess the feasibility or the PPH pilot program.

The PPH between the Canadian Intellectual Property Office (CIPO) and the USPTO was also extended and a similar cooperation with the German patent office was declared on April 14, 2009.

Other countries participating in PPH programs with one or more other national patent offices include the European Union, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Japan, and

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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

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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

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Patently-O brings data relating to USPTO backlog

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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

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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

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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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Fees will recover costs for maintaining attorney-agent automated system; fund the disciplinary system.

Consistent with its commitment to e-government initiatives and promoting high standards of practice before the Office, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has adopted new annual practitioner maintenance fee rules for individuals recognized to practice in patent cases. The annual fee recovers costs to the USPTO of maintaining the roster of attorneys and agents authorized to practice in patent cases, including the USPTO disciplinary system. Beginning in the spring 2009, active patent practitioners will be required to pay a $118 annual practitioner maintenance fee. Adequate notice will be published and sent to practitioners in advance of the due date for payment of the

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I'd like to draw your attention to Dennis Crouch's latest posting on Patenly O, presenting an actual estimation of waiting times for a first USPTO Office Action .

I don't know if the statistics refer to all US Applications, i.e. including those filed as a PCT National Phase. As far as I know, Applications filed as a national phase of a PCT Application take longer than Applications originally submitted as a US Application.

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