Monthly Minute | Design Patents
On March 8, the USPTO joined other intellectual property offices in celebrating International Women’s Day with a theme of “Invest in Women: Accelerate Progress.”...more
The United States Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO or PTO) recently announced proposed changes to certain fees it charges with respect to patent applications, design patents, and America Invents Act (AIA) trials. These...more
On April 20, the USPTO announced an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) seeking public input regarding potential PTAB reforms, including proposed changes to discretionary institution practices, petition word limits,...more
USPTO Delays Fee for Failure to File Applications in DOCX Format - In a notice published in the Federal Register earlier today (86 Fed. Reg. 66192), the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office announced that it was delaying the...more
USPTO Director Andrei Iancu and Deputy Director Laura Peter resigned from their respective posts prior to inauguration day. Commissioner for Patents Drew Hirschfeld and Senior Counsel Coke Morgan Stewart are temporarily...more
The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) published a Final Rule today in the Federal Register, viewable at 85 Fed. Reg. 46932 (August 3, 2020), announcing fee adjustments affecting all aspects of patent practice...more
One of the many concerns raised by the recent outage of the USPTO’s electronic filing system was the requirement to pay the surcharge due when a new U.S. application is not filed electronically. The surcharge is statutory...more
The USPTO has published a proposed fee schedule for patent fees likely to take effect October 1, 2017–the start of the USPTO’s next fiscal year. The proposed fee schedule makes “slight” changes to many fees, and more...more
Pre-AIA and Post-AIA Issues Presented by the On-Sale Bar - The “on-sale” bar to patentability refers to a sale or offer for sale of an invention that can invalidate the patent for that invention. The...more