Below is information that may be useful for those considering taking the Patent Bar Examination, including:

1. New Patent Practice Rules

2. When is the next administration of the patent bar exam?

3. Who may take the patent bar exam?

4. Patent Bar Review Course

5. How do I find information from the USPTO?

 

New Patent Practice Rules

Recently the United States Patent Office released new rules of practice that relate to claims and continuations. These new rules will take effect on November 1, 2007. Similarly, the Patent Office has proposed additional new rules that relate to the claiming of inventions in the alternative, and the U.S. Congress continues to consider significant legislative reform. All of these changes should be expected to significantly change the face of patent practice moving forward.

We have been told by the Office of Enrollment & Discipline that there will be no changes to the patent bar exam without at least 90 days notice. So if you are studying for the exam or planning on taking the exam during the fall the old rules of procedure will apply.

 

The Next Administration of the Exam

The Patent Office has revise the way in which the patent bar examination will be administered. In the past, the examination was administered twice a year using examination booklets and multiple choice grading forms. The Patent Office has now decided to move to a frequently administered computer-based examination. This change will make the testing process more efficient and should benefit applicants by permitting faster notification of test results. The computer-based examination will also facilitate more frequent administration and permit the test to be given simultaneously in many locations, thus reducing delays and travel expenses for applicants.

The Patent Office will maintain control over the development and content of the examination. A private sector entity, Prometric Inc., will be primarily responsible for administration of the examination. Applicants for registration to practice will apply to the Office of Enrollment and Discipline for approval to sit for the examination. Upon approval, the applicant will be assigned a ninety (90) day time period during which he or she may sit for the examination. The applicant will then contact Prometric and arrange for a convenient examination date and location within that approved test-taking period.

There will be two government fee payments associated with each application for registration: an application fee and a registration examination fee. These fees will be payable at the time the application is submitted to the Patent Office. The nonrefundable application fee is expected to be $40.00. The computer-based examination fee is expected to be $200.00. A service fee of approximately $150.00 would be charged by Prometric to the applicant. The total cost will, therefore, be in line with the cost of previous administrations of the examination.

Beginning on July 26, 2004, the Patent Bar Exam moved to a computer-based, virtually on-demand exam, available at a testing site near you. The Patent Office has offers yearly written administration of the examination in Washington, DC, normally during the month of July. Written, paper exams will be administered only once per year, the test will be conducted at the Patent Office and the cost for such examination is higher than the cost to sit for the computerized examination. Those interested in taking the exam in paper format should consult the Office of Enrollment and Discipline for more information.

 

Who Can Take the Patent Bar Exam?

In order to represent inventors in their quest to obtain US patents you must be admitted to practice in front of the United States Patent Office. In order to become a patent attorney or patent agent it is necessary to take and pass the Patent Bar Examination. Only those individuals with scientific education are allowed to sit for the examination, and you do not need any legal training to take the exam. The burden is placed on individuals applying for the examination to demonstrate that they possess the scientific and technical training necessary to provide valuable service to patent Applicants. An Applicant will be considered to have the necessary scientific and technical training if he or she provides an official transcript showing that a Bachelor’s degree was awarded in one of the following subjects by an accredited United States college or university, or that the equivalent to a Bachelor’s degree was awarded by a foreign university in one of the following subjects:

Science Degrees	Engineering Degrees
Biology Biochemistry Botany Computer Science* Electronics Technology Food Technology General Chemistry Marine Technology Microbiology Molecular Biology Organic Chemistry Pharmacology Physics Textile Technology	Aeronautical Engineering Agricultural Engineering Biomedical Engineering Ceramic Engineering Chemical Engineering Civil Engineering Computer Engineering Electrical Engineering Electrochemical Engineering Engineering Physics General Engineering Geological Engineering Industrial Engineering Mechanical Engineering Metallurgical Engineering Mining Engineering Nuclear Engineering Petroleum Engineering

 
Please note that with Computer Science degrees the school the degree is awarded by must be accredited by the Computer Science Accreditation Commission (CSAC) of the Computing Sciences Accreditation Board (CSAB), or by the Computing Accreditation Commission (CAC) of the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET), on or before the date the degree was awarded. Computer science degrees that are accredited may be found on the Internet (http://www.abet.org ).

For those who do not qualify as a result of having a bachelors degree in one of the above disciplines, the most common way of demonstrating the technical sophistication required is to resort to what is called Category B. Under Category B an applicant can qualify to sit for the patent bar examination through fulfillment of one of four options.

Option 1: 24 semester hours in physics. Only physics courses for physics majors will be accepted.

Option 2: 32 semester hours in a combination consisting of the following:

• 8 semester hours of chemistry or 8 semester hours of physics,and

• 24 semester hours in bio logy,botany,microbiology,or molecular biology.

• The 8 semester hours in chemistry or 8 semester hours of physics must be obtained in two sequential semesters, each semester including a lab. Only courses for science or engineering majors will be accepted.

Option 3: 30 semester hours in chemistry. Only chemistry courses for chemistry majors will be accepted.

Option 4: 40 semester hours in a combination consisting of the following:

• 8 semester hours of chemistry or 8 semester hours of physics,and

• 32 semester hours of chemistry, physics, biology, botany, microbiology, molecular biology, or engineering.

• The 8 semester hours of chemistry or 8 semester hours of physics must be obtained in two sequential semesters, each semester including a lab. Only courses for science or engineering majors will be accepted.

All acceptable coursework for Options 2 and 4 must be for science or engineering majors.

Those who do not satisfy the bachelors degree requirement should consult the General Requirements Bulletin for a more detailed explanation of what courses may be counted. Additionally, there is a Category C that will allow individuals to petition to sit for the exam based on practical experience, but in my experience qualifying under this section is virtually impossible (i.e., I have NEVER seen anyone fulfill the requirements of Category C no matter who brilliant and technically sophisticated).

If you do not qualify to sit for the patent bar but are close in the number of credits you can always just take a few more science courses. I have known many who have done this. The Patent Office does not seem to care where the course work is completed, as long as the courses are completed.

 

Patent Bar Review Course

There are a number of patent bar exam review courses available for students to choose from, some good and others not so good. As with most things in life, you normally get what you pay for. In my experience the patent bar review courses that are more expensive tend to be better than those that are marketed as appropriate for those on a tight budget. One of the reasons there are a proliferation of inexpensive courses is because there are a number of free resources available to anyone with Internet access, so it can be easy to put materials together and have a bargain patent bar review course. What I have always told my law school students is that if they are going to pay under $1,000.00 for a course they might as well just keep their money and collect the available information for themselves. There is no point wasting the money to get a cheap patent bar review course.

I have been teaching patent bar review courses for the Practicing Law Institute since 2001. This is an excellent course. It comes both in live lectures and in home study, and the focus of the course is the information you need to know in order to pass the actual exam. PLI’s main competitor offers a patent bar review course that is more geared toward understanding patent law and patent practice, which is fine, but not necessarily calculated to lead to success on the exam. The PLI course provides a detailed outline, hundreds of practice and drill questions, exercises designed to help you put likely exam content into context, and a computerized exam simulation containing 800 patent bar questions. For more information on this course go to PatentBarReview.com.

 

Information from the USPTO

For more information on the Patent Bar Examination, requirements for sitting for the exam, and an application for the examination go to the Office of Enrollment and Discipline web page.