Posts Tagged: "patent examination policy"

In part 1 of my interview with Stoll we discussed his adjusting to life in the private sector, the fact that he doesn’t enjoy the billable hour part of private practice (just like every other attorney I know) and we discussed politics a bit, as well as the U.S. economy and innovation policy. Part 2 of my interview, which appears below, picks up where we left off discussing Presidential politics and the buzz that engulfs D.C. every 4 years. We then move on to talk about how innovation drives the U.S. economy and I get his thoughts on why we haven’t seen a great new technology that has spawned an entirely new industry as we have coming out of so many recessions in the past. We then finish part 2 discussing changes to the patent examination process and how to streamline the examination process.

The new procedures measure seven diverse aspects of the examination process to form a more comprehensive composite quality metric. The composite quality metric is designed to reveal the presence of quality issues arising during examination, and to aid in identification of their sources so that problems may be remediated by training, and so that the presence of outstanding quality procedures may be identified and encouraged. The procedures will be implemented for fiscal year 2011.

With respect to Track I, of particular note is the fact that the Patent Office is considering limiting the number of claims in a prioritized application to four independent and thirty total claims. In addition, the USPTO is considering requiring early publication of prioritized applications so that applications would be published shortly after a request for prioritization is granted, or no later than eighteen months from the earliest filing date. While this will undoubtedly make those in the patent community nervous, I suggest holding off on reactionary judgment. Obviously, limiting the number of claims conjures up nightmare memories about the failed claims and continuations rules. The big problem there though was not the limitation of claims, it was the limitation of continuations. If the Patent Office wants smaller, bite-size patent applications I see no problem with that as long as continuation practice is not compromised. I see no reason to suggest continuation practice will be compromised, remembering full well that David Kappos famously opposed the rules by filing an affidavit in support of the AIPLA amicus brief to the District Court while then Vice President of IBM. Nevertheless, this bears watching.

The United States Patent and Trademark Office is seeking public comment on a major new patent examination initiative that would provide applicants greater control over the speed with which their applications are examined and promote greater efficiency in the patent examination process. This newly proposed Three-Track program aims to provide applicants with the ability to go faster or slower through the patent process, which will in turn hopefully reduce the pendency of those patent applications that are the most time sensitive. Under Track I applications will be expedited, under Track III they can be slowed at the applicants request.

Lets be perfectly clear, the Patent Office does not call me and ask my input regarding anything, which should be readily apparent to those who read IPWatchdog.com regularly.  Had the Patent Office done so, and actually taken my suggestions to heart the Department of Justice would not have needed to ask the Federal Circuit to hold off on taking the…

We argue, hour by hour, day by day, about large issues of morality and ethics and discuss how to make our nation “green”. We discuss large high-level issues like “should we have a public option for healthcare?”, but we give less attention to the details regarding what such an option might look like. Similarly, in the patent system, the public…