Now that our readers have had their fill of turkey and all the fixings, they can gorge on an abundance of patent petitions data. Earlier this year, Director of the USPTO Michelle Lee announced a new public, user-friendly tool to obtain information about the abundance and success rate of petitions of every nature. The information generally includes:
- The average number of days a petition is pending before a decision is made;
- The grant rate for a petition; and
- The office within the USPTO that makes the decision on the petition.
Whether you want to know how likely you are to obtain approval on a petition to make special for accelerated examination (just 38%), how long it takes to decide a petition for unintentional delay of a priority claim (102 days, with a grant rate of 55%), or how successful petitions to revive an abandoned patent application for unintentional delay are (a grant rate of 84% actually), the information is just a few mouse clicks away.
The tool is intended to allow applicants to make more informed decisions throughout the patent prosecution process. Be sure to use it to aid in your decision making process throughout patent prosecution.
Originally published December 1, 2015
This update is for information purposes only and should not be construed as legal advice on any specific facts or circumstances. Under the rules of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, this material may be considered as advertising.
