At a town-hall meeting held last Friday, March 4th in Chicago, Under Secretary and Director Jon Dudas identified three new USPTO initiatives that will speed patent prosecution and which will save applicants about $30 million annually.
The initiatives include changing the rules for appeal conferences, eliminating the backlog of ex parte re-examinations and creating a more transparent office.
In a move that will save customers at least $30 million annually, Under Secretary Dudas announced that the USPTO will begin a program this year that allows applicants to request an appeal conference and learn the results before having to file an appeal brief. Currently, when applicants appeal rejections to the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences (BPAI), they must file a Notice of Appeal and an appeal brief. The next step is an appeal conference. Statistics demonstrate that appeal conferences result in approximately 60% of cases being returned to the patent corps. Under Secretary Dudas explained this important process reform, noting, "By eliminating a major processing cost now associated with appeal conferences, we are implementing the President's Management Agenda mandate that government be citizen-centered and results oriented."
In regard to ex parte re-exams, the Under Secretary announced that the USPTO will revamp the way it handles such requests in the future to ensure that re-examination remains a viable, cost-effective alternative to litigation. According to Under Secretary Dudas, the new system will allow the agency to complete processing of 420 cases that have been pending for more than two years. Three-examiner panels will be assigned to each re-examination, compared to the past practice of assigning a single examiner to each case. This initiative, which will be implemented in the near term, will ensure that all current and future ex parte re-examinations take no longer than two years to process.
In discussing his concept of a more transparent office, the Under Secretary pledged to provide USPTO customers not only with more information, but information and numbers that have greater meaning. This includes the way the agency measures pendency. "Our pendency measures need to be meaningful from the perspective of managing an office," Under Secretary Dudas declared. "I have asked for, and I am now receiving, statistics that give a realistic view of the current state of affairs in the office, giving us the information we need for specific improvements."
The Under Secretary's speech was delivered at a patent reform meeting sponsored by the American Intellectual Property Law Association, the Federal Trade Commission and the National Academy of Sciences.
(08Mar2005)
|
