National Patent Application Drafting Competition

The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) started the National Patent Application Drafting Competition in 2014 to introduce law students to issues arising in U.S. patent law, and it has since evolved into a national law school competition. The competition gives law students an opportunity to develop patent skills by applying legal principles to a hypothetical invention scenario. Each team completes a search pertaining to the invention statement, drafts a utility patent application, and defends their decisions before a panel of judges composed of USPTO executives and staff, patent practitioners, academicians, and special guest judges from the intellectual property (IP) community.

Successful teams demonstrate an ability to draft a patent specification and claims that are both patentable over the prior art and valuable, in terms of breadth of the claims and other considerations relating to post-issuance enforcement of the patent.

The competition consists of five regional rounds held virtually and a national finals round. The winner of each regional round advances to compete in the national finals held at USPTO's headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia.

There is no entry fee; all eligible teams are encouraged to enter.