The United States Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO) Office of the Chief Economist released an Economic Note and working paper examining the causal impacts from the first randomized control trial (RCT) undertaken by the USPTO. The RCT, which focused on patent applicants without legal representation (pro se applicants), aimed to improve examination outcomes. The analysis demonstrates that additional communication during patent examination was an effective way to improve patent examination outcomes for pro se applicants, especially for women.
An extended abstract of the paper was published in the 2022 Academy of Management (AOM) Proceedings (top 10% of submitted conference papers), and the paper was also awarded Best Paper Finalist for the Technology and Innovation Management (TIM) Division of AOM (top three of all TIM-submitted papers).
For more information, read the Economic Note on the USPTO website.