Innowacje i własność intelektualna · 14.11.2014

Changes To Permit Delayed Submission of Certain Requirements for Prioritized Examination

The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act includes provisions for prioritized examination of patent applications (also referred to as "Track I"), which have been implemented by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (Office) in previous rulemakings. The Office published an interim rule on March 5, 2014 (prioritized examination interim rule), to simplify the Track I prioritized examination practice to reduce the number of requests for prioritized examination that must be dismissed. In order to enable rapid processing and examination of those applications, the previous rulemakings provided that a request for Track I prioritized examination requires, upon filing of the application, an inventor's oath or declaration and all required fees, and that the application contain no more than four independent claims, thirty total claims, and no multiple dependent claims. If a request for Track I prioritized examination failed to meet these requirements on filing, then the request was dismissed. After operating under the previous rulemakings for some time, the Office determined that the time period for meeting the identified requirements could be expanded and still enable the Office to timely e