Category: Industrial Designs

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Will the attached assignment be acceptable to the USPTO?

About once a month we at OPLF get an inquiry from an intellectual property firm located outside of the US regarding a client’s name change or assignment.  The inquiry is along the lines of:

Here is a draft Assignment from Company A to Company B.  Kindly advise whether this Assignment will be acceptable to the USPTO to transfer patent C from Company A to Company B.  Kindly advise what other documents if any will be needed and what this will cost.

Or the inquiry is along the lines of:

Here is an excerpt from the official corporate register of country A evidencing that the Company has officially changed its name from A to B.  Kindly advise whether this document will be acceptable to the USPTO to change the applicant name from A to B.  Kindly advise what other documents if any will be needed and what this will cost.

We find ourselves having to explain the same things, over and over again, to non-US counsel.  We hope that with this blog article we can save some time for everybody involved and answer some of the questions.  Continue reading “Will the attached assignment be acceptable to the USPTO?”

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Today is the day — Lithuanian patent office and the DAS system

Today is the day that the State Patent Bureau of the Republic of Lithuania becomes even more trendy, modern and up-to-date.   Today is the date that the Lithuanian patent office commences participation in the DAS system in four ways:

    • as a Depositing Office for purposes of national industrial design applications,
    • as a Depositing Office for purposes of national trademark applications,
    • as an Accessing Office for purposes of national industrial design applications, and
    • as an Accessing Office for purposes of national trademark applications.

You heard this exciting news from me first, in my blog posting of May 4, 2023.

The Lithuanian patent office has already been a participant in the DAS system since January 1, 2023 in these ways:

    • as a Depositing Office for purposes of national patent applications;
    • as an Accessing Office for purposes of national patent applications;  and
    • as an Accessing Office for purposes of PCT patent applications.

The two-letter code (ISO-3166 code) for this Office is “LT”.  The web site of the Lithuanian patent office may be seen here.

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July 4 a holiday at the USPTO

Tuesday, July 4, 2023 will be a federal holiday in the District of Columbia.  This means that the USPTO will be closed that day.

This means that any response that would normally be due on Tuesday, July 4 will be timely if made by Wednesday, July 5.

Note the important comment below from alert reader Dan Ferris:

It’s important to note that the “next business day” rule does not apply to the copendency requirement for filing divisional/continuation applications. Any such applications with parent applications issuing on July 4, 2023 should be filed no later than July 4, 2023.

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The State Patent Bureau of the Republic of Lithuania becomes even more trendy, modern and up-to-date

On July 1, 2023, the State Patent Bureau of the Republic of Lithuania will become even more trendy, modern and up-to-date.  That is the date that the Lithuanian patent office will commence participation in the DAS system in four new ways:

    • as a Depositing Office for purposes of national industrial design applications,
    • as a Depositing Office for purposes of national trademark applications,
    • as an Accessing Office for purposes of national industrial design applications, and
    • as an Accessing Office for purposes of national trademark applications.

The Lithuanian patent office has already been a participant in the DAS system since January 1, 2023 in these ways:

    • as a Depositing Office for purposes of national patent applications;
    • as an Accessing Office for purposes of national patent applications;  and
    • as an Accessing Office for purposes of PCT patent applications.

The two-letter code (ISO-3166 code) for this Office is “LT”.  The web site of the Lithuanian patent office may be seen here.

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Time of day at the IB returns to normal for US filers

Two weeks ago I blogged (see blog posting) that US filers filing PCT applications in RO/IB needed to pay extra close attention to what time it is in Switzerland.  (And it was the same for e-filers in the Madrid Protocol system.)  The reason is that in the US, Daylight Saving Time happened on March 12.  But did not happen on that day in Switzerland.  This meant that for the past two weeks, a US-based filer in (for example) the Mountain Time zone would be able to e-file in RO/IB as late as 5PM and still get a same-day filing date.  This differed from the usual drop-dead time of 4PM.

Today (March 26, 2023) is the day that Daylight Saving Time happens in Switzerland.  The consequence of this is that the time difference between the US filer’s time zone and the time in RO/IB is back to normal.  So for a US-based filer in the Mountain Time zone, the drop-dead time returns today to the usual 4PM.

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Are you in one of these 13 countries?

Are you in one of these 13 countries?

    1. Austria
    2. Denmark
    3. Estonia
    4. Eurasian Patent Organization (yes I realize this is not a country)
    5. Georgia
    6. Iran (Islamic Republic of)
    7. Italy
    8. Latvia
    9. Monaco
    10. Morocco
    11. New Zealand
    12. Republic of Korea
    13. Türkiye

If so, can you please let me know whether your DAS Depositing Office charges a fee for a DAS access code?  Please see this page where I am trying to collect all of the answers that kind readers have provided.

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USPTO corrupts credit card expiration dates in FM

click to enlarge

Hello folks.  Here is a warning that I saw today in a USPTO system when I was paying a government fee in Financial Manager:

Credit/Debit Card Expiration Dates
Due to a recent system upgrade, some card expiration dates may have been converted to an incorrect month for cards stored within Financial Manager.  …

Try to guess, dear reader, what the next few words were.  For example, maybe the next few words explained that the USPTO was working to restore the expiration dates to their correct values, but that this might take a day or two, and they apologize for the inconvenience.  Continue reading “USPTO corrupts credit card expiration dates in FM”