Patents – Page 59 – Ant-Like Persistence

April 5, 2019

USPTO can now publish a new Federal Register notice about ePCT

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For many years the Best Practice for filing in RO/US has been to use a ZIP file as the way to provide the PCT Request to EFS-Web. Originally the only way create the ZIP file was PCT-SAFE. Three years ago WIPO announced that ePCT would be available starting on June 1, 2016 as a second way to create the ZIP file. Shortly after this announcement, USPTO published a Federal Register notice that put a cloud over the use of ePCT in this way. WIPO has made a change to ePCT that obviates concerns raised in that notice. Hopefully now the USPTO will publish a “cloud removal” Federal Register notice that expressly cites the previous notice and that expressly removes the cloud.

In this blog article I explain that at this point ePCT is now without question the Best Practice for creating the ZIP file. And I offer proposed language for a “cloud removal” Federal Register notice. Continue reading “USPTO can now publish a new Federal Register notice about ePCT”

March 31, 2019

The fourth annual US Utility Patent Toteboard is out

It is my honor to post the fourth annual US Utility Patent Toteboard. This toteboard lists the firms that obtained the most US utility patents in 2018.

You can see the other 2018 toteboards here.

March 31, 2019

e-filing at WIPO — back to normal

For the past three weeks the situation for e-filing at WIPO has been that the local time to e-file so as to get a same-day filing date in Switzerland has been different from usual. But today the people in Switzerland have turned their clocks forward. So things are back to normal.

For example if you are in the Mountain time zone, once again as of today you will be counting toward 4PM local time to get a same-day filing date in Switzerland. (For the past three weeks the answer was 5PM.)

March 28, 2019

Who doesn’t know the difference between a patent and a trademark? USA Today, that’s who.

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Today’s USA Today newspaper roasts a celebrity for getting a patent denied due to poor punctuation. The article is embarrassingly poorly written. Continue reading “Who doesn’t know the difference between a patent and a trademark? USA Today, that’s who.”

March 20, 2019

RO/EP joins the DAS system

This has indeed been a busy week for good news about Offices participating in the DAS system. Yet another piece of good news is that RO/EP has joined the DAS system. Continue reading “RO/EP joins the DAS system”

March 20, 2019

Georgia patent office joins the DAS system

This is a busy week for good news about participation in the DAS system. The Georgia patent office, whose formal name in English is the National Intellectual Property Center of Georgia, has joined the DAS system. Continue reading “Georgia patent office joins the DAS system”

March 20, 2019

Israel Patent Office joins the DAS system

I am delighted to have learned that the Israel Patent office has joined the DAS system. Continue reading “Israel Patent Office joins the DAS system”

March 19, 2019

Broken links in “get your numbers in for the toteboards”

Hello readers. After comments from several people I went to look closely at my four recent posts:

Each blog article contains four important links for you to click on:

a link to the questionnaire where you can enter your numbers for the particular category in that particular blog post, and
crosslinks to the other three blog posts.

In each case the questionnaire link works fine so far as I am aware. But until today, each place where there was a crosslink to one of the other three blog posts, the crosslink was no good. It asked for a user ID and password instead of taking you to the desired page.

Thanks to alert readers, I have hopefully corrected the crosslinks.

Hopefully everybody will get their numbers in soon.

March 10, 2019

Get your numbers in for the 2018 US Plant Patent tote board

It’s time for the second annual US Plant Patent Toteboard.

The goal of this toteboard is to list the firms that helped clients to obtain US plant patents in 2018. It will rank the firms according to the number of US plant patents obtained. Respondents are asked to report only US plant patents for which the firm is listed on the front page of the granted patent. Please respond by Thursday, March 21, 2019.

You can see the previous Toteboards here.

To send in your numbers for the 2018 US Plant Patent tote board, click here.

It is also time to report your numbers for the 2018 US Design Patent tote board and the 2018 US Utility Patent tote board and the 2018 trademark registration tote board.

March 10, 2019

Get your numbers in for the 2018 US utility patent tote board

A year ago I published the 2017 US Utility Patent Toteboard and before that, the 2016 US Utility Patent Toteboard, and a year before that the 2015 US Utility Patent Toteboard. Now it’s time to finalize and publish the 2018 US Utility Patent toteboard.

The goal of this toteboard is to list the firms that helped clients to obtain US utility patents in 2018. It will rank the firms according to the number of US utility patents obtained. Respondents are asked to report only US utility patents for which the firm is listed on the front page of the granted patent. Please respond by Thursday, March 21, 2019.

You can see the previous Toteboards here.

To respond to be listed in the US Utility Patent Tote Board, click here.

It is also time to report your numbers for the 2018 US design patent tote board and the 2018 US trademark registration tote board and the 2018 US plant patent tote board.