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Continuing patent application
Under United States patent law, a continuing patent application is a patent application that follows, and claims priority to, an earlier-filed patent application. A continuing patent application may be one of three types: a continuation, divisional, or continuation-in-part. Although continuation and continuation-in-part applications are generally available in the U.S. only, divisional patent applications are also available in other countries, as such availability is required under Article 4G of the Paris Convention.
From 1838 to 1861, inventors could file patent applications on improvements to their inventions. These were published as "additional improvement patents" and were given numbers preceded by "A.I.". About 300 of these patents were issued.
Under the law in the U.S., inventors may file several different types of patent applications to cover new improvements to their inventions or to cover different aspects of their inventions. These types of patent applications include "continuation", "divisional", "continuation in part", and "reissue".
A "continuation application" is a patent application filed by an applicant who wants to pursue additional claims to an invention disclosed in an earlier application of the applicant (the "parent" application) that has not yet been issued or abandoned. The continuation uses the same specification as the pending parent application, claims the priority based on the filing date of the parent, and must name at least one of the inventors named in the parent application. This type of application is useful when a patent examiner allowed some, but rejected other claims in an application, or where an applicant may not have exhausted all useful ways of claiming different embodiments of the invention.
During the prosecution of a continuation application, the applicant may not add additional disclosure to the specification. If the inventor needs to supplement the disclosure of the earlier parent application, he has to file a continuation-in-part application.
In the typical case, a patent examiner will examine patent claims and amendments in an original patent application for two rounds of "office actions" before ending examination. However, often two office actions are not enough to resolve all of the issues in the patent prosecution.
A request for continued examination (RCE) is a request by an applicant for continued prosecution after the patent office has issued a "final" rejection or after prosecution "on the merits" has been closed (for example by a Notice of Allowance or by a Final Rejection). An RCE is not considered a continuing patent application - rather, prosecution of the pending application is reopened. The inventor pays an additional filing fee and continues to argue his case with the patent examiner. No RCE was allowed prior to June 8, 1995.
Because of a large number of last-minute Requests for Continuing Examination (RCEs) due to new prior art being found, and the additional burden these RCEs impose on examination, the USPTO launched in May 2012 the Quick Path Information Disclosure Statement (QPIDS) Pilot Program. The program can be used to submit an Information Disclosure Statement (IDS) during the time interval after payment of the issue fee but prior to patent grant. Only if the examiner feels that the references on the IDS are material, a Request for Continuous Examination is executed and examination is reopened. Prior to QPIDS program, launching a full-scale RCE was the only option to introduce new prior art during that time interval. Filing a QPIDS request requires a payment of full RCE and IDS fees, which are refunded, if no RCE is opened. However, QPIDS petition fee is not returned.
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Continuing patent application
Under United States patent law, a continuing patent application is a patent application that follows, and claims priority to, an earlier-filed patent application. A continuing patent application may be one of three types: a continuation, divisional, or continuation-in-part. Although continuation and continuation-in-part applications are generally available in the U.S. only, divisional patent applications are also available in other countries, as such availability is required under Article 4G of the Paris Convention.
From 1838 to 1861, inventors could file patent applications on improvements to their inventions. These were published as "additional improvement patents" and were given numbers preceded by "A.I.". About 300 of these patents were issued.
Under the law in the U.S., inventors may file several different types of patent applications to cover new improvements to their inventions or to cover different aspects of their inventions. These types of patent applications include "continuation", "divisional", "continuation in part", and "reissue".
A "continuation application" is a patent application filed by an applicant who wants to pursue additional claims to an invention disclosed in an earlier application of the applicant (the "parent" application) that has not yet been issued or abandoned. The continuation uses the same specification as the pending parent application, claims the priority based on the filing date of the parent, and must name at least one of the inventors named in the parent application. This type of application is useful when a patent examiner allowed some, but rejected other claims in an application, or where an applicant may not have exhausted all useful ways of claiming different embodiments of the invention.
During the prosecution of a continuation application, the applicant may not add additional disclosure to the specification. If the inventor needs to supplement the disclosure of the earlier parent application, he has to file a continuation-in-part application.
In the typical case, a patent examiner will examine patent claims and amendments in an original patent application for two rounds of "office actions" before ending examination. However, often two office actions are not enough to resolve all of the issues in the patent prosecution.
A request for continued examination (RCE) is a request by an applicant for continued prosecution after the patent office has issued a "final" rejection or after prosecution "on the merits" has been closed (for example by a Notice of Allowance or by a Final Rejection). An RCE is not considered a continuing patent application - rather, prosecution of the pending application is reopened. The inventor pays an additional filing fee and continues to argue his case with the patent examiner. No RCE was allowed prior to June 8, 1995.
Because of a large number of last-minute Requests for Continuing Examination (RCEs) due to new prior art being found, and the additional burden these RCEs impose on examination, the USPTO launched in May 2012 the Quick Path Information Disclosure Statement (QPIDS) Pilot Program. The program can be used to submit an Information Disclosure Statement (IDS) during the time interval after payment of the issue fee but prior to patent grant. Only if the examiner feels that the references on the IDS are material, a Request for Continuous Examination is executed and examination is reopened. Prior to QPIDS program, launching a full-scale RCE was the only option to introduce new prior art during that time interval. Filing a QPIDS request requires a payment of full RCE and IDS fees, which are refunded, if no RCE is opened. However, QPIDS petition fee is not returned.