Portions of 37 CFR. Parts 1 and 11 were made final by the USPTO.  The final rule was published in the Federal Register / Vol 73  No.222 / Monday, November 17, 2008 / Rules ...

The USPTO is proposing limiting documents that may be sent via fax and specifying a minimum font size.  The release in the Federal Register said, in part:

In today's Federal Register, the USPTO published a notice clarifying which rules are in effect after the Tafas v. Dudas Ruling.  The announcements says:

The USPTO announced it will extend the duration, increase the maximum number of applications, and expand the scope of applications eligible to participate in the Peer Review Pilot. The pilot, launched in June 2007, encourages the public to review voluntee ...

The program will begin July 28, 2008 and end on July 28, 2009 or upon acceptance of 100 requests.   There are special requirements to ensure that the applications are from "diverse technologies."    The concept of the ...

On June 10, the USPTO published new rules that will improve the process of ex parte appeals before the USPTO’s Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences (BPAI). The final rule provides new requirements and clarifications that will help to streamline ...

A new case, Litecubes, LLC v. N. Light Prods., 2008 U.S. App. LEXIS 9166, 29-37 (Fed. Cir. Apr. 28, 2008), attempts to clarify the “often-confused boundary between elements of a federal claim, which must be established before relief ...

The USPTO and the European Patent Office (EPO) announced that they intend to launch a new trial cooperation initiative called the Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH) in September. The PPH will leverage fa ...

The USPTO announced that it is initiating a six-month pilot program that will allow an applicant to have an interview with the patent examiner prior to the first Office action on the merits in a new utility application. The First Action Interview Pilot pr ...

The USPTO is offering pilot program through which law students will be able to gain practical exp ...

The PTO released new Written Description Training Materials, which are intended to “supersede and replace the 1999 training materials.” Much of the material is related to biochemistry examples; however, there are examples which are relevant ...

On April 1, 2008, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia granted summary judgment and permanently enjoined the USPTO from implementing the Final Rules that were to have taken effect on November 1, 2007. Judge ...