Technology Center 3600 is somewhat of a catch-all tech center, with applicable technologies ranging from animal husbandry to furniture to robotics systems. The 3600s are also home to the business methods art units, which have been the subject of a great deal of interest and critical analysis following Alice v. CLS Bank Int’l., 573 U.S. ___(2014). Its average allowance rate is 61.1%, which is lower than the USPTO average of 71%.
Below is a ranking of the top 10 speediest firms by time to disposition in TC 3600. The firms were selected from IP Today’s top firms for 2015 and all have at least 250 disposed applications in the tech center. Time to disposition was measured by the average number of months between an application’s filing date and the date it was either patented or abandoned.

Technology Center 1600 covers a variety of biotech, chemical, and pharmaceutical technologies, as well as plants and cosmetics. Its overall allowance rate is 51%, which is significantly lower than the USPTO's average of 71%. In terms of speed to disposition, it takes an average of 36.1 months to prosecute an application to disposition in TC 1600, which is nearly equal to the USPTO average of 35.8 months.
Below is a ranking of the top 10 firms by allowance rate among IP Today's top patent firms.*

Obtaining a utility patent is not always an easy task. In order to do so, an inventor, normally assisted by a patent attorney, must demonstrate to the USPTO that a particular invention is worthy of a patent.

The USPTO evaluates worthiness using a strict set of patentability requirements aimed at ensuring that granted patents encourage innovation and productivity.

The five major patentability requirements are (1) subject matter, (2) utility, (3) novelty, (4) non-obviousness, and (5) the writing requirements. We will address of each of these criteria in turn.