IBM recently took a giant step forward to position itself as a leader in the new frontier of cloud computing.

It’s common for patent applications to suffer at least one rejection during prosecution. To overcome rejections, patent professionals will often request an interview with the assigned USPTO examiner. But are some examiners more receptive to interviews than others?

To speed up patent prosecution and minimize unnecessary Requests for Continued Examination (RCEs), the USPTO enacted the After Final Consideration Pilot (AFCP) 2.0 program as an alternative response to a final rejection. The plan was to increase communication between examiners and applicants and take those applications that are close to allowance across the finish line, without requiring the time and cost inevitably associated with an RCE. 

Editor’s Note: Juristat doesn’t take a position in the software patentability debate. The views reflected in this piece are meant to be informative and do not necessarily reflect the views of Juristat or the authors themselves.

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.