By Porter Wright on The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) offers valuable IP-related business resources through an intellectual property (IP) attaché program. The program is structured to generally improve IP policies, laws and regulations abroad for the benefit of U.S. businesses and stakeholders, while providing country-specific IP-related materials and services to teach and inform. However, the program … Continue Reading
By Porter Wright on About two decades ago, Amazon.com, Inc. revolutionized e-commerce transactions with the innovation of single click buying. Single click buying is a checkout process that enables customers to bypass the shopping cart to make an online purchase with a single click based on payment and shipping information previously provided by the customer. Amazon received U.S. Patent … Continue Reading
By Porter Wright on It’s the month of March, and most of us are highly aware of the NCAA’s basketball tournament that dramatically decreases work productivity and determines the college basketball national champion. If you’re thinking about entering the hype and using any of the NCAA’s trademarks in your promotions and marketing this month, it’s important to consider your … Continue Reading
By Porter Wright on The US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has posted a warning on its website regarding solicitations that appear to be official notices (Click here for a sample). The notices come from private companies that are not associated with the USPTO. The notice is typically made to resemble an official notice from the USPTO by including … Continue Reading
By Marty Miller on The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act ("AIA") was enacted on September 16, 2011. The changes implemented by this Act are wide-ranging and significant, and different provisions have different effective dates, with many taking effect September 26, 2011, September 16, 2012, or March 16, 2013. We will be providing additional information in the coming weeks and months.… Continue Reading
By Porter Wright on According to a message to USPTO Employees from Director David Kappos, the Track One expedited patent examination program (discussed in this earlier post), scheduled to go into effect on May 4, 2011, is postponed until further notice. As reported in Hal Wegner’s newsletter, the cancellation is due to budgetary cuts and whether and when prioritized … Continue Reading
By Holly Kozlowski on Beginning May 4, 2011, a US patent applicant can request prioritized or "fast track" examination at the USPTO under the newly promulgated "Track 1" procedure of 37 C.F.R. 1.102(e). To obtain the Track 1 prioritized examination, the following conditions must be met when the application is filed: (1) the application must be an original utility or … Continue Reading
