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Why The Uspto Should Adopt A Deferred Patent Examination System, David Peter Irimies

David Irimies

To date, the United States Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) has addressed its two main issues - backlog and stretching pendency times - primarily by throwing resources at them. This approach has failed. This paper explores how the USPTO adopting deferred examination on all non-provisional U.S. patent applications - similar to current Patent Cooperation Treaty practice - would help alleviate these issues. This paper proposes a deferral system, demonstrates how deferred examination could be done at the USPTO as part of its normal practice of examining patent applications, and discusses policy considerations that support and are antagonistic to the USPTO …