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Failure to do so will result in future communications being mailed to the old address, and there is no guarantee that these communications will be forwarded to applicant's new address. Applicant's failure to receive, and properly reply to these Office communications will result in the application being held abandoned. Notification of "Change of Address" should be made by separate letter, and a separate notification should be filed for each application.
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Nonprovisional utility application
A design patent is a type of legal protection for the unique visual qualities of a manufactured item. It may be granted for products with a distinct shape, configuration, or surface decoration. In other words, a design patent provides protection for the ornamental aspect of an item that also serves a practical function. The plane upon which a sectional view is taken should be indicated on the view from which the section is cut by a broken line. The ends of the broken line should be designated by Arabic or Roman numerals corresponding to the view number of the sectional view, and should have arrows to indicate the direction of sight.
What Steps Should You Take Before Filing a Design Patent?
A utility patent is for your best choice if you are concerned about competitors duplicating your invention. This could be duplicating the way the product works, or how the product is used. A design patent is right for you if your intention is to protect the appearance of your product. Often, inventors and savvy entrepreneurs find that it is best to apply for both utility and design patents.
Steps to File a Design Patent
A separate broken line figure should be used if the broken line obscures a clear understanding of the design. The photographs and drawings cannot be combined in the formal submission because of the potential of inconsistency. They should contain enough views, including front, rear, right and left sides, and top and bottom, to totally disclose the appearance of the design. They should also show surface shading that indicates contours, as well as open and solid areas of the design.
During this prosecution phase of the application process, the applicant may argue against the examiner’s reasoning and usually amend the application to overcome the cited issues affecting patentability. Amendments to the application’s drawings are limited in certain ways. For example, a utility patent on a smartphone could cover technology such as unlocking, video calling, and texting, whereas a design patent could cover the shape of the phone, such as the rectangular body with rounded edges of an iPhone.
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You may make a preliminary search of patents and other publications to discover if a particular invention or one similar to it has been shown in prior art. You may also consider employing patent attorneys or agents to do the search. On the other hand, the utility patent approval process takes nine to 14 months from start to finish. With a 15 years term starting from the date of grant, a design patent’s lifespan is shorter than utility… And are not eligible for renewal.
When necessary, a view of a large machine or device in its entirety may be broken into partial views on a single sheet, or extended over several sheets if there is no loss in facility of understanding the view. Partial views drawn on separate sheets must always be capable of being linked edge to edge so that no partial view contains parts of another partial view. A smaller scale view should be included showing the whole formed by the partial views and indicating the positions of the parts shown.
For regular, nonprovisional utility applications, these “sheets” should be filed electronically with other application documents via Patent Center. Preparing a patent application and conducting the proceedings requires knowledge of patent law, USPTO rules and procedures, and scientific or technical knowledge related to the particular invention. While you may prosecute the application without these skills, you might not get all the protection you can without an experienced attorney/agent’s help. So we suggest you hire a registered patent practitioner to draft and prosecute your application. Applying for a utility patent requires preparing very detailed and highly technical descriptions about the particular parts of the invention.
Individually or in combination, they can effectively represent the character and contour of most surfaces. Upon submission of a reply to an Office action, the application will be reconsidered and further examined in view of applicant's remarks and any amendments included with the reply. The examiner will then either withdraw the rejection and allow the application or, if not persuaded by the remarks and/or amendments submitted, repeat the rejection and make it Final. Applicant may file an appeal with the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) after given a final rejection or after the claim has been rejected twice. Applicant may also file a new application prior to the abandonment of the original application, claiming benefit of the earlier filing date.
In other countries, a registered design might serve a similar purpose to a design patent. In some European countries, design patents can be obtained through a fee and meeting basic registration criteria. No description, other than a reference to the drawing, is ordinarily required. The claim shall be in formal terms to the ornamental design for the article (specifying name) as shown, or as shown and described. The text of any added subject matter must be shown by underlining the added text. The text of any deleted matter must be shown by strike-through except that double brackets placed before and after the deleted characters may be used to show deletion of five or fewer consecutive characters.
Most titles have only one or two words that label the design based on consumer words, such as "chair," "wind chime," or "fish tank." A design patent protects the way a manufactured product looks but not the way it works or how it's structured. Businesses can protect their intellectual property (IP) rights over an original design by applying for patent protection. This should be done before entering the market to prevent a competitor from copying and profiting from your design. Design patents can be invalidated if the design is dictated solely by function (e.g. the outline of a key blade blank).
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