Rejections Prior to Issuance

by Dennis Crouch

I recently posted a chart showing that there is a significant difference in technology focus of patents tied to US-Inventors as compared with Non-US-inventors.  The following chart looks at the file histories of U.S. patents and asks what percentage received a rejection prior to issuance (blue) and what percentage received a Section 101 rejection prior to issuance (issued patents 2015-2020).   Overall, 83% of the patents received some sort of rejection prior to issuance. The vast majority of these rejections are based upon prior art – and are primarily Section 103 obviousness rejections.  13% of these patents were rejected on eligibility grounds prior to issuance.

Applications from US Inventors were significantly more likely to be rejected on eligibility than non-US Inventors (15% vs 10%).  However, that difference can be fully explained by differences in the types of patents being obtained. For example, US applications are much more likely to patent in the business-method group (as well as 8 of the top-9 art unit groups most likely to receive 101 rejections).   But, within the art units  groups, there is typically no difference between US and Non-US inventions in terms of eligibility rejections.  Thus, for my sample of business method patents, 75% of the patents in each group (US and Non-US inventors) received an eligibility rejection.  The data do reveal some outliers. In 1660-plants, non-us-inventor patents received 15% more eligibility rejections than us-inventor patents; while in 2760-printers & graphics, non-us-inventor patents received 10% fewer.

US Inventors

3 thoughts on “Rejections Prior to Issuance

  1. 2

    I claim a method for commerce, comprising:

    presenting a debit or credit card for payment;
    obtaining data from said debit or credit card;
    processing said data;
    using said data to determine if a transaction is authorized;
    generating a report stating whether said transaction is authorized;
    and completing a transaction if the report states that said transaction is authorized.

    NOW PAY ME $10,000,000,000,000 !

  2. 1

    “for my sample of business method patents, 75% of the patents in each group (US and Non-US inventors) received an eligibility rejection”

    I’m surprised that this number is so low. But I’m guessing that this includes CONs? Any idea what the number is when CONs are excluded?

    1. 1.1

      I’m surprised that this number is so low.

      Ben, ever the Lemming bureaucrat, is ‘surprised.’

      And I can imagine, disappointed as well.

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