United States Patent Office

The examination process by United States Patent Office after the patent application has been filed usually takes 12 to 18 months. This is so because it will depend on the workload and staffing of the United States Patent Office. The United States Patent Office examiners only verify that the description and claims per description by their inventors are new, unique, and not obvious to the United States Patent Office. The United States Patent Office examiners do not verify that an invention works or that it can ever be, or never has been, built. They try only to correctly verify that the invention is patentable and has not been patented in the U.S. before and their results have been overturned on more than one occasion. The United States Patent Office will not tell you if your invention has already been invented by someone else unless you apply for a patent.

To be patentable, an invention essentially must meet the following requirements set by United States Patent Office which are: (1) useful, (2) novel, and (3) non-obvious. The novelty requirement of United States Patent Office is often consider the entry test for patentability. The probably more demanding, non-obviousness requirement is harder to objectively define. The typical way that an examiner in United States Patent Office shows obviousness is to cite a number of prior art references that, when combined as suggested by possibly another prior art reference, contain all of the elements of the applicant's invention. The applicant generally challenges the logic of the combination and identifies certain secondary considerations that suggest that the invention was not obvious.

Inventors can make a search of patents already granted, text books, journals and other publications to be sure that someone else has not already invented their idea. They may hire someone to do it for them or may do this themselves at the Public Search Room of the United States Patent Office in Arlington, Virginia, on the PTO web page on the Internet, or at one of the Patent and Trademark Depository Libraries across the country.

When the United States Patent Office examiner has made his/her initial patentability determination, the United States Patent Office responds by sending the applicant what is known as an "Office Action" containing its determination and the reasons for it. If the Office Action contains a rejection of the claims, one can file a "Response," usually in the form of an Amendment, to overcome the rejection. There are usually only two Office Actions and Responses before a final determination is made by the United States Patent Office examiner as to the invention's patentability.