More on the proposed changes to continuing applications

The Recorder, 28 Feb. 06: Jon Dudas is in for some tough questioning. Today, the director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office holds a town hall meeting to sell his plan for reforming the U.S. patent system to 375 patent attorneys, agents, inventors and business leaders at UC-Berkeley's International House.

The Recorder repeats the mistake about the number of continuations: At
least a third of the more than 400,000 applications filed in 2004 are
continuation applications, according to the agency.

There is also an issue of the number of claims. "In the last 15 years, the average number of claims in a patent has increased from 14 to 24 claims," Dudas said. "That's 4 million new claims each year that examiners have to look at." Applicants who wish to file applications with more than 10 claims will be
required to perform their own search for existing patents, using PTO standards.


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