A frequent question I hear from inventors is “How long will it be until the Patent Office will look at my patent application?”
The answer? “It depends.” It depends on a number of factors, including but not limited to the number of applications in line in front of you AND how complex applications like yours are.
Following up on a recent discussion on the PatentLawPractice Yahoo! Group, Dennis Crouch has compiled a table showing what a typical (current) wait is for a patent application to receive a First Office Action. Typical wait periods range from fourteen (14) months for applications assigned to Tech Center (Art Unit) 3640 (Aeronautics, agriculture, fishing, trapping, vermin destroying, plant and animal husbandry, weaponry, nuclear systems and licensing & review) to forty (40) months for applications assigned to Tech Center (Art Unit) 2660 (multiplex communications).
So. How do you tell how long until your application will be examined?
Pull out your “Filing Receipt” and look for “Art Unit.” (see example below)
Then, take that number (3635 in the example above) and look it up in Dennis’ table. Then, take that number (months) and add it to your “Filing or 371(c) date.” In our example above, Art Unit 3630 (Static structures, supports and furniture) usually takes sixteen (16) months to get a First Office Action out the door.
So, how did the numbers stack up?? Not bad. The Office Action in that example was actually sent 15 months, 6 days after filing.
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