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DOC/PTO | RIN: 0651-AD64 | Publication ID: Fall 2024 |
Title: Setting and Adjusting Patent Fees During Fiscal Year 2025 | |
Abstract:
The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO or Office) takes this action to set and adjust Patent fee amounts to provide the Office with sufficient aggregate revenue to recover its aggregate cost of operations thereby maintaining a sustainable funding model. The new fee amounts will provide the Office with additional resources to decrease patent pendency and ensure robust and reliable patents are allowed while continuing to promote access to the patent system for underresourced individuals. This rule reflects feedback the Office has received throughout the rulemaking process. Initial feedback from members of the Patent Public Advisory Committee and the public, including organizations, practitioners, and independent inventors, was gathered during a public hearing held on May 18, 2023, and the subsequent public comment period following the hearing. The USPTO published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) on April 3, 2024.The NPRM included a 60-day comment period that closed on June 3, 2024, and is preparing a final rule that incorporates the feedback received on the NPRM.
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Agency: Department of Commerce(DOC) | Priority: Section 3(f)(1) Significant |
RIN Status: Previously published in the Unified Agenda | Agenda Stage of Rulemaking: Final Rule Stage |
Major: Yes | Unfunded Mandates: No |
CFR Citation: 37 CFR 1 37 CFR 41 37 CFR 42 | |
Legal Authority: Pub. L. 112-29 |
Legal Deadline:
None |
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Statement of Need: The purpose of this rule is to set and adjust patent fee amounts to provide sufficient aggregate revenue to cover the agency's aggregate cost of operations. To this end, this rule creates new or changes existing fees for patent services, and does so without imposing any new costs. |
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Summary of the Legal Basis: The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (AIA), enacted in 2011, provided USPTO with the authority to set and adjust its fees for patent and trademark services. This authority was extended an additional 8 years by the Study of Underrepresented Classes Chasing Engineering and Science Success (SUCCESS) Act of 2018. The USPTO has conducted an internal biennial fee review, in which it undertook internal consideration of the current fee structure, and considered ways that the structure might be improved, including rulemaking pursuant to the USPTO's fee setting authority. This fee review process involves public outreach, including, as required by the Act, a public hearing held by the USPTO's Patent Public Advisory Committee, as well as public comment and other outreach to the user community and public in general. |
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Alternatives: The alternatives are: 1) the final patent fee schedule to set and adjust patent fees, 2) setting fees at unit cost recovery, 3) a 12.5 percent across the board adjustment that would set fees by applying a one-time inflationary increase to all fees, and 4) the current fee schedule (no adjustments). |
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Anticipated Costs and Benefits: The proposed alternative has qualitative benefits of improved fee schedule design and securing aggregate revenue to recover aggregate cost that outweigh the minimal fee schedule design cost. The user fees charged by the USPTO for its services are considered transfer payments that do not affect the total resources available to society, and therefore the changes to patent fees proposed by this rulemaking are transfers, and are not costs of this rulemaking. |
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Risks: The USPTO will set and adjust patent fee amounts to provide the Office with a sufficient amount of aggregate revenue to recover the aggregate cost of patent operations in future years and operate within a sustainable funding model that supports the USPTO’s strategic goals and objectives. Therefore, one risk of taking no action could be that USPTO might not be able to recover its aggregate costs of operations in the long run. |
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Timetable:
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Regulatory Flexibility Analysis Required: YES | Government Levels Affected: None |
Small Entities Affected: Businesses, Organizations | Federalism: No |
Included in the Regulatory Plan: Yes | |
RIN Data Printed in the FR: Yes | |
Agency Contact: Brendan Hourigan Director, Office of Planning and Budget Department of Commerce Patent and Trademark Office P.O. Box 1450, Alexandria, VA 22313-1450 Phone:571 272-8966 Fax:571 273-8966 Email: brendan.hourigan@uspto.gov |