Within 12 months from the filing date of the provisional application, if the applicant fails to turn the provisional application into a formal application or file other formal applications related to the provisional application, the provisional application shall be deemed as abandonment.
Formally speaking, a formal application should include the following parts: instructions (required), drawings (if any), affidavits (or statements), or other information disclosure documents (IDS). Among them, the oath or statement can be replaced by a statement when the inventor dies, refuses to sign or cannot be contacted after efforts. The statement must record the relationship between the signatory of the statement and the inventor and the reasons why the oath or statement cannot be provided.
The filing date of American patent is subject to the completeness of the above application documents (description+necessary drawings) (the application fee and oath or statement can be paid within two months, but there will be an extension fee). Upon receipt of the applicant's application, uspto will forward the document to opap for formal review. If the relevant necessary drawings are missing, opap will issue an irrevocable correction notice within two months, and the date of supplementary drawings will be the application date. If the applicant fails to supplement it within the time limit, the case review procedure shall be suspended.
The priority policy of American patents is similar to that of China. The latter case requires that the priority of the former case should meet the following requirements: 1, the former case at least partially discloses some inventions of the latter case; 2. The inventor of the previous case is at least one of the inventors of the latter case (without asking the applicant); 3. It shall meet the requirements of 12 months.
The costs associated with American patents are related to the size of the applicant. According to the number of people, applicants are divided into micro-entities (individuals, non-profit organizations or enterprises with no more than 500 employees, among which the inventors have no more than 4 patents, and their annual income does not exceed 3 times of the average income of American families, and they have not authorized or transferred patents to entities with annual income exceeding 3 times of the average income of American families), small entities (individuals, non-profit organizations or enterprises with no more than 500 employees) and large entities (except the above). In terms of application fee, search fee, examination fee, etc. Small entities are half of large entities and micro entities are half of small entities. If efsweb system is adopted, the cost of small entities can be reduced by another half. It should be noted that if small entities transfer, license, authorize, etc. At any time during the validity of the patent, the relevant application will apply to the expenses of large entities. In other words, unless the relevant rights are ensured to belong to small entities from beginning to end, the expenses shall be calculated as large entities as far as possible.
If the applicant mistakenly believes that he belongs to a small entity in good faith and pays the relevant fees according to the small entity, after finding the relevant mistakes, he can overcome the above problems by submitting opinions and making up the difference. If the identity type of uspto applicant is maliciously deceived, the patent will not be enforced. In the United States, patents are considered unenforceable, which will lead the patentee to lose the patent lawsuit naturally and need to pay the defendant's lawyer's fees and legal fees.