USPTO (United States Patent and Trademark Office) announced updated patents fees in a final rule, effective January 19, 2025. These fee adjustments aim to effectively and efficiently administer the U.S. patent system and continue progress toward achieving its strategic goals.
The updated patent fees provide additional resources to reflect the budgetary impact of new discounts enacted under the Unleashing American Innovators Act for small businesses, independent inventors, and others who qualify as “small entities” (discount of 60%) or “micro entities” (discount of 80%).
The patent proposal is shaped by public feedback USPTO received since the publishing of the Federal Register Notice on April 20, 2023, that announced plans to set or adjust patent fees. On May 18, 2023, the Patent Public Advisory Committee (PPAC) held a public hearing in Alexandria, Virginia, and invited members of the public to submit comments on fee adjustments. Following the hearing, PPAC provided a written report detailing the public comments received and its recommendations regarding the proposed fees. All comments, advice, and recommendations, were considered and analyzed and on April 3, 2024, following which a notice of proposed rulemaking on setting and adjusting patent fees was published. Again, additional comments were invited and considered. In response, USPTO decided not to move forward with three targeted proposals and revised an additional three targeted proposals.
The three fee changes that are not moving forward include:
· a new fee for After Final Consideration Pilot 2.0 requests;
· a targeted increase to the patent term adjustment fee; and
· terminal disclaimer tiered fees.
The three revised fee changes (and their revisions) include:
· upward adjustment of the timing thresholds for continuing applications (as shown below);
· substantial reduction to the adjusted patent term extension fee (as shown below); and
· elimination of the proposed new tier for third and subsequent requests for continued examination, and corresponding adjustments to the existing fee for second and subsequent requests (as shown below).
On the whole, the adjustment shows fee increasing, including significant ones like patent application filing fees, patent search fees, post-issuance fees, patent petition fees, patent term fees, PCT fees - national stage, Hague international design application fees, with the highest change percentage reach 200%. Only patent extension of time fees for provisional application decrease around 75% to 86%. For more information on these fee adjustments, please visit the fee setting section of the USPTO website.
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