Post-grant patent proofreading remains indispensable in maintaining the integrity and strength of granted patents. It serves as a crucial quality control measure, ensuring that the patent document accurately reflects the granted claims and specifications without errors or inconsistencies. By meticulously reviewing granted patents, patent owners can identify any discrepancies or ambiguities that may arise during the prosecution process or due to clerical errors.
A mid-size east coast law firm were facing challenges with the quality of the granted patents. The current staff were occupied with day-to-day workload and were not able to proofread the granted patents to check for errors which had creeped in during drafting, prosecution, and clerical errors.
Assessment of workload – We assessed the backlog for total granted patents to be proofread along with the average new grants the law firm wants to proofread.
What to proofread – We listed down all the proofreading services we are offering like, face page, face page & claims, or the entire patent.
DnC implemented the following steps:
Bifurcation of back log and new grants – we divided the entire project into backlog and the new grants. We ascertain the time frame for clearing the backlog.
Resource allocation – DnC allocated a dedicated project manager to oversee the entire workflow and a resource to clear the backlog. We calculated the timeframe for clearing the backlog and got the clients confirmation. Another dedicated resource was allocated to proofread all the new grants to ensure those were not adding to the backlog.
Official Gazette – We agreed with the client to pull the issued patents directly from the weekly official gazette for the customer number for which the proofreading was to be done.
COC filed – There were nearly 30% granted patents where a certificate of correction was prepared and filed at the USPTO. Out of all the errors identified, 20% were in claims and 15% were in specifications.
Client Satisfaction – The law firms end customer was highly satisfied as the granted patents were error free and the ones which had errors were already rectified.
Higher billing – Law firms internal staff such as the paralegals and legal assistants were now able to focus on higher billing tasks without worrying about errors in granted patents sent to the client.
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