In Insights, there is the option of using the Examiner Analysis report, which will help you to forecast examiner behavior based on historical record analysis to help you form a concrete prosecution strategy to potentially save time, money and gain valuable patent rights.
This report will allow you to:
- Estimate the length of the patent examination process: Use examiner analytical data to predict the length of the examination review. Identify likely actions and average response times of the examiner. Compare the average response times of the examiner with the overall response of the Art Unit where your application is under review to identify any unusual examination times that require prosecution strategy adjustment.
- Understand the most frequent responses of an examiner: Analyze the examiner's most frequent responses to transform examiner data into actionable insights.
To access this, choose the "Examiner Analysis" option on the Key Reports list:
Once you have clicked this option, you will be able to type in an examiner's name and see the art unit that they are associated with. You can then Create the Report based on this examiner.
Once you have created the report, you will see the options in the top-right corner of the screen, which will allow you to export or delete it.
You are able to see an Examiner Profile for them, which provides you with details of their allowance rate, average time of allowance, average number of office actions and the percentage of cases that are currently in the appeal process. These will all be in comparison to the art unit that they operate within. You can see some brief personal information for them as well.
The average number of office actions can give an indication of the leniency of the examiner and the average number of office actions to expect with an application that is under review by the examiner.
After this, you can see the Average Office Action Times for this examiner, which breaks down the average time that it would take them to perform the 1st, 2nd and 3rd office actions for a given patent application along with the average issuance time. All these times are again compared with the art unit they operate within.
Analysis into examiner grant times gives an indication of their performance, which can be useful to set expectations, plan the most effective response and assist with budgeting. The identified risks can then be communicated to colleagues or clients, and recommendations given.
Next, you will be able to see an Allowance Rate Analysis for this examiner which provides you with their overall allowance rate percentage along with the percentage of these applications which are allowed before and after the first Final Rejection.
This is useful to understand the examiner's tendencies and whether getting allowance from the examiner will be challenging or if they are more willing to accept argument or amendments.
You can then see a Reason for Rejection Analysis, which provides you with the reasons that the examiner rejected particular applications which is broken down to the different stages of the prosecution process.
This is useful information as it will allow you to plan for each stage of the process and direct your strategy to actively avoid the likely reasons for rejection and subsequently bypass any potential rejections.
Finally, you can see the Top Assignee Applicants who have applications assigned to this examiner along with their allowance. This indicates the type of organization this examiner is accustomed to reviewing patents of.
