Request for Comments on the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program, 61195-61196 [2016-21306]

Download as PDF Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 172 / Tuesday, September 6, 2016 / Notices approximately 112 Firewalled Status Application Forms per year. Estimated Time per Response: 60 minutes. Estimated Total Annual Burden Hours: 112 (112 × 1 hour = 112 hours). Estimated Total Annual Cost to Public: NTIS expects to receive approximately 112 applications annually at a fee of $200 per application, for a total cost to the public of $22,400. The total annual cost reflects the cost to the Federal Government, which consists of the expenses associated with NTIS personnel reviewing and processing the Firewalled Status Application Forms. In addition, NTIS estimates that it will take a senior auditor within the organization one hour to complete the form at a rate of $135 per hour, for a total additional cost to the public of $15,120 (112 burden hours × $135/hour = $15,120). NTIS estimates the total annual cost to the public to be $22,400 in fees + $15,120 in staff time = $37,520. IV. Request for Comments Comments are invited on: (a) Whether the proposed collection of information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of the agency, including whether the information shall have practical utility; (b) the accuracy of the agency’s estimate of the burden (including hours and cost) of the proposed collection of information; (c) ways to enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information to be collected; and (d) ways to minimize the burden of the collection of information on respondents, including through the use of automated collection techniques or other forms of information technology. Comments submitted in response to this notice will be summarized and/or included in the request for OMB approval of this information collection; they also will become a matter of public record. Dated: August 31, 2016. Glenna Mickelson, Management Analyst, Office of the Chief Information Officer. [FR Doc. 2016–21279 Filed 9–2–16; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 3510–13–P mstockstill on DSK3G9T082PROD with NOTICES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE Patent and Trademark Office [Docket No. PTO–P–2016–0027] Request for Comments on the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program United States Patent and Trademark Office, Commerce. AGENCY: VerDate Sep<11>2014 17:04 Sep 02, 2016 Jkt 238001 ACTION: Request for comments. The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has a pilot program (Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program) in which an applicant, under certain conditions, can request a 12month time period to pay the search fee, the examination fee, any excess claim fees, and the surcharge (for the late submission of the search fee and the examination fee) in a nonprovisional application. The Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program is currently set to expire on December 31, 2016. The USPTO is seeking public comment on whether the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program offers sufficient benefits to the patent community for it to be made permanent or whether the USPTO should permit the program to expire. DATES: Comment Deadline Date: Written comments must be received on or before November 7, 2016. ADDRESSES: Comments should be sent by electronic mail message over the Internet addressed to: extendedmissingparts2016@uspto.gov. Comments may also be submitted by postal mail addressed to: Mail Stop Comments—Patents, Commissioner for Patents, P.O. Box 1450, Alexandria, VA 22313–1450, marked to the attention of Eugenia A. Jones. Although comments may be submitted by postal mail, the Office prefers to receive comments by electronic mail message over the Internet in order to facilitate posting on the USPTO’s Internet Web site. Electronic comments are preferred to be submitted in plain text, but also may be submitted in ADOBE® portable document format or MICROSOFT WORD® format. Comments not submitted electronically should be submitted on paper in a format that facilitates convenient digital scanning into ADOBE® portable document format. The comments will be available for public inspection at the Office of the Commissioner for Patents, currently located in Madison East, Tenth Floor, 600 Dulany Street, Alexandria, Virginia 22314. Comments also will be available for viewing via the USPTO’s Internet Web site (https://www.uspto.gov). Because comments will be made available for public inspection, information that the submitter does not desire to make public, such as an address or phone number, should not be included in the comments. It would be helpful to the USPTO if comments included information about: (1) The name and affiliation of the individual responding; and (2) an indication of whether the comments represent views SUMMARY: PO 00000 Frm 00015 Fmt 4703 Sfmt 4703 61195 of the respondent’s organization or are the respondent’s personal views. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Eugenia A. Jones, Senior Legal Advisor, Office of Patent Legal Administration, Office of the Deputy Commissioner for Patent Examination Policy, by telephone at (571) 272–7727, or Erin M. Harriman, Legal Advisor, Office of Patent Legal Administration, Office of the Deputy Commissioner for Patent Examination Policy, by telephone at (571) 272–7747. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: I. Background On December 8, 2010, after considering written comments from the public, the USPTO implemented the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program. See Pilot Program for Extended Time Period To Reply to a Notice to File Missing Parts of Nonprovisional Application, 75 FR 76401 (Dec. 8, 2010), 1362 Off. Gaz. Pat. Office 44 (Jan. 4, 2011). Over the course of the pilot program, the USPTO provided extensions of the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program through notices published in the Federal Register. The most recent notice extended the program until December 31, 2016, to allow the USPTO time to seek public comment on whether the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program offers sufficient benefits to the patent community for it to be made permanent. See Extension of Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program, 80 FR 80325 (Dec. 24, 2015), 1422 Off. Gaz. Pat. Office 192 (Jan. 19, 2016). Since the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program has been in place for more than five years, it is now a good opportunity to seek public comment on whether the program offers sufficient benefits to the patent community for it to be made permanent or whether the USPTO should permit the program to expire. Summary of the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program: In order for an applicant to be provided a 12-month (non-extendable) time period to pay the search and examination fees and any required excess claims fees in response to a Notice to File Missing Parts of Nonprovisional Application under the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program, the applicant must satisfy the following conditions: (1) The applicant must submit a certification and request to participate in the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program with the nonprovisional application on filing, preferably by using Form PTO/AIA/421, titled ‘‘Certification and Request for Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program’’; (2) the application must be an original (i.e., not a Reissue) nonprovisional E:\FR\FM\06SEN1.SGM 06SEN1 mstockstill on DSK3G9T082PROD with NOTICES 61196 Federal Register / Vol. 81, No. 172 / Tuesday, September 6, 2016 / Notices utility or plant application filed under 35 U.S.C. 111(a) within the duration of the pilot program; (3) the nonprovisional application must directly claim the benefit under 35 U.S.C. 119(e) and 37 CFR 1.78 of a prior provisional application filed within the previous 12 months, and the specific reference to the provisional application must be in an application data sheet under 37 CFR 1.76 (see 37 CFR 1.78(a)(3)); and (4) the applicant must not have filed a nonpublication request. As required for all nonprovisional applications, the applicant must satisfy filing date requirements and publication requirements. If the application submitted on filing does not meet the requirements for publication, or if the application is filed without any claims, the Office of Patent Application Processing will issue an appropriate notice setting a two-month (extendable) time period within which to respond. The Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program does not change the two-month time period set forth in any such notice. In accordance with 35 U.S.C. 122(b), the USPTO will publish the application promptly after the expiration of 18 months from the earliest filing date for which benefit is sought. If the applicant satisfies the requirements (discussed above) on filing of the nonprovisional application and the application is in condition for publication, the USPTO will send the applicant a Notice to File Missing Parts of Nonprovisional Application that sets a 12-month (non-extendable) time period to submit the search fee, the examination fee, any excess claims fees (under 37 CFR 1.16(h)-(j)), and the surcharge under 37 CFR 1.16(f) (for the late submission of the search fee and examination fee). If an applicant files a timely reply to the Notice to File Missing Parts within the 12-month time period and the nonprovisional application is completed, the nonprovisional application will be placed in the examination queue based on the actual filing date of the nonprovisional application. For additional discussion, see Pilot Program for Extended Time Period To Reply to a Notice to File Missing Parts of Nonprovisional Application, 75 FR 76401 (Dec. 8, 2010), 1362 Off. Gaz. Pat. Office 44 (Jan. 4, 2011), and Extension of the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program, 80 FR 80325 (Dec. 24, 2015), 1422 Off. Gaz. Pat. Office 192 (Jan. 19, 2016). II. Request for Public Comments The USPTO is requesting written public comments on whether the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program VerDate Sep<11>2014 17:04 Sep 02, 2016 Jkt 238001 should be made permanent. The USPTO seeks input from the public on the following: 1. Have you participated in the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program? If so, please discuss what aspects of the program you think are beneficial and what aspects are not. 2. Please discuss why an applicant would be discouraged from participating in the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program. 3. Do you think the USPTO should make the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program permanent? Why or why not? 4. Please provide any other input that you would like the USPTO to consider in determining whether the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program should be made permanent. Dated: August 29, 2016. Russell Slifer, Deputy Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Deputy Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office. [FR Doc. 2016–21306 Filed 9–2–16; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 3510–16–P DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE Patent and Trademark Office [Docket No. PTO–C–2016–0032] USPTO Cancer Moonshot Challenge United States Patent and Trademark Office, Commerce. ACTION: Notice. AGENCY: The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) publishes this notice to announce the Cancer Moonshot Challenge, which was launched on August 22, 2016, to enlist the public’s help to leverage the USPTO’s intellectual property data, often an early indicator of meaningful research and development, and combine it with other economic and funding data. This challenge supports the goals and objectives of the National Cancer Moonshot, a Presidential initiative to speed up cancer advances, make more therapies available to more patients, and improve the ability to prevent cancer and detect it at an early stage. This notice provides the public with information on participation and application requirements for the challenge, including the judging criteria, submission requirements, and rules of eligibility. SUMMARY: Challenge Deadline: The deadline for submissions is September 12, 2016, 5:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST). DATES: PO 00000 Frm 00016 Fmt 4703 Sfmt 4703 All individuals or entities who wish to participate in the challenge must register and submit their entry through www.challenge.gov. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: For further information, please contact Thomas A. Beach, Office of the Under Secretary and Director, at 571–272– 8600. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: ADDRESSES: I. About the Challenge Background Cancer is undoubtedly a disease that touches all our lives. Ending cancer as we know it requires the formation of new alliances. As President Obama noted, getting this done isn’t just going to take the best and brightest across the medical, research, and data communities—but millions of Americans owning a stake of it. By harnessing the power of patent data and accelerating the process for protecting the intellectual property that leads to cancer immunotherapy breakthroughs, the USPTO is standing up and doing its part to help bring potentially life-saving treatments to patients, faster. The Challenge With data released through the USPTO Developer Hub, users are building rich visualizations of intellectual property data, an early indicator of meaningful innovation and research and development (R&D), and combining this data with other state or agency data, such as census and bureau of labor statistics, and/or economic and financial data. These types of visualizations demonstrate the power of telling complex stories that lead to impactful insights and ask why the data matters. Similarly, we challenge you to create and illuminate new trend lines and interactive mappings of innovation with visualizations for all types of cancer treatments and diagnostics by combining our data with other unique data. Be sure to list the sources of your data sets (i.e., orange book data from the FDA), tools, and assumptions used to form your conclusion and visualizations. Imagine your data visualizations will be the foundation to empower the Federal Government—as well as the medical, research, and data communities—to make more precise funding and policy decisions based on the commercialization lifecycle of the most promising treatments, while maximizing U.S. competitiveness in cancer investments. Using analytic tools, processes, and other interoperable data sets, we are challenging you to develop interactive visualizations and stories that can help E:\FR\FM\06SEN1.SGM 06SEN1

Agencies

[Federal Register Volume 81, Number 172 (Tuesday, September 6, 2016)]
[Notices]
[Pages 61195-61196]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2016-21306]


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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

 Patent and Trademark Office

[Docket No. PTO-P-2016-0027]


Request for Comments on the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program

AGENCY: United States Patent and Trademark Office, Commerce.

ACTION: Request for comments.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

SUMMARY: The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has a 
pilot program (Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program) in which an 
applicant, under certain conditions, can request a 12-month time period 
to pay the search fee, the examination fee, any excess claim fees, and 
the surcharge (for the late submission of the search fee and the 
examination fee) in a nonprovisional application. The Extended Missing 
Parts Pilot Program is currently set to expire on December 31, 2016. 
The USPTO is seeking public comment on whether the Extended Missing 
Parts Pilot Program offers sufficient benefits to the patent community 
for it to be made permanent or whether the USPTO should permit the 
program to expire.

DATES: Comment Deadline Date: Written comments must be received on or 
before November 7, 2016.

ADDRESSES: Comments should be sent by electronic mail message over the 
Internet addressed to: extendedmissingparts2016@uspto.gov. Comments may 
also be submitted by postal mail addressed to: Mail Stop Comments--
Patents, Commissioner for Patents, P.O. Box 1450, Alexandria, VA 22313-
1450, marked to the attention of Eugenia A. Jones.
    Although comments may be submitted by postal mail, the Office 
prefers to receive comments by electronic mail message over the 
Internet in order to facilitate posting on the USPTO's Internet Web 
site. Electronic comments are preferred to be submitted in plain text, 
but also may be submitted in ADOBE[supreg] portable document format or 
MICROSOFT WORD[supreg] format. Comments not submitted electronically 
should be submitted on paper in a format that facilitates convenient 
digital scanning into ADOBE[supreg] portable document format.
    The comments will be available for public inspection at the Office 
of the Commissioner for Patents, currently located in Madison East, 
Tenth Floor, 600 Dulany Street, Alexandria, Virginia 22314. Comments 
also will be available for viewing via the USPTO's Internet Web site 
(https://www.uspto.gov). Because comments will be made available for 
public inspection, information that the submitter does not desire to 
make public, such as an address or phone number, should not be included 
in the comments. It would be helpful to the USPTO if comments included 
information about: (1) The name and affiliation of the individual 
responding; and (2) an indication of whether the comments represent 
views of the respondent's organization or are the respondent's personal 
views.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Eugenia A. Jones, Senior Legal 
Advisor, Office of Patent Legal Administration, Office of the Deputy 
Commissioner for Patent Examination Policy, by telephone at (571) 272-
7727, or Erin M. Harriman, Legal Advisor, Office of Patent Legal 
Administration, Office of the Deputy Commissioner for Patent 
Examination Policy, by telephone at (571) 272-7747.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: 

I. Background

    On December 8, 2010, after considering written comments from the 
public, the USPTO implemented the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program. 
See Pilot Program for Extended Time Period To Reply to a Notice to File 
Missing Parts of Nonprovisional Application, 75 FR 76401 (Dec. 8, 
2010), 1362 Off. Gaz. Pat. Office 44 (Jan. 4, 2011). Over the course of 
the pilot program, the USPTO provided extensions of the Extended 
Missing Parts Pilot Program through notices published in the Federal 
Register. The most recent notice extended the program until December 
31, 2016, to allow the USPTO time to seek public comment on whether the 
Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program offers sufficient benefits to the 
patent community for it to be made permanent. See Extension of Extended 
Missing Parts Pilot Program, 80 FR 80325 (Dec. 24, 2015), 1422 Off. 
Gaz. Pat. Office 192 (Jan. 19, 2016). Since the Extended Missing Parts 
Pilot Program has been in place for more than five years, it is now a 
good opportunity to seek public comment on whether the program offers 
sufficient benefits to the patent community for it to be made permanent 
or whether the USPTO should permit the program to expire.
    Summary of the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program: In order for 
an applicant to be provided a 12-month (non-extendable) time period to 
pay the search and examination fees and any required excess claims fees 
in response to a Notice to File Missing Parts of Nonprovisional 
Application under the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program, the 
applicant must satisfy the following conditions: (1) The applicant must 
submit a certification and request to participate in the Extended 
Missing Parts Pilot Program with the nonprovisional application on 
filing, preferably by using Form PTO/AIA/421, titled ``Certification 
and Request for Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program''; (2) the 
application must be an original (i.e., not a Reissue) nonprovisional

[[Page 61196]]

utility or plant application filed under 35 U.S.C. 111(a) within the 
duration of the pilot program; (3) the nonprovisional application must 
directly claim the benefit under 35 U.S.C. 119(e) and 37 CFR 1.78 of a 
prior provisional application filed within the previous 12 months, and 
the specific reference to the provisional application must be in an 
application data sheet under 37 CFR 1.76 (see 37 CFR 1.78(a)(3)); and 
(4) the applicant must not have filed a nonpublication request.
    As required for all nonprovisional applications, the applicant must 
satisfy filing date requirements and publication requirements. If the 
application submitted on filing does not meet the requirements for 
publication, or if the application is filed without any claims, the 
Office of Patent Application Processing will issue an appropriate 
notice setting a two-month (extendable) time period within which to 
respond. The Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program does not change the 
two-month time period set forth in any such notice. In accordance with 
35 U.S.C. 122(b), the USPTO will publish the application promptly after 
the expiration of 18 months from the earliest filing date for which 
benefit is sought.
    If the applicant satisfies the requirements (discussed above) on 
filing of the nonprovisional application and the application is in 
condition for publication, the USPTO will send the applicant a Notice 
to File Missing Parts of Nonprovisional Application that sets a 12-
month (non-extendable) time period to submit the search fee, the 
examination fee, any excess claims fees (under 37 CFR 1.16(h)-(j)), and 
the surcharge under 37 CFR 1.16(f) (for the late submission of the 
search fee and examination fee). If an applicant files a timely reply 
to the Notice to File Missing Parts within the 12-month time period and 
the nonprovisional application is completed, the nonprovisional 
application will be placed in the examination queue based on the actual 
filing date of the nonprovisional application.
    For additional discussion, see Pilot Program for Extended Time 
Period To Reply to a Notice to File Missing Parts of Nonprovisional 
Application, 75 FR 76401 (Dec. 8, 2010), 1362 Off. Gaz. Pat. Office 44 
(Jan. 4, 2011), and Extension of the Extended Missing Parts Pilot 
Program, 80 FR 80325 (Dec. 24, 2015), 1422 Off. Gaz. Pat. Office 192 
(Jan. 19, 2016).

II. Request for Public Comments

    The USPTO is requesting written public comments on whether the 
Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program should be made permanent. The 
USPTO seeks input from the public on the following:
    1. Have you participated in the Extended Missing Parts Pilot 
Program? If so, please discuss what aspects of the program you think 
are beneficial and what aspects are not.
    2. Please discuss why an applicant would be discouraged from 
participating in the Extended Missing Parts Pilot Program.
    3. Do you think the USPTO should make the Extended Missing Parts 
Pilot Program permanent? Why or why not?
    4. Please provide any other input that you would like the USPTO to 
consider in determining whether the Extended Missing Parts Pilot 
Program should be made permanent.

    Dated: August 29, 2016.
Russell Slifer,
Deputy Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Deputy 
Director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
[FR Doc. 2016-21306 Filed 9-2-16; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 3510-16-P

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