USPTO Issues Proposed Rules to Implement the Micro Entity Provision for Paying Discounted Patent Fees

The USPTO has published proposed rules related to micro entity provisions in the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act. Smaller innovators qualifying for micro entity status receive a 75 percent discount on patent fees. The micro entity proposed rules were published in the Federal Register on May 30, starting a sixty-day public comment period. Read more at USPTO.

Micro Entity Status Inventors

Patent application filers may be able to qualify for Micro Entity status and qualify for 75% discount of patent filing fees. The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act, (AIA) signed by President Obama on September 16, 2011, creates this new status that entitles micro entity patent filers to a remarkable 75% discount on fees. Currently the regular fee for filing a provisional patent application is $250, the Small Entity fee is $125 and the Micro Entity fee would be $62.50.  Although, this status is supposed to be available as of the date of enactment of the AIA, the USPTO is not expected to place the Micro Entity fee system into effect until 2013.

To qualify as a Micro Entity, the filer must be a Small Entity and must meet the following criteria:

(1) The applicant has not been named as the inventor on a total of more than four utility patents (regular utility patents, not provisional patent applications), design patents or plant patents. This also does not include certain international PCT applications and applications owned by a previous employer. In addition, the applicant had to have had a gross income in the previous year of less than three times the median household income reported by the Bureau of the Census (The median household income has been hovering around $50,000 for the past two years.) In the event that the patent application has been assigned, the assignee had to have a gross (not net) income of less than three times the U.S. median household income; or

(2) the majority of the patent filer’s employment income is from an Institution of Higher Learning, or the applicant has assigned, or is obliged to assign the patent to an Institution of Higher Learning. An Institution of Higher Learning is a public or non-profit accredited institution that admits post-secondary students for programs of not less than 2 years.