Technology area: Communications
5 pending office actions • 4 art units • 5 examiners • 0 of 5 (0%) have an AI response strategy ready • 11 patents granted in the last 365 days
Fortell Research Inc. has 5 pending office actions in Communications. The matters involve 5 distinct examiners across 4 distinct art units, showing that examiner assignments are fully distributed while the technical work has some art-unit concentration.
YU, NORMAN is the busiest examiner, with 1 pending matter. Since each examiner handles one pending matter, counsel should coordinate recurring communications technology positions across the art units without assuming that one examiner’s approach will govern the portfolio.
Difficulty is derived from the rejection statutes on the most recent pending office action. §101-driven and multi-statute cases are graded Hard; §112-only and obviousness-type double-patenting cases are graded Easy; everything else is Medium. "Unknown" means we have not yet parsed a statute for that office action.
| Bucket | Cases |
|---|---|
| §103 only | 3 (60%) |
| Multi-statute (no §101) | 2 (40%) |
How the docket's pending cases split across USPTO tech-center bands.
Manual office-action response work runs about 10 hours per case. The time-saved bands below show what IP Author's prosecution pipeline typically delivers — a conservative 20% on the low end, 35% in the middle, 50% on the high end.
| Examiner | Apps on this docket | Allow rate | Interview lift |
|---|---|---|---|
| YU, NORMAN | 1 | 87.5% | +14.0% |
| JOSHI, SUNITA | 1 | 81.2% | +6.0% |
| REN, ZHUBING | 1 | 71.7% | +42.1% |
| RINEHART, SEAN MICHAEL | 1 | 65.4% | +40.0% |
| DABNEY, PHYLESHA LARVINIA | 1 | 76.6% | +14.8% |
Cases in front of an examiner with an allow rate of 80%+ where the difficulty is Easy or Medium. The top 2 ordered by deadline are shown.
| App # | Title | Examiner | Due in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 19216468 | EAR-WORN DEVICE WITH NEURAL NETWORK-BASED NOISE MODIFICATION AND/OR SPATIAL FOCUSING | YU, NORMAN | — |
| 19081230 | MIXING SPEECH AND NOISE IN AN EAR-WORN DEVICE BASED ON NOISE LEVEL | JOSHI, SUNITA | — |
Multi-statute / §101-driven matters, or cases in front of an examiner with an allow rate under 30%. The top 2 ordered by deadline are shown.
| App # | Title | Examiner | Due in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 19015099 | EAR-WORN DEVICES WITH REMOTE PAIRING TO OTHER EAR-WORN DEVICES | RINEHART, SEAN MICHAEL | — |
| 18950324 | NEURAL-NETWORK BASED DENOISING OF AUDIO SIGNALS RECEIVED BY AN EAR-WORN DEVICE CONTROLLED BASED ON ACTIVATION OF A USER INPUT DEVICE ON THE EAR-WORN DEVICE | DABNEY, PHYLESHA LARVINIA | — |
Cases in front of an examiner whose interview lift is 10 percentage points or more — i.e. interviewed cases historically resolve more favorably than non-interviewed ones. The top 4 ordered by deadline are shown.
| App # | Title | Examiner | Due in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 19216468 | EAR-WORN DEVICE WITH NEURAL NETWORK-BASED NOISE MODIFICATION AND/OR SPATIAL FOCUSING | YU, NORMAN | — |
| 19065431 | PERSONALIZING A SPEECH ENHANCEMENT NEURAL NETWORK USING SAMPLES OF A TARGET SPEAKER'S CLONED VOICE | REN, ZHUBING | — |
| 19015099 | EAR-WORN DEVICES WITH REMOTE PAIRING TO OTHER EAR-WORN DEVICES | RINEHART, SEAN MICHAEL | — |
| 18950324 | NEURAL-NETWORK BASED DENOISING OF AUDIO SIGNALS RECEIVED BY AN EAR-WORN DEVICE CONTROLLED BASED ON ACTIVATION OF A USER INPUT DEVICE ON THE EAR-WORN DEVICE | DABNEY, PHYLESHA LARVINIA | — |
| Art Unit | Apps |
|---|---|
| 2694 | 2 |
| 2693 | 1 |
| 2691 | 1 |
| 2658 | 1 |
| App # | Title | Examiner | Art Unit | Statutes | Status | Due in | AI | Filed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19216468 | EAR-WORN DEVICE WITH NEURAL NETWORK-BASED NOISE MODIFICATION AND/OR SPATIAL FOCUSING | YU, NORMAN | 2693 | §103 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | May 22, 2025 |
| 19081230 | MIXING SPEECH AND NOISE IN AN EAR-WORN DEVICE BASED ON NOISE LEVEL | JOSHI, SUNITA | 2691 | §103 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Mar 17, 2025 |
| 19065431 | PERSONALIZING A SPEECH ENHANCEMENT NEURAL NETWORK USING SAMPLES OF A TARGET SPEAKER'S CLONED VOICE | REN, ZHUBING | 2658 | §103 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Feb 27, 2025 |
| 19015099 | EAR-WORN DEVICES WITH REMOTE PAIRING TO OTHER EAR-WORN DEVICES | RINEHART, SEAN MICHAEL | 2694 | §103§112 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Jan 09, 2025 |
| 18950324 | NEURAL-NETWORK BASED DENOISING OF AUDIO SIGNALS RECEIVED BY AN EAR-WORN DEVICE CONTROLLED BASED ON ACTIVATION OF A USER INPUT DEVICE ON THE EAR-WORN DEVICE | DABNEY, PHYLESHA LARVINIA | 2694 | §102§103Other | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Nov 18, 2024 |
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Start Free TrialFortell Research Inc. has 5 pending office actions as of October 2026, spread across 4 art units and 5 examiners.
Norman Yu has the most, with 1 of Fortell Research Inc.'s pending office actions.
Mostly Communications (USPTO Tech Center 2600), based on where its pending office actions are examined.
