Prosecution Insights
Prosecution Insights
Technology area: Biotechnology & Pharmaceuticals
3 pending office actions • 2 art units • 3 examiners • 0 of 3 (0%) have an AI response strategy ready • 1 patents granted in the last 365 days
Ginkgo Bioworks Inc. is managing 3 pending office actions in the Biotechnology & Pharmaceuticals technology area. These actions are distributed across 3 distinct examiners. Despite the multiple examiners, the activity is concentrated within 2 distinct art units. JOHNSON, ALLISON MARIE is the busiest examiner, currently handling 1 busiest examiner pending action.
This distribution indicates a technical scope that requires coordination across 3 distinct examiners. With 3 pending office actions, the company's active prosecution is more distributed than the 1 busiest examiner pending action. The use of 2 distinct art units suggests that the technology spans multiple specialized classifications. Practitioners must manage 3 distinct examiners, which increases the variety of examiner behavior the company encounters. This multi-examiner environment requires a diversified prosecution strategy to address the 3 pending office actions effectively. The concentration in 2 distinct art units provides some level of predictability in the technical guidelines applied to 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 |
|---|---|
| Double-patenting + other | 1 (33%) |
| Multi-statute (no §101) | 2 (67%) |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| JOHNSON, ALLISON MARIE | 1 | 40.9% | +53.3% |
| HUMPHRIES, NICHOLAS ADAM | 1 | 36.1% | +75.9% |
| VANNI, GEORGE STEVEN | 1 | 67.4% | +24.4% |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18283688 | ORGANOPHOSPHORUS NERVE AGENT HYDROLYZING ENZYMES | JOHNSON, ALLISON MARIE | — |
| 17959679 | HIGH-THROUGHPUT AUTOMATED STRAIN LIBRARY GENERATOR | HUMPHRIES, NICHOLAS ADAM | — |
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 3 ordered by deadline are shown.
| App # | Title | Examiner | Due in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18283688 | ORGANOPHOSPHORUS NERVE AGENT HYDROLYZING ENZYMES | JOHNSON, ALLISON MARIE | — |
| 17959679 | HIGH-THROUGHPUT AUTOMATED STRAIN LIBRARY GENERATOR | HUMPHRIES, NICHOLAS ADAM | — |
| 17320513 | METHODS FOR MAKING A SYNTHETIC GENE | VANNI, GEORGE STEVEN | — |
| Art Unit | Apps |
|---|---|
| 1638 | 1 |
| 1631 | 1 |
| App # | Title | Examiner | Art Unit | Statutes | Status | Due in | AI | Filed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18283688 | ORGANOPHOSPHORUS NERVE AGENT HYDROLYZING ENZYMES | JOHNSON, ALLISON MARIE | 1638 | §102§103§112 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Sep 22, 2023 |
| 17959679 | HIGH-THROUGHPUT AUTOMATED STRAIN LIBRARY GENERATOR | HUMPHRIES, NICHOLAS ADAM | 1631 | §102§112 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Oct 04, 2022 |
| 17320513 | METHODS FOR MAKING A SYNTHETIC GENE | VANNI, GEORGE STEVEN | — | §112DP | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | May 14, 2021 |
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