Prosecution Insights
Prosecution Insights
Technology area: Medical Devices & Mechanical Engineering
3 pending office actions • 1 art units • 3 examiners • 0 of 3 (0%) have an AI response strategy ready • 16 patents granted in the last 365 days
Hypertherm Inc. currently manages 3 pending office actions in the Medical Devices & Mechanical Engineering technology area. These 3 actions are being reviewed by 3 distinct examiners, all of whom are located within 1 distinct art unit. FULL, SIDNEY DANIELLE is the busiest examiner for the company, with 1 pending office action under her review.
Since 3 distinct examiners are each handling 1 of the 3 pending office actions, the portfolio's prosecution is distributed at the individual level. However, the use of 1 distinct art unit indicates a focused technical scope for these applications. To resolve the 3 pending office actions, the applicant must engage with 3 different examiners who all operate within the same art unit, likely sharing similar technical benchmarks. This structure requires managing 3 separate examiner relationships while maintaining a consistent technical argument across the 1 distinct art unit. Each of the 3 pending office actions will be decided by one of the distinct examiners.
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 | 2 (67%) |
| Multi-statute (no §101) | 1 (33%) |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| FULL, SIDNEY DANIELLE | 1 | 69.9% | +67.6% |
| LEE JR, WOODY A | 1 | 84.6% | +12.9% |
| HUNTER, JOHN S | 1 | 82.9% | +22.7% |
Cases in front of an examiner with an allow rate of 80%+ where the difficulty is Easy or Medium. The top 1 ordered by deadline are shown.
| App # | Title | Examiner | Due in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18135939 | CARTRIDGE FOR A LIQUID-COOLED PLASMA ARC TORCH | HUNTER, JOHN S | — |
Multi-statute / §101-driven matters, or cases in front of an examiner with an allow rate under 30%. The top 1 ordered by deadline are shown.
| App # | Title | Examiner | Due in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18382355 | ELECTRODES FOR A PLASMA ARC PROCESSING SYSTEM | LEE JR, WOODY A | — |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18810432 | ABRASIVE SUSPENSION JET CUTTING SYSTEM HAVING REDUCED SYSTEM WEAR AND PROCESS MATERIALS RECLAMATION | FULL, SIDNEY DANIELLE | — |
| 18382355 | ELECTRODES FOR A PLASMA ARC PROCESSING SYSTEM | LEE JR, WOODY A | — |
| 18135939 | CARTRIDGE FOR A LIQUID-COOLED PLASMA ARC TORCH | HUNTER, JOHN S | — |
| Art Unit | Apps |
|---|---|
| 3700 | 1 |
| App # | Title | Examiner | Art Unit | Statutes | Status | Due in | AI | Filed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18810432 | ABRASIVE SUSPENSION JET CUTTING SYSTEM HAVING REDUCED SYSTEM WEAR AND PROCESS MATERIALS RECLAMATION | FULL, SIDNEY DANIELLE | — | §103 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Aug 20, 2024 |
| 18382355 | ELECTRODES FOR A PLASMA ARC PROCESSING SYSTEM | LEE JR, WOODY A | — | §102§103§112 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Oct 20, 2023 |
| 18135939 | CARTRIDGE FOR A LIQUID-COOLED PLASMA ARC TORCH | HUNTER, JOHN S | 3700 | §103 | Final Rejection | — | Pending | Apr 18, 2023 |
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