Prosecution Insights
Prosecution Insights
Technology area: Medical Devices & Mechanical Engineering
3 pending office actions • 3 art units • 3 examiners • 0 of 3 (0%) have an AI response strategy ready • 2 patents granted in the last 365 days
Makino Milling Machine Co., Ltd. currently manages 3 pending office actions within the Medical Devices & Mechanical Engineering technology area. These 3 pending office actions indicate the level of ongoing activity in the company's patent portfolio. The prosecution work is distributed across 3 distinct examiners, which means the company interacts with 3 different officials. With 3 distinct examiners involved, the portfolio is subject to a variety of individual scrutiny.
The company's applications are situated within 3 distinct art units. This distribution across 3 distinct art units reflects the technical scope for the pending matters within the medical devices and mechanical engineering sectors. VITALE, MICHAEL J is identified as the busiest examiner for this portfolio, currently overseeing 1 pending office action. Because VITALE, MICHAEL J is responsible for the 1 pending office action, the workload is spread across the various examiners. This distribution means that the busiest examiner manages 1 of the active patent applications, preventing a high concentration of matters under a single official.
Based on the USPTO statutory response window for each pending office action. 2 of the docket's apps have a known mailing date; the rest are excluded from the tile counts.
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 |
|---|---|
| §102 only | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| VITALE, MICHAEL J | 1 | 67.2% | +34.7% |
| HOTCHKISS, MICHAEL WAYNE | 1 | 69.5% | +49.6% |
| DION, MARCEL T | 1 | 40.8% | +37.1% |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18553050 | BELT PROCESSING DEVICE | DION, MARCEL T | 42d overdue |
| 18687775 | HOLE MACHINING METHOD, CONTROL DEVICE, AND MACHINE TOOL | VITALE, MICHAEL J | — |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18553050 | BELT PROCESSING DEVICE | DION, MARCEL T | 42d overdue |
| 18570997 | ROTARY TABLE AND MACHINE TOOL EQUIPPED THEREWITH | HOTCHKISS, MICHAEL WAYNE | 3d overdue |
| 18687775 | HOLE MACHINING METHOD, CONTROL DEVICE, AND MACHINE TOOL | VITALE, MICHAEL J | — |
| Art Unit | Apps |
|---|---|
| 3722 | 1 |
| 3726 | 1 |
| 3723 | 1 |
| App # | Title | Examiner | Art Unit | Statutes | Status | Due in | AI | Filed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18687775 | HOLE MACHINING METHOD, CONTROL DEVICE, AND MACHINE TOOL | VITALE, MICHAEL J | 3722 | §102§112 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Feb 28, 2024 |
| 18570997 | ROTARY TABLE AND MACHINE TOOL EQUIPPED THEREWITH | HOTCHKISS, MICHAEL WAYNE | 3726 | §102 | Final Rejection | 3d overdue | Pending | Dec 15, 2023 |
| 18553050 | BELT PROCESSING DEVICE | DION, MARCEL T | 3723 | §102§103§112 | Final Rejection | 42d overdue | Pending | Sep 28, 2023 |
IP Author helps IP teams respond to office actions faster with AI-generated responses, examiner analytics, and prosecution intelligence.
Start Free Trial