Technology areas: Chemistry & Materials • Medical Devices & Mechanical Engineering
2 pending office actions • 2 art units • 2 examiners • 0 of 2 (0%) have an AI response strategy ready • 1 patents granted in the last 365 days
The Middleby Corporation has 2 pending office actions distributed across the Chemistry & Materials technology area. These matters are handled by 2 distinct examiners, indicating a lack of examiner overlap in the current portfolio. Furthermore, the filings are spread across 2 distinct art units, which suggests the technology may touch upon different sub-specialties within the Chemistry & Materials field. CORMIER, DAVID G is the busiest examiner for the portfolio, holding 1 busiest examiner pending action. Because the total of 2 pending office actions is split between the busiest examiner and one other, the workload is evenly distributed.
This distribution across 2 distinct art units requires monitoring of different examination styles and procedural nuances. The presence of 2 distinct examiners shows that each pending matter is receiving independent review without the benefit or risk of a single examiner's consolidated perspective. Practitioners should be prepared to manage different individuals who may have different interpretations of the filings. This structure suggests that the company's innovations are being evaluated in separate technical silos within the patent office. The involvement of 2 distinct art units means the company is interacting with different specialized groups. This distribution ensures that each case is being handled independently.
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 | 1 (50%) |
| §112 only | 1 (50%) |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| CORMIER, DAVID G | 1 | 64.6% | +28.7% |
| PAIK, SANG YEOP | 1 | 65.5% | +16.3% |
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 2 ordered by deadline are shown.
| App # | Title | Examiner | Due in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18977884 | AUTOMATED MULTI-BEVERAGE DISPENSER WITH SELF-CLEANING | CORMIER, DAVID G | — |
| 18420629 | CONTROL METHODS FOR INFRARED CONVEYOR OVENS | PAIK, SANG YEOP | — |
| Art Unit | Apps |
|---|---|
| 1711 | 1 |
| 3761 | 1 |
| App # | Title | Examiner | Art Unit | Statutes | Status | Due in | AI | Filed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18977884 | AUTOMATED MULTI-BEVERAGE DISPENSER WITH SELF-CLEANING | CORMIER, DAVID G | 1711 | §112 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Dec 11, 2024 |
| 18420629 | CONTROL METHODS FOR INFRARED CONVEYOR OVENS | PAIK, SANG YEOP | 3761 | §103 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Jan 23, 2024 |
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Start Free TrialThe Middleby Corporation has 2 pending office actions as of October 2026, spread across 2 art units and 2 examiners.
David G Cormier has the most, with 1 of The Middleby Corporation's pending office actions.
Mostly Chemistry & Materials (USPTO Tech Center 1700), based on where its pending office actions are examined.
