Technology area: Chemistry & Materials
7 pending office actions • 7 art units • 7 examiners • 0 of 7 (0%) have an AI response strategy ready • 10 patents granted in the last 365 days
Ulvac Inc. maintains a company patent portfolio with 8 pending office actions in the Chemistry & Materials technology area. This volume of activity is spread across 7 distinct examiners and 7 distinct art units. Such a wide distribution suggests that the portfolio covers a broad range of chemical and material science innovations, requiring review from many different specialized groups at the patent office.
MCDONALD, RODNEY GLENN is the busiest examiner for this portfolio, currently managing 2 pending office actions. The remaining workload is distributed among the other distinct examiners. This means that while the busiest examiner has a higher workload, the portfolio is largely decentralized. For practitioners, this diversity of 7 distinct examiners and 7 distinct art units presents a complex management task, as they must adapt to many different sets of examiner behaviors. The fact that 8 pending office actions involve 7 distinct examiners highlights a high degree of variety in the examination process. This decentralized approach across 7 distinct art units ensures that each matter is reviewed by a specific technical expert.
Based on the USPTO statutory response window for each pending office action. 3 of the docket's apps have a known mailing date; the rest are excluded from the tile counts.
Every pending office action with a known statutory deadline, placed on a days-until-due axis. Dots left of Today are overdue; the further right, the more runway. Cases that share a deadline window stack vertically. 3 of the docket's apps have a known mailing date.
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 | 4 (57%) |
| Multi-statute (no §101) | 3 (43%) |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| BENNETT, CHARLEE | 1 | 58.8% | +35.1% |
| MCDONALD, RODNEY GLENN | 1 | 63.7% | +24.3% |
| DAGENAIS, KRISTEN A | 1 | 64.0% | +19.8% |
| CARTER, JONATHAN LANGDON | 1 | 100.0% | +0.0% |
| SONG, MATTHEW J | 1 | 60.4% | +13.9% |
| KLUNK, MARGARET D | 1 | 44.0% | +31.5% |
| MCCORMACK, JOHN PATRICK | 1 | 71.3% | +28.8% |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18761500 | ETCHING APPARATUS AND ETCHING METHOD | CARTER, JONATHAN LANGDON | — |
Multi-statute / §101-driven matters, or cases in front of an examiner with an allow rate under 30%. The top 3 ordered by deadline are shown.
| App # | Title | Examiner | Due in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18987741 | VACUUM TREATMENT APPARATUS AND VACUUM TREATMENT METHOD | BENNETT, CHARLEE | 40d |
| 18942842 | PROCESS FOR PRE-LITHIATION AND EQUIPMENT FOR IMPLEMENTING THE SAME | DAGENAIS, KRISTEN A | — |
| 18408369 | ETCHING DEVICE AND ETCHING METHOD | KLUNK, MARGARET D | — |
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 6 ordered by deadline are shown.
| App # | Title | Examiner | Due in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18872170 | METHOD FOR CONTROLLING SPECIFIC RESISTIVITY AND STRESS OF TUNGSTEN THROUGH PVD SPUTTERING METHOD | MCDONALD, RODNEY GLENN | 19d |
| 18987741 | VACUUM TREATMENT APPARATUS AND VACUUM TREATMENT METHOD | BENNETT, CHARLEE | 40d |
| 17996985 | VACUUM FREEZE-DRYING METHOD, INJECTION NOZZLE FOR A VACUUM FREEZE-DRYING APPARATUS, AND VACUUM FREEZE-DRYING APPARATUS | MCCORMACK, JOHN PATRICK | 65d |
| 18942842 | PROCESS FOR PRE-LITHIATION AND EQUIPMENT FOR IMPLEMENTING THE SAME | DAGENAIS, KRISTEN A | — |
| 18700218 | METHOD FOR MANUFACTURING CRYSTALLIZED LAMINATED STRUCTURE | SONG, MATTHEW J | — |
| 18408369 | ETCHING DEVICE AND ETCHING METHOD | KLUNK, MARGARET D | — |
| Art Unit | Apps |
|---|---|
| 1718 | 1 |
| 1794 | 1 |
| 1717 | 1 |
| 1713 | 1 |
| 1714 | 1 |
| 1716 | 1 |
| 3762 | 1 |
| App # | Title | Examiner | Art Unit | Statutes | Status | Due in | AI | Filed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18987741 | VACUUM TREATMENT APPARATUS AND VACUUM TREATMENT METHOD | BENNETT, CHARLEE | 1718 | §103§112 | Final Rejection | 40d | Pending | Dec 19, 2024 |
| 18872170 | METHOD FOR CONTROLLING SPECIFIC RESISTIVITY AND STRESS OF TUNGSTEN THROUGH PVD SPUTTERING METHOD | MCDONALD, RODNEY GLENN | 1794 | §103 | Final Rejection | 19d | Pending | Dec 05, 2024 |
| 18942842 | PROCESS FOR PRE-LITHIATION AND EQUIPMENT FOR IMPLEMENTING THE SAME | DAGENAIS, KRISTEN A | 1717 | §102§103 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Nov 11, 2024 |
| 18761500 | ETCHING APPARATUS AND ETCHING METHOD | CARTER, JONATHAN LANGDON | 1713 | §103 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Jul 02, 2024 |
| 18700218 | METHOD FOR MANUFACTURING CRYSTALLIZED LAMINATED STRUCTURE | SONG, MATTHEW J | 1714 | §103 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Apr 10, 2024 |
| 18408369 | ETCHING DEVICE AND ETCHING METHOD | KLUNK, MARGARET D | 1716 | §103§112 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Jan 09, 2024 |
| 17996985 | VACUUM FREEZE-DRYING METHOD, INJECTION NOZZLE FOR A VACUUM FREEZE-DRYING APPARATUS, AND VACUUM FREEZE-DRYING APPARATUS | MCCORMACK, JOHN PATRICK | 3762 | §103 | Final Rejection | 65d | Pending | Oct 24, 2022 |
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Start Free TrialUlvac Inc. has 7 pending office actions as of October 2026, spread across 7 art units and 7 examiners.
Charlee Bennett has the most, with 1 of Ulvac Inc.'s pending office actions.
Mostly Chemistry & Materials (USPTO Tech Center 1700), based on where its pending office actions are examined.
