Technology area: Chemistry & Materials
1 pending office actions • 1 art units • 1 examiners • 0 of 1 (0%) have an AI response strategy ready
USA Rare Earth, LLC maintains a company patent portfolio within the Chemistry & Materials technology area. The portfolio currently contains 1 pending office action. This action is assigned to 1 distinct examiner, KIM, SUN U, who is the busiest examiner for the company. The prosecution activity is situated within 1 distinct art unit. KIM, SUN U is responsible for the 1 busiest examiner pending action.
The involvement of 1 distinct examiner means that the outcome of the pending portfolio is subject to the review of KIM, SUN U. This structure in 1 distinct art unit defines the prosecution strategy. Practitioners should note that the company's patent trajectory is tied to this point of review. The presence of 1 pending office action indicates the phase of intellectual property development for the company. The 1 distinct examiner and 1 distinct art unit represent the scope of the portfolio's engagement with the patent office. Because only 1 distinct art unit is involved, the technical focus is limited to the subject matter handled by that unit. The 1 pending office action constitutes the total active workload for the company in the Chemistry & Materials area. This concentration in a single art unit and examiner suggests a concentrated approach to patenting.
Based on the USPTO statutory response window for each pending office action. 1 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 |
|---|---|
| Multi-statute (no §101) | 1 (100%) |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| KIM, SUN U | 1 | 78.2% | +11.6% |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18364387 | APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR METAL EXTRACTION | KIM, SUN U | 40d |
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 1 ordered by deadline are shown.
| App # | Title | Examiner | Due in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18364387 | APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR METAL EXTRACTION | KIM, SUN U | 40d |
| Art Unit | Apps |
|---|---|
| 1777 | 1 |
| App # | Title | Examiner | Art Unit | Statutes | Status | Due in | AI | Filed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18364387 | APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR METAL EXTRACTION | KIM, SUN U | 1777 | §102§103 | Final Rejection | 40d | Pending | Aug 02, 2023 |
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Start Free TrialUSA Rare Earth, LLC has 1 pending office actions as of October 2026, spread across 1 art units and 1 examiners.
Sun U Kim has the most, with 1 of USA Rare Earth, LLC's pending office actions.
Mostly Chemistry & Materials (USPTO Tech Center 1700), based on where its pending office actions are examined.
