Prosecution Insights
Prosecution Insights
Technology area: Medical Devices & Mechanical Engineering
5 pending office actions • 4 art units • 5 examiners • 0 of 5 (0%) have an AI response strategy ready • 10 patents granted in the last 365 days
WestRock Shared Services, LLC maintains a portfolio in the Medical Devices & Mechanical Engineering technology area. The company is currently responding to 5 pending office actions. These actions are distributed among 5 distinct examiners, which suggests that no single examiner holds a majority of the current workload. This level of examiner diversity requires a broad strategy to address various examination styles.
The prosecution activity spans 4 distinct art units within the Medical Devices & Mechanical Engineering sector. ISLAM, SANJIDUL is listed as the busiest examiner, though this individual is only responsible for 1 of the pending office actions. This means the remaining 4 actions are spread across the other examiners. This breadth indicates that the portfolio covers a variety of technical sub-specialties.
Managing 5 pending office actions across 4 distinct art units necessitates a coordinated effort to ensure consistency in claim construction and arguments. Since the busiest examiner, ISLAM, SANJIDUL, only handles 1 pending action, the portfolio's progress is not heavily reliant on any single official. Practitioners must prepare for separate examiner interactions to resolve the current docket.
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 | 1 (20%) |
| §102 only | 1 (20%) |
| Multi-statute (no §101) | 3 (60%) |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| ISLAM, SANJIDUL | 1 | 62.3% | +39.9% |
| HIBBERT, MARY C | 1 | 66.4% | +26.5% |
| DEMEREE, CHRISTOPHER R | 1 | 68.9% | +14.1% |
| SANGHERA, SYMREN K | 1 | 51.5% | +12.1% |
| TAWFIK, SAMEH | 1 | 63.1% | +31.2% |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18686189 | PRODUCT CONTAINERS, PACKAGING SYSTEMS, PACKAGING METHODS, AND BLANKS AND METHODS FOR MAKING PRODUCT CONTAINERS | ISLAM, SANJIDUL | 62d |
| 18230947 | PACK TO POUCH SYSTEMS | HIBBERT, MARY C | — |
| 18013672 | PACKAGING SYSTEMS FOR MULTIPLE POTTED PLANTS AND ASSOCIATED BLANKS AND PACKAGING METHODS | SANGHERA, SYMREN K | — |
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 5 ordered by deadline are shown.
| App # | Title | Examiner | Due in |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18165899 | METHOD OF FORMING CONTAINERS HAVING A BOTTOM WALL WITH AN OPENING, SAME CONTAINERS, AND BLANKS FOR FORMING SAME | DEMEREE, CHRISTOPHER R | 1d overdue |
| 17589645 | MACHINE AND METHODS FOR FORMING, ERECTING, AND LOADING A POUCH WITH A PRODUCT | TAWFIK, SAMEH | 14d |
| 18686189 | PRODUCT CONTAINERS, PACKAGING SYSTEMS, PACKAGING METHODS, AND BLANKS AND METHODS FOR MAKING PRODUCT CONTAINERS | ISLAM, SANJIDUL | 62d |
| 18230947 | PACK TO POUCH SYSTEMS | HIBBERT, MARY C | — |
| 18013672 | PACKAGING SYSTEMS FOR MULTIPLE POTTED PLANTS AND ASSOCIATED BLANKS AND PACKAGING METHODS | SANGHERA, SYMREN K | — |
| Art Unit | Apps |
|---|---|
| 3731 | 2 |
| 3736 | 1 |
| 3734 | 1 |
| 3735 | 1 |
| App # | Title | Examiner | Art Unit | Statutes | Status | Due in | AI | Filed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18686189 | PRODUCT CONTAINERS, PACKAGING SYSTEMS, PACKAGING METHODS, AND BLANKS AND METHODS FOR MAKING PRODUCT CONTAINERS | ISLAM, SANJIDUL | 3736 | §102§103 | Final Rejection | 62d | Pending | Feb 23, 2024 |
| 18230947 | PACK TO POUCH SYSTEMS | HIBBERT, MARY C | 3731 | §102§112 | Non-Final OA | — | Pending | Aug 07, 2023 |
| 18165899 | METHOD OF FORMING CONTAINERS HAVING A BOTTOM WALL WITH AN OPENING, SAME CONTAINERS, AND BLANKS FOR FORMING SAME | DEMEREE, CHRISTOPHER R | 3734 | §102 | Final Rejection | 1d overdue | Pending | Feb 07, 2023 |
| 18013672 | PACKAGING SYSTEMS FOR MULTIPLE POTTED PLANTS AND ASSOCIATED BLANKS AND PACKAGING METHODS | SANGHERA, SYMREN K | 3735 | §102§103§112 | Final Rejection | — | Pending | Dec 29, 2022 |
| 17589645 | MACHINE AND METHODS FOR FORMING, ERECTING, AND LOADING A POUCH WITH A PRODUCT | TAWFIK, SAMEH | 3731 | §103 | Final Rejection | 14d | Pending | Jan 31, 2022 |
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