Rocky Start for the USPTO under President Trump and Director Stewart
Patent – Patently-O 2025-01-23
Summary:
by Dennis Crouch
It is tough that one of the very first acts of new USPTO Director Coke Morgan Stewart’s was to cancel hiring for the agency. Two weeks ago I saw a notice that the USPTO expected to hire over 800 new examiners during 2025 in an attempt to address the ever growing backlog of unexamined patent applications. But, today the agency rescinded offers already given and cancelled its job ads. Although unclear, examiners still in their first year probationary period may also be let go. What we have here is the patent office being caught up in the larger political theatre with real world consequences — directly for those individuals losing promised employment and more generally for the intellectual property system as a whole.
This is the first time I have ever searched USAJobs and found nothing for the USPTO.
Still, this week the USPTO did not rescind the notices of allowances already mailed. And the patents issued on time at 12:01 am on Tuesday 1/21/25. This includes US12206106 and US12204163. These two are notable because they each list 28 inventors. One of the more interesting is US12205207, issued to Snap Inc.