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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif">For years I have, when available/warranted, included an appendix at initial filing of a design patent. The appendix can include photos, CAD, additional views, and/or etc. that can be useful
when a clarifying amendment to the drawings is required. For the first time (for me), a (primary) examiner indicates that such appendix must be explicitly incorporated by reference at time of initial filing in order to be considered, pointing to MPEP 2163.07(b).
Is the examiner right?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif">My review of that section does not clearly confirm the examiners position. Of the 174 design patents I could identify (Google Patents search) that include the term Appendix (Im confident
there are many more that included an appendix but do not mention it in the specification), very few (i.e., single digits) appear to explicitly incorporate that appendix by reference. For example, some mention an attached appendix without incorporating. Naturally,
the MPEP does not specifically discuss appendices to design patents. Indeed, the only USPTO mention Ive found is in a
<a href="https://rev-vbrick.uspto.gov/#/videos/93a61b35-2d17-4d45-a6ae-09e3821ed641">
USPTO Inventor Info Webinar in 2017</a>, where the presenters appear to indicate that an appendix is NOT part of the specification (suggesting incorporation by reference is not required).<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:.5in"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif">(at 35:17)<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:.5in"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif">Q: Can you provide an appendix in y our design application which includes photos or 3D drawings that may be used and how those would be tied into the design?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:.5in"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:.5in"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif">A: Yes, you can absolutely include an appendix. These days we actually like an appendix in the application. You can put as much information about your design in that
appendix. Its really helpful to the examiner. Its also helpful to you if you ever want to make an amendment in the application and maybe the actual drawing disclosure you submitted didnt provide enough information, that you would run into a new matter
issue. Your appendix could very well have so much information in it that you actually have that info to overcome any kind of new matter issue. Thats actually one example of how it would be used in a design application. But keep in mind the appendix is
separate from the rest of the application in the sense that the appendix is youre not gonna get any protection in your patent from the appendix. The appendix is just
<u>a separate document that isnt part of the formal disclosure</u> (the specification and drawings). Its just separate there. Its just a good way of being able to overcome new matter issues.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:.5in"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:.5in"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif">The appendix stays in the file, so its in the application file which may help you in other circumstances. Again, we dont do litigation, but in theory those things
could help you in court. The use of an appendix in a design applicationas well as helping the examiner understand what youre attempting to claim, what youre claimingit also allows you to add, to that claim, inadvertently omitted information. It doesnt
let you add a whole different piece to a design. If you have an application for a camera and your application for a camera does not have the lens on it (its a removable lens), and nothing in that application shows the lens, and your examiner gives you a
rejection because that camera body is exactly the same as other camera bodies or is a very obvious variation on other camera bodies, you will not be able to bring the lens into that application to overcome that rejection because thats too much. Its not
inadvertently omitted material. It was material that you chose initially not to claim. Now you want to claim it to overcome a 112. You cant do that. However, lets say that you have the same camera body and you show in one view an aperture for a light meter,
lets say. And in the other views you dont show it. You might be able to overcome a rejection for the drawings being inconsistent by saying, oh, but it is in the appendix. You can see that this feature is there and its in all the drawings and was inadvertently
omitted from all the figures except one of the figures. Thats basically the purpose of the appendix.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif">So, no mention in the MPEP or in the webinar of a requirement to incorporate by reference.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Arial",sans-serif"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;mso-ligatures:none">Best regards,<br>
<br>
-Jim<br>
<br>
James C. Larsen<br>
Attorney<br>
Larsen IP PLLC<br>
p: 425.298.6846<br>
e: <a href="mailto:jim@Larsen-IP.com"><span style="color:#0563C1">jim@Larsen-IP.com</span></a><br>
w. <a href="http://www.Larsen-IP.com"><span style="color:#0563C1">www.Larsen-IP.com</span></a><br>
<br>
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