<div dir="ltr"><div>I agree with Carl on the two most important things --</div><div> -- This is a matter of national law in each jurisdiction you eventually enter, which you can't know<br></div><div> -- Move heaven and earth to make the problem go away in advance<br></div><div><br></div><div>I took over a case from an attorney who didn't understand this stuff. She filed the provisional with the inventor as applicant, then she filed the PCT with the inventor's company as applicant. Then my client bought the application and the problem dumps the problem in my lap. In my case, the company was a single member LLC, so it was easy to show that the company was "successor in title." My European counsel gave me a doc to have the inventor sign, which said basically "The application belonged to the company before the PCT filing date." Note that it was <i><b>not</b></i><b> </b>an assignment -- he stressed that it must <i><b>not</b></i> be an assignment after the PCT date. But this after-the-fact paper stating before-the-fact title was good enough for him.<br></div></div><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Thu, Mar 27, 2025 at 12:30\u202fPM Carl Oppedahl via Pct <<a href="mailto:pct@oppedahl-lists.com" target="_blank">pct@oppedahl-lists.com</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><u></u>
<div>
<div>On 3/27/2025 10:07 AM, a listserv
member via Pct wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div dir="ltr">
<div>Hoping someone can offer some advice because "SAOSIT"
scares me!</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>A provisional application is filed without an Applicant
(for whatever reason)</div>
</div>
</blockquote>
<p>Nope. This can't happen. Every US provisional patent
application has an applicant. It might be an inventor. I think
what you mean is "the application was not filed with a
non-inventor applicant".<br>
</p>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div dir="ltr">
<div> and the one-year anniversary approaches, and a PCT is
desired WITH an Applicant, there are no assignments filed to
the Applicant in the provisional, should the PCT be filed
with:</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>1. Inventors as inventors/applicant AND corporate entity as
an Applicant, and then file a 92<i>bis</i> after the
assignment is recorded in the provisional to remove inventors
as applicants (inventors ONLY), OR</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>2. file with inventors as inventors/applicant and add the
corporate entity via 92<i>bis</i> as an Applicant after
assignments are signed/recorded in the provisional.</div>
</div>
</blockquote>
<p>What I would do is the following:</p>
<ol>
<li>Find out from the client where exactly the client is going to
want to enter the national phase. Which patent offices?</li>
<li>Seek advice of competent counsel in each of those places as to
what they recommend.</li>
<li>Keep in mind that in the PCT system, you can specify "who is
the applicant?" on an office-by-office basis. Nothing in the
PCT system requires you to pick some particular applicant mix
and apply that applicant mix across the board, uniformly across
all offices.</li>
<li>After considering step 3, return to steps 1 and 2.<br>
</li>
</ol>
<p>As for step 2, I consider it likely that at least one competent
counsel will likely say that heaven and earth should get moved
before the PCT application is filed, to secure appropriate
assignments from the inventors and to get them signed prior to the
filing of the PCT application.</p>
<p>Keep in mind as well that this is not at all a PCT question.
This is simply a Paris Article 4 question. Suppose that there was
no plan at all to do PCT filings. Instead suppose that the plan
was to do some number of direct national filings in various places
around the world, all within the one-year priority period. In
such a scenario, what you would want to do is seek advice of
competent counsel in each of those places. In other words step 2
would apply anyway.<br>
</p>
</div>
-- <br>
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