The US Patent Office

The US patent office is one of the most important patent offices in the world, where many patents are filed every year. Inventors and companies from around the world tend to file applications to register patents in the USA.

The US Patent Office contains vast quantities of information about patent applications that have been submitted, and patent registrations that have been accepted. These can be searched through by using a free patent search engine. There is a lot of information available for inventors and patent applicants.

Different types of patents can be applied for at the US Patent Office. For example, temporary provisional patents, as they are sometimes mistakenly called, but are actually interim place-holders that have not undergone examination. US registered patents can also be applied for, that grant a 20-year monopoly right from the filing date, should the invention be accepted as a registered patent.

A registered US patent grants its holder the same rights in every US state with one application: there is no need to file individual applications in each individual state of the USA. The cost of such a patent is also therefore relatively cheap. This is also true due because the patent does not need to be translated to multiple local languages, as would be necessary in other countries, for example the Far East: China, Japan; or different countries in Europe.