#design-patents

#design-patents

The USPTO issued ~325,800 utility patents in calendar year 2025, a figure virtually unchanged from the ~325,600 issued in 2024. This stability marks another year in what has become a post-pandemic plateau for utility patent issuances, with annual totals hovering around this mark since 2021. The days of dramatic year-over-year growth appear to be behind us, at least for now. Over the past two years, allowance rates have also remained virtually unchanged.

"We see no reason to distinguish between disclaimer by amendment and disclaimer by argument and conclude that a patentee may surrender claim scope of a design patent by its representations to the Patent Office during prosecution."

If the 'sufficiently distinct' test is intended to impose a special gloss on Rule 56, that gloss cannot stand.

The claimed design is a cooling blanket -- with the drawings showing a 6x5 array pattern. The priority filing included a 6x6 array, a 6x4 array.