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Trademark Forum / Question about "note to the file"
« on: 06-15-11 at 04:03 pm »Quote
Under the new standard for granting a pre-publication letter of protest, the examining attorney is not required to issue a refusal as a result of the grant. The examining attorney is required only to consider the evidence and make an independent determination whether to issue the requirement or refusal requested in the letter of protest. The examining attorney need not inform the applicant that a letter of protest was granted unless he or she is issuing a refusal based upon the information provided with the letter of protest. The prosecution history of the application will reflect the grant of a letter of protest and a memorandum granting the protest and all relevant evidence will become part of the official record. If the examiner decides against issuing the requirement or refusal, a note to the file should be entered indicating that the evidence was reviewed.
I submitted a letter of protest based on likelihood of confusion with a pending application that I have. That letter of protest was accepted and the examiner added a note to the file indicating "Protest evidence reviewed". Does this mean that the examiner decided against issuing a requirement or refusal? The letter of protested was granted for likelihood of confusion prior to the application going to publication and the application hasn't gone to publication yet.
