Trademark Dashboard

Last month, I posted about the Patent Dashboard, a fairly new feature on the USPTO’s website that provides statistics on how quickly and how well the USPTO is examining patent applications.

Last month, the USPTO’s Director announced a new Trademark Dashboard aimed at providing the same type of information for trademark application pendency. Currently, a trademark applicant can expect to hear something about an application within 3 months. Assuming no problems, total pendency is averaging a little under a year.

The new tool provides tons more useful statistics. As a practitioner, it is helpful to have this information available so I can give my clients a firm estimate of how much time it will take to secure a federal trademark registration. This represents a step in the right direction for the USPTO, which has been plagued by a lack of transparency about its operations in recent years.