Category: Glossary

American Inventors Protection Act of 1999

America Invents Act

— see MORE

Application DataSheet

Automated Clearing House – a nationwide batch-oriented electronic funds transfer system governed by the NACHA (National Automated Clearing House Association)

Automated Biotechnology Sequence Search

See PSIPS to access sequence searching online

Activity based management – a management methodology that combines ABC with business process analysis techniques to run, improve and measure performance for a business or organization.

Activity based cost accounting – an accrual-based accounting method for determining unit-based costs of delivering services by allocating the costs to budgetary resources; it measures the performance and costs related to a specific activity or function.

A trademark application that has been declared abandoned is “dead” and no longer pending. Abandonment occurs under several circumstances. The most common reason is when the USPTO does not receive a response to an Office Action letter from an applicant within 6 months from the date the Office action letter was mailed. Another instance is when the USPTO does not receive a Statement of Use (or request for an extension of time to file a statement of use) from an applicant within 6 months from the issuance of a Notice of Allowance). Applications abandoned for failure to respond to an Office Action or a Notice of Allowance can be revived or reinstated in certain circumstances. For more information, see Petition to Revive and Request for Reinstatement.

A patent application becomes abandoned for failure to file a complete and proper reply as the condition of the application may require within the time period provided under 37 CFR § 1.134 and § 1.136 unless an Office action indicates otherwise.

Abandonment may be either of the invention or of an application. An abandoned application, in accordance with 37 CFR §§ 1.135 and 1.138, is one which is removed from the Office docket of pending applications.

— see MPEP 711 for more
— see express abandonment

American Bankers Association number – often referred to as the “transit routing number”, is the nine (9) digit electronic address of a financial institution. The ABA number is encoded in the MICR (Magnetic Ink Character Recognition) line of all checks, and is assigned to each financial institution and each branch office of that financial institution.