134 
(2) CONTENTS.—Each plan under paragraph (1) 
shall— 
(A) summarize the operations of the Office 
for the current fiscal year, including financial 
details and staff levels with respect to major ac-
tivities; and 
(B) detail the operating plan of the Office, 
including specific expense and staff needs, for the 
current fiscal year. 
(f) AUDIT.—The Director shall, on an annual basis, 
provide for an independent audit of the financial state-
ments of the Office. Such audit shall be conducted in accord-
ance with generally acceptable accounting procedures. 
(g) BUDGET.—The Director shall prepare and submit 
each year to the President a business-type budget for the 
Fund in a manner, and before a date, as the President pre-
scribes by regulation for the Federal budget. 
SEC. 23. SATELLITE OFFICES. 
(a) ESTABLISHMENT.—Subject to available resources, 
the Director shall, by not later than the date that is 3 years 
after the date of the enactment of this Act, establish 3 or 
more satellite offices in the United States to carry out the 
responsibilities of the Office. 
(b) PURPOSES.—The purposes of the satellite offices es-
tablished under subsection (a) are to— 
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(1) increase outreach activities to better connect 
patent filers and innovators with the Office; 
(2) enhance patent examiner retention; 
(3) improve recruitment of patent examiners; 
(4) decrease the number of patent applications 
waiting for examination; and 
(5) improve the quality of patent examination. 
(c) REQUIRED CONSIDERATIONS.— 
(1) IN GENERAL.—In selecting the location of 
each satellite office to be established under subsection 
(a), the Director— 
(A) shall ensure geographic diversity among 
the offices, including by ensuring that such of-
fices are established in different States and re-
gions throughout the Nation; 
(B) may rely upon any previous evalua-
tions by the Office of potential locales for sat-
ellite offices, including any evaluations prepared 
as part of the Office’s Nationwide Workforce Pro-
gram that resulted in the 2010 selection of De-
troit, Michigan, as the first satellite office of the 
Office. 
(2) OPEN
SELECTION
PROCESS.—Nothing in 
paragraph (1) shall constrain the Office to only con-
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sider its evaluations in selecting the Detroit, Michi-
gan, satellite office. 
(d) REPORT TO CONGRESS.—Not later than the end 
of the third fiscal year that begins after the date of the en-
actment of this Act, the Director shall submit a report to 
Congress on— 
(1) the rationale of the Director in selecting the 
location of any satellite office required under sub-
section (a); 
(2) the progress of the Director in establishing 
all such satellite offices; and 
(3) whether the operation of existing satellite of-
fices is achieving the purposes under subsection (b). 
SEC. 24. DESIGNATION OF DETROIT SATELLITE OFFICE. 
(a) DESIGNATION.—The satellite office of the United 
States Patent and Trademark Office to be located in De-
troit, Michigan, shall be known and designated as the ‘‘Eli-
jah J. McCoy United States Patent and Trademark Office’’. 
(b) REFERENCES.—Any reference in a law, map, regu-
lation, document, paper, or other record of the United 
States to the satellite office of the United States Patent and 
Trademark Office to be located in Detroit, Michigan, re-
ferred to in subsection (a) shall be deemed to be a reference 
to the ‘‘Elijah J. McCoy United States Patent and Trade-
mark Office’’. 
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SEC. 25. PATENT OMBUDSMAN PROGRAM FOR SMALL BUSI-
NESS CONCERNS. 
Using available resources, the Director shall establish 
and maintain in the Office a Patent Ombudsman Program. 
The duties of the Program’s staff shall include providing 
support and services relating to patent filings to small busi-
ness concerns. 
SEC. 26. PRIORITY EXAMINATION FOR TECHNOLOGIES IM-
PORTANT TO AMERICAN COMPETITIVENESS. 
Section 2(b)(2) of title 35, United States Code, is 
amended— 
(1) in subparagraph (E), by striking ‘‘and’’ after 
the semicolon; 
(2) in subparagraph (F), by inserting ‘‘and’’ 
after the semicolon; and 
(3) by adding at the end the following: 
‘‘(G) may, subject to any conditions pre-
scribed by the Director and at the request of the 
patent applicant, provide for prioritization of 
examination of applications for products, proc-
esses, or technologies that are important to the 
national economy or national competitiveness 
without recovering the aggregate extra cost of 
providing such prioritization, notwithstanding 
section 41 or any other provision of law;’’. 
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SEC. 27. CALCULATION OF 60-DAY PERIOD FOR APPLICA-
TION OF PATENT TERM EXTENSION. 
(a) IN GENERAL.—Section 156(d)(1) of title 35, 
United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the 
following flush sentence: 
‘‘For purposes of determining the date on which a product 
receives permission under the second sentence of this para-
graph, if such permission is transmitted after 4:30 P.M., 
Eastern Time, on a business day, or is transmitted on a 
day that is not a business day, the product shall be deemed 
to receive such permission on the next business day. For 
purposes of the preceding sentence, the term ‘business day’ 
means any Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, or 
Friday, excluding any legal holiday under section 6103 of 
title 5.’’. 
(b) APPLICABILITY.—The amendment made by sub-
section (a) shall apply to any application for extension of 
a patent term under section 156 of title 35, United States 
Code, that is pending on, that is filed after, or as to which 
a decision regarding the application is subject to judicial 
review on, the date of the enactment of this Act. 
SEC. 28. STUDY ON IMPLEMENTATION. 
(a) PTO STUDY.—The Director shall conduct a study 
on the manner in which this Act and the amendments made 
by this Act are being implemented by the Office, and on 
such other aspects of the patent policies and practices of 
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