MPEP § 301 — MPEP § 301
Current through: 2022-07-01

301-Ownership/Assignability of Patents and Applications 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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 Chapter 0300 

 Section 301 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 301 Ownership/Assignability of Patents and Applications [R-01.2024]

 
 35 U.S.C. 261 
 Ownership; assignment. 

 Subject to the provisions of this title, patents shall have the
 attributes of personal property. The Patent and Trademark Office shall maintain a
 register of interests in patents and applications for patents and shall record any
 document related thereto upon request, and may require a fee therefor. 
 

 Applications for patent, patents, or any interest therein, shall be
 assignable in law by an instrument in writing. The applicant, patentee, or his assigns
 or legal representatives may in like manner grant and convey an exclusive right under
 his application for patent, or patents, to the whole or any specified part of the United
 States.
 

 A certificate of acknowledgment under the hand and official seal of a
 person authorized to administer oaths within the United States, or, in a foreign
 country, of a diplomatic or consular officer of the United States or an officer
 authorized to administer oaths whose authority is proved by a certificate of a
 diplomatic or consular officer of the United States, or apostille of an official
 designated by a foreign country which, by treaty or convention, accords like effect to
 apostilles of designated officials in the United States, shall be prima facie evidence
 of the execution of an assignment, grant, or conveyance of a patent or application for
 patent.
 

 An interest that constitutes an assignment, grant, or conveyance shall
 be void as against any subsequent purchaser or mortgagee for valuable consideration,
 without notice, unless it is recorded in the Patent and Trademark Office within three
 months from its date or prior to the date of such subsequent purchase or mortgage.
 

 

 

 
 35 U.S.C. 262 
 Joint owners. 

 In the absence of any agreement to the contrary, each of the joint
 owners of a patent may make, use, offer to sell, or sell the patented invention within
 the United States, or import the patented invention into the United States, without the
 consent of and without accounting to the other owners.
 

 

 
 37 CFR 3.1 Definitions. 

 For purposes of this part, the following definitions shall apply:

 Application means a national application for patent, an international
 patent application that designates the United States of America, an international design
 application that designates the United States of America, or an application to register
 a trademark under section 1 or 44 of the Trademark Act, 15 U.S.C. 1051 or 15 U.S.C.
 1126, unless otherwise indicated.
 

 Assignment means a transfer by a party of all or part of its right,
 title and interest in a patent, patent application, registered mark or a mark for which
 an application to register has been filed.
 

 Document means a document which a party requests to be recorded in
 the Office pursuant to § 3.11 and which affects some interest in an application, patent,
 or registration.
 

 Office means the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
 

 Recorded document means a document which has been recorded in the
 Office pursuant to §
 3.11 .
 

 Registration means a trademark registration issued by the Office.
 

 

 

 I. OWNERSHIP Ownership of a patent gives the patent owner the right to exclude
 others from making, using, offering for sale, selling, or importing into the United
 States the invention claimed in the patent. 35 U.S.C. 154(a)(1) . Ownership of
 the patent does not furnish the owner with the right to make, use, offer
 for sale, sell, or import the claimed invention because there may be other legal
 considerations precluding same (e.g., existence of another patent owner with a dominant
 patent, failure to obtain FDA approval of the patented invention, an injunction by a
 court against making the product of the invention, or a national security related
 issue).
 

 For applications filed on or after September 16, 2012, the original
 applicant is presumed to be the owner of the application for an original patent. See
 37 CFR
 3.73(a) . For applications filed before September 16, 2012, the
 ownership of the patent (or the application for the patent) initially vests in the named
 inventors of the invention of the patent. See Beech Aircraft Corp. v. EDO
 Corp., 990 F.2d 1237, 1248, 26 USPQ2d 1572, 1582 (Fed. Cir. 1993). A patent
 or patent application is assignable by an instrument in writing, and the assignment of
 the patent, or patent application, transfers to the assignee(s) an alienable
 (transferable) ownership interest in the patent or application. 35 U.S.C. 261 .
 
 

 II. ASSIGNMENT “Assignment,” in general, is the act of transferring to another the
 ownership of one’s property, i.e., the interest and rights to the property. The U.S.
 Patent and Trademark Office cannot explain or interpret laws that govern assignments and
 related documents, nor can it act as counselor for individuals. Assignments and other
 documents are contracts that are governed by the relevant state or jurisdictional law. 
 

 In 37 CFR 3.1 , assignment of
 patent rights is defined as “a transfer by a party of all or
 part of its right, title and interest in a patent [or] patent application....” An
 assignment of a patent, or patent application, is the transfer to another of a party’s
 entire ownership interest or a percentage of that party’s ownership
 interest in the patent or application. In order for an assignment to take place, the
 transfer to another must include the entirety of the bundle of rights that is associated
 with the ownership interest, i.e., all of the bundle of rights that are inherent in the
 right, title and interest in the patent or patent application. 35 U.S.C. 261 
 requires transfer of ownership by an assignment to be in writing. See Realvirt,
 LLC v. Lee, 195 F.Supp.3d 847, 859 (E.D. Va. 2016). 
 

 III. LICENSING As compared to assignment of patent rights, the licensing of a patent
 transfers a bundle of rights which is less than the entire ownership interest, e.g.,
 rights that may be limited as to time, geographical area, or field of use. A patent
 license is, in effect, a contractual agreement that the patent owner will not sue the
 licensee for patent infringement if the licensee makes, uses, offers for sale, sells, or
 imports the claimed invention, as long as the licensee fulfills its obligations and
 operates within the bounds delineated by the license agreement. 
 

 An exclusive license may be granted by the patent owner to a licensee.
 The exclusive license prevents the patent owner (or any other party to whom the patent
 owner might wish to sell a license) from competing with the exclusive licensee, as to
 the geographic region, the length of time, and/or the field of use, set forth in the
 license agreement.
 

 A license is not an assignment of the patent. Even if the license is an
 exclusive license, it is not an assignment of patent rights in the patent
 or application. 
 

 IV. INDIVIDUAL AND JOINT OWNERSHIP Individual ownership - An individual entity may own the entire right,
 title and interest of the patent property. This occurs where there is only one inventor,
 and the inventor has not assigned the patent property. Alternatively, it occurs where
 all parties having ownership interest (all inventors and assignees) assign the patent
 property to one party.
 

 Joint ownership - Multiple parties may together own the
 entire right, title and interest of the patent property. This occurs when any of the
 following cases exist: 
 

 
 (A) Multiple partial assignees of the patent property; 

 (B) Multiple inventors who have not assigned their right, title and
 interest; or 
 

 (C) A combination of partial assignee(s), and inventor(s) who have not
 assigned their right, title and interest.
 

 
 Each individual inventor may only assign the interest held by that
 individual; thus, assignment by one joint inventor renders the assignee a partial
 assignee. A partial assignee likewise may only assign the interest it holds; thus,
 assignment by a partial assignee renders a subsequent assignee a partial assignee. All
 parties having any portion of the ownership in the patent property must act
 together as a composite entity in patent matters before the Office. See
 MPEP §
 325 for information on establishing the right of an assignee
 to take action in an application.
 

 V. MAKING THE ASSIGNMENT OF RECORD An assignment can be made of record in the United States Patent and
 Trademark Office (Office) in two different ways, for two different purposes. The
 differences are important to note: 
 

 
 (A) An assignment can be made of record in the assignment records of
 the Office as provided for in 37 CFR Part 3 . Recordation of
 the assignment provides legal notice to the public of the assignment. It should be
 noted that recording of the assignment is merely a ministerial act; it is not an
 Office determination of the validity of the assignment document or the effect of
 the assignment document on the ownership of the patent property. See
 37 CFR 3.54
 , MPEP § 317.03 , and
 Realvirt, LLC v. Lee, 195 F.Supp.3d 847, 862-3 (E.D. Va.
 2016). For a patent to issue to an assignee, the assignment must have been
 recorded or filed for recordation in accordance with 37 CFR 3.11 .
 See 37 CFR
 3.81(a) . 
 

 (B) An assignment can be made of record in the file of a patent
 application, patent, or other patent proceeding (e.g., reexamination proceeding).
 This step may be necessary to permit the assignee to “take action” in the
 application, patent, or other patent proceeding under the conditions set forth in
 37 CFR
 1.46 and 37 CFR 3.81(a) and
 MPEP § 325 (for applications filed on or after
 September 16, 2012) or under the conditions set forth in pre-AIA 37 CFR
 3.73 and MPEP § 324 (for applications
 filed before September 16, 2012). Recordation of an assignment in the assignment
 records of the Office does not , by itself, permit the assignee to
 take action in the application, patent, or other patent proceeding. 
 

 
 Additionally, for applications filed under
 35 U.S.C.
 111(a) , 363 , or 385 on
 or after September 16, 2012, an assignment may contain the statements required to be
 made in an oath or declaration (“assignment-statement”), and if the assignment is made
 of record in the assignment records of the Office, then the assignment may be utilized
 as the oath or declaration. See 35 U.S.C. 115(e) , 37 CFR
 1.63(e) , and MPEP §§ 302.07 , 317 , and
 602.01(a) .
 

 
 301.01 Accessibility of Assignment Records [R-01.2024]

 
 37 CFR 1.12 Assignment records open to public inspection. 

 
 (a)
 
 (1) Separate assignment records are maintained in the United
 States Patent and Trademark Office for patents and trademarks. The
 assignment records, relating to original or reissue patents, including
 digests and indexes (for assignments recorded on or after May 1, 1957),
 and published patent applications are open to public inspection at the
 United States Patent and Trademark Office, and copies of patent
 assignment records may be obtained upon request and payment of the fee
 set forth in § 1.19 of this
 chapter. See § 2.200 of this chapter regarding trademark assignment
 records.
 

 (2) All records of assignments of patents recorded before May
 1, 1957, are maintained by the National Archives and Records
 Administration (NARA). The records are open to public inspection.
 Certified and uncertified copies of those assignment records are provided
 by NARA upon request and payment of the fees required by NARA.
 

 
 

 (b) Assignment records, digests, and indexes relating to any
 pending or abandoned patent application, which is open to the public pursuant
 to §
 1.11 or for which copies or access may be supplied
 pursuant to § 1.14 , are available to
 the public. Copies of any assignment records, digests, and indexes that are not
 available to the public shall be obtainable only upon written authority of an
 inventor, the applicant, the assignee or an assignee of an undivided part
 interest, or a patent practitioner of record, or upon a showing that the person
 seeking such information is a bona fide prospective or actual purchaser,
 mortgagee, or licensee of such application, unless it shall be necessary to the
 proper conduct of business before the Office or as provided in this part. 
 

 (c) Any request by a member of the public seeking copies of any
 assignment records of any pending or abandoned patent application preserved in
 confidence under § 1.14 , or any information
 with respect thereto, must:
 
 (1) Be in the form of a petition including the fee set forth
 in § 1.17(g) ; or
 

 (2) Include written authority granting access to the member
 of the public to the particular assignment records from an inventor, the
 applicant, the assignee or an assignee of an undivided part interest, or
 a patent practitioner of record.
 

 
 

 (d) An order for a copy of an assignment or other document should
 identify the reel and frame number where the assignment or document is
 recorded. If a document is identified without specifying its correct reel and
 frame, an extra charge as set forth in § 1.21(j) will be made for
 the time consumed in making a search for such assignment.
 

 
 

 

 Assignment documents relating to patents, published patent applications,
 registrations of trademarks, and applications for registration of trademarks are open to
 public inspection. Records related to assignments of patents, and patent applications
 that have been published as patent application publications are available on the USPTO
 website. Images of assignment documents recorded June 1998 and later are also viewable
 on the Office website. To view images of earlier-recorded assignment documents, members
 of the public must place an order pursuant to 37 CFR 1.12(d) . 
 

 The Office will not open only certain parts of an assignment document to
 public inspection. If such a document contains two or more items, any one of which, if
 alone, would be open to such inspection, then the entire document will be open. Thus, if
 a document covers either a trademark or a patent in addition to one or more patent
 applications, it will be available to the public ab initio; and if it
 covers a number of patent applications, it will be so available as soon as any one of
 them is published or patented. Documents relating only to one or more pending
 applications for patent which have not been published under 35 U.S.C. 122(b)
 will not be open to public inspection.
 

 Copies of assignment records relating to pending or abandoned patent
 applications which are open to the public pursuant to 37 CFR 1.11 or for
 which copies or access may be supplied pursuant to 37 CFR 1.14 
 are available to the public. For pending or abandoned applications which are
 not open to the public pursuant to 37 CFR 1.11 or for
 which copies or access may not be supplied pursuant to
 37 CFR
 1.14 , information related thereto is only obtainable upon a proper
 showing of written authority. For applications filed on or after September 16, 2012, the
 written authority must be from (A) an inventor, (B) an applicant, (C) the assignee or an
 assignee of an undivided part interest, (D) a patent practitioner of record, or (E) a
 person with written authority from (A), (B), (C), or (D). See 37 CFR 1.12 .
 For applications filed prior to September 16, 2012, the written authority must be from
 the applicant or applicant’s assignee or from the attorney or agent of either, or upon a
 showing that the person seeking such information is a bona fide prospective or actual
 purchaser, mortgagee, or licensee of such application. See pre-AIA 37 CFR
 1.12 . 
 

 If the application on which a patent was granted is a division,
 continuation, or continuation-in-part of an earlier application, the assignment records
 of that earlier application will be open to public inspection because copies or access
 may be supplied to the earlier application pursuant to 37 CFR
 1.14 .
 

 Assignment records relating to reissue applications are open to public
 inspection because reissue applications are open to public inspection pursuant to
 37 CFR
 1.11(b) .
 

 Requests for abstracts of title for assignments of patents recorded
 after May 1, 1957, are provided by the Patent and Trademark Copy Fulfillment Branch of
 the Public Records Division upon request and payment of the fee required in
 37 CFR
 1.19 . Requests for copies of pre-1957 records for patents should
 be directed to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). Since these
 records are maintained by NARA, it is more expeditious to request copies directly from
 NARA, rather than from the Office, which would then have to route the requests to NARA.
 Payment of the fees required by NARA should accompany all requests for copies.
 

 All assignment records from 1837 to April 30, 1957 for patents are now
 maintained and are open for public inspection in the National Archives Research Room
 located at the Washington National Records Center Building, 4205 Suitland Road,
 Suitland, Maryland 20746 and at the Civilian Records Division of the National Archives
 at College Park, 8601 Adelphi Road, College Park, MD 20740-6001. Assignment records from
 before 1837 are not available. Individuals should check the National Archives website,
 www.archives.gov , for
 how to obtain information from these locations.
 

 

 [top] 

 

 

 
 

 
 

 

 

 

 
 
 
 301-Ownership/Assignability of Patents and Applications 
 301.01-Accessibility of Assignment Records 

 
 

 302-Recording of Assignment Documents 
 302.01-Assignment Document Must Be Copy for Recording 

 302.02-Translation of Assignment Document 

 302.03-Identifying Patent or Application 

 302.04-Foreign Assignee May Designate Domestic Representative 

 302.05-Address of Assignee 

 302.06-Fee for Recording 

 302.07-Assignment Document Must Be Accompanied by a Cover Sheet 

 302.08-Mailing Address for Submitting Assignment Documents 

 302.09-Facsimile Submission of Assignment Documents 

 302.10-Electronic Submission of Assignment Documents 

 
 

 303-Assignment Documents Not Endorsed on Pending Applications 

 304‑305-[Reserved] 

 306-Assignment of Division, Continuation, Substitute, and Continuation-in-Part in Relation to Parent Application 
 306.01-Assignment of an Application Claiming the Benefits of a Provisional Application 

 
 

 307-Issue to Non-Applicant Assignee 

 308-Issue to Applicant 

 309-Restrictions Upon Employees of U.S. Patent and Trademark Office 

 310-Government License Rights to Contractor-Owned Inventions Made Under Federally Sponsored Research and Development 

 311-Filing of Notice of Arbitration Awards 

 312-[Reserved] 

 313-Recording of Licenses, Security Interests, and Documents Other Than Assignments 

 314-Certificates of Change of Name or of Merger 

 315-Indexing Against a Recorded Certificate 

 316-[Reserved] 

 317-Handling of Documents in the Assignment Recordation Branch 
 317.01-Recording Date 

 317.02-Correction of Unrecorded Returned Documents and Cover Sheets 

 317.03-Effect of Recording 

 
 

 318-Documents Not to be Placed in Files 

 319-[Reserved] 

 320-Title Reports 

 321‑322-[Reserved] 

 323-Procedures for Correcting Errors in Recorded Assignment Document 
 323.01-Correction of Error in Recorded Cover Sheet 
 323.01(a)-Typographical Errors in Cover Sheet 

 323.01(b)-Typographical Errors in Recorded Assignment Document 

 323.01(c)-Assignment or Change of Name Improperly Filed and Recorded by Another Person Against Owner’s Application or Patent 

 323.01(d)-Expungement of Assignment Records 

 
 

 
 

 324-Establishing Right of Assignee To Take Action in Application Filed Before September 16, 2012 

 325-Establishing Right of Assignee To Take Action in Application Filed On or After September 16, 2012 

 

 

 
 

 
 
 

 
 

 

 
 
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 Last Modified: 
 
 03/09/2026 20:50:51