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This week’s batch is the 198 design patents that issued on September 15, 2026 after at least one rejection. It includes a rare thing in design prosecution: a Board decision on the article of manufacture. The Board reversed five anticipation rejections of a connector design and held that when an applicant argues that the reference is a different article, the examiner must answer that argument separately from any finding that the art is analogous.
The rest of the list covers a GUI allowed with no display screen drawn under the March 2026 guidance, a domain registration date that sank a web reference, two continuations that recovered their priority dates by changing how lines were drawn, an Amazon date beaten only after two appeal briefs, a transliterated inventor name, a YouTube screenshot read in the context of the whole video, a rarely used common-ownership exception, and a priority restoration that went wrong.
The Week in Numbers
- 198 issued prosecution histories: 144 in the 29 series, 34 in the 30 series and 20 Hague designations in the 35 series. Median time from filing to issue: about 24 months. The range ran from about 7 months to 5 years.
- How they got there: about 161 were allowed without a final rejection or an Ex parte Quayle action. 22 received a final rejection and about 17 a Quayle action. About 26 had a separate restriction requirement. 4 drew an advisory action.
- Rejections by ground: 35 USC 112, 133 files. 35 USC 102, 42 files. 35 USC 103, 11 files. Double patenting, about 30 files, including 5 same-design rejections under 35 USC 171.
- Rule 130 declarations: about 33 files. Rule 132 declarations: 1. Interviews: about 30. Appeals: 2, one decided by the Board and one that ended in allowance after a pre-appeal request and a second brief.
- LKQ v. GM cited: 2 files, both by the applicant. No examiner cited it. Examiners used the pre-LKQ “so related” language of In re Glavas in 2 files.
- Applications abandoned and later revived: 5.
Method note: these are file-level counts across the 198 histories. One file can carry several grounds, so the categories overlap. The counts come from the OCR’d text of each file, and the smaller figures should be read as approximate.
The Top Ten
1. The Board: analogous art is not the same article of manufacture
The file: Application No. 29/864,924 (connector, D1,147,940), filed June 28, 2022.
The problem: The examiner rejected the connector design as anticipated by a 1972 design patent for a switch housing and, later, by Amazon listings for USB flash drives and similar products with built-in connectors. The examiner read In re SurgiSil narrowly: “SurgiSil does not require that prior art be identical to the claimed article. It only limits anticipation to analogous articles.” The examiner also relied on In re Zahn to compare the claim with parts of the references.
The move: From the first response, the applicant argued SurgiSil, with an earlier Board decision attached, and later added dictionary evidence of what a connector is and Curver. It argued that analogous art is an obviousness concept with no place in anticipation, and that a buyer would never take a switch housing or a flash drive for a connector. It observed that “Not all examiners have adjusted their practice to take account of this change in the law.” An earlier anticipation rejection over a “Concave Shredder” had already been withdrawn on the same argument.
The result: The Board reversed. It held that “when an appellant advances an article-of-manufacture argument, an examiner must address this issue separately from analogous-art issues,” and found the examiner had not shown that the built-in connectors were visible or carried the claimed features. The claim was allowed.
The takeaway: When an examiner answers a SurgiSil argument with “analogous art,” the Board has now said that is not enough. Make the different-article argument expressly and early.
2. A GUI allowed with no display screen drawn, and adding one would have been new matter
The file: Application No. 29/923,449 (display screen with graphical user interface for a software directed at constructing machine learning workflows, D1,147,985).
The problem: The examiner finally rejected the claim under 35 USC 112(b) because the broken line statement described a display screen in broken lines around the interface that did not appear in the drawings, along with icons and links that were not clearly shown.
The move: The examiner applied the USPTO’s “Supplemental Guidance for Examination of Design Patent Applications Related to Computer-Generated Interfaces and Icons,” published March 13, 2026: “the depiction of a display screen or a portion thereof is no longer required” when the title and claim identify the article. In an interview the applicant proposed adding a broken-line screen border, and the examiner “advised that the proposed drawings would introduce new matter.” The fix was to delete the screen language from the broken line statement.
The result: The rejection was withdrawn and the claim allowed with no screen in the drawings.
The takeaway: Under the 2026 guidance, a GUI claim can stand on the title and claim alone. Do not try to draw in a screen after filing; fix the words instead.
3. A domain registration date sinks a web reference
The file: Application No. 30/007,909 (bubble machine, D1,148,060), effective filing date May 27, 2025.
The problem: The examiner rejected the claim as anticipated by a web listing for a Halloween bubble machine said to be available on January 2, 2025.
The move: The inventor’s Rule 130 declaration covered the applicant’s own authorized Amazon listing, but the decisive evidence was simpler. A domain registration lookup showed that the site hosting the reference had not been registered until October 15, 2025. The inventor also swore that the listing carried incorrect availability and review dates and was never authorized.
The result: The examiner withdrew the rejection because the reference “could not have been published before the effective filing date of the present application, because the domain name of the website upon which the reference was published, was not registered until October 15, 2025.”
The takeaway: Before arguing the merits of a web reference, check when its domain was registered. It takes a minute and can end the rejection.
4. Match the ancestor’s shading and get a 2015 priority date back
The file: Application No. 29/917,702 (container lid, D1,147,782), YETI Coolers.
The problem: This continuation sits in a chain back to a 2015 application. The ancestors showed soft contour shading around the slider grip, but this application showed a broken boundary line there. The examiner held that shading and boundary lines say different things (“The lines are mutually exclusive”), denied the earlier dates, and made three anticipation rejections over YETI’s own family patents, D751,339, D751,341 and D761,619.
The move: The applicant redrew the grip area with soft contour shading, matching the ancestors, and added “The unshaded regions form no part of the claimed design.”
The result: The examiner held that “converting the said broken line to soft contour shading line in the replacement drawings” was permitted, restored the earliest date, and withdrew all three rejections. Abbott used the mirror-image move in Application No. 29/953,742 (analyte sensor device, D1,148,149), converting disputed lines to unclaimed broken lines to restore a priority chain to 2012 and clear same-design and obviousness-type double patenting without a terminal disclaimer.
The takeaway: In a continuation, how a surface is drawn matters as much as what is drawn. A drafting choice that departs from the parent can cost the priority date and turn your own patents into art.
5. Four added lines turn a continuation into a CIP, and boundary lines do not fix it
The file: Application No. 29/997,069 (infusion bag, D1,148,133), Fresenius Medical Care.
The problem: The examiner found that this “continuation” of a 2019 application added object lines at the bottom of the bag that the parent did not show, and required it to be redesignated a continuation-in-part. Without the parent’s date, the applicant’s own EU design registration became prior art: “Without the benefit of the filing date in application 29/714,770, European patent registration 006530614-0006 qualifies as prior art.”
The move: The applicant first proposed broken-line boundaries. In an interview, the examiners said “the broken line boundaries still present the same issue with continuity as the solid lines.” The applicant then removed the four lines and converted the bag’s outermost line and bottom corners to broken lines, so every claimed line could be traced to the parent.
The result: The continuity objection was withdrawn, the parent’s date restored, and the claim allowed over the EU registration.
The takeaway: Under Owens, a boundary line needs support in the parent just as a solid line does. Remove what the parent does not show rather than trying to fence it off.
6. Amazon’s “Date First Available” falls, but only after two appeal briefs
The file: Application No. 29/864,266 (scrubber, D1,147,719).
The problem: The examiner rejected the claim as anticipated by an Amazon listing whose only date was a “Date First Available” of October 12, 2021, about a month before the Australian priority date. In an advisory action, the examiner held that the applicant “fails to establish a sufficient reason why the 10/12/2021 is not considered prima facie evidence.” After the first appeal brief, the examiner reopened prosecution and added an obviousness rejection using an Instagram post dated only by its “likes” line.
The move: The applicant attacked the date, not the design, with two Rule 132 declarations. One explained that the field records when the ASIN was created and that the listing’s images had changed over time. The other gathered Seller Central and forum material showing that the field is unreliable. The briefs relied on recent Board decisions, including Vectair (2024), and applied the same reasoning to the Instagram date.
The result: After a pre-appeal request and a second appeal brief filed March 11, 2026, the rejections were withdrawn and the claim allowed.
The takeaway: Some examiners still treat “Date First Available” as prima facie proof. Evidence under Rule 132, not attorney argument, is what moves them, and an appeal may be needed.
7. Two spellings, one inventor: a transliteration declaration clears a Taiwanese registration
The file: Application No. 29/960,278 (spray gun, D1,148,094), filed August 29, 2024.
The problem: The examiner rejected the claim as anticipated by a Taiwanese design registration published June 21, 2024, which named “SHI Guixiang” as its inventor. On its face, the reference came from someone else.
The move: The first-named inventor’s Rule 130 declaration showed that the two names are the same person, romanized under different systems. On the drawings, the applicant converted surface shading to a wireframe style and confirmed in an interview that this was not new matter.
The result: The examiner found that the names “are different transliterations of the same Taiwanese name,” withdrew the rejection, and allowed the claim.
The takeaway: When a foreign reference seems to name a stranger, check for a romanization difference before conceding it is third-party art.
8. Watch the whole video, not the examiner’s screenshot
The file: Application No. 29/990,231 (game controller, D1,148,055), Nintendo.
The problem: The examiner rejected the claim as anticipated by a single frame from a YouTube review of a third-party controller grip. The examiner also objected that the title “Controller for Electronic Device” was too broad.
The move: The applicant used the whole video, with timestamps, to show what the reference really was: a charging grip with detachable pieces, holding what “appears to be Applicant’s own Nintendo Joy-Con controller.” It then compared the claim separately with the grip alone and with the assembled image the examiner had used. In the interview, the examiner took the view that “changing the dimensions, or removing a part from the claim, does not create novelty.”
The result: The rejection was withdrawn on the arguments, the title became “Game Controller,” and the claim was allowed.
The takeaway: When the art is a video, the frames around the screenshot can show that the reference is a different product, or even your client’s own.
9. The common-ownership exception, used in a design case
The file: Application No. 30/012,283 (shingle, D1,148,183), Owens Corning.
The problem: The examiner rejected the claim under 35 USC 102(a)(2) over an earlier-filed design patent, D1,086,504, that named different inventors, and noted that “This rejection may not be overcome by the filing of a terminal disclaimer.”
The move: The applicant made a statement under 35 USC 102(b)(2)(C) that both designs were owned by, or subject to an obligation of assignment to, the same company, and pointed to the recorded assignments. It filed no declaration and no terminal disclaimer.
The result: The examiner withdrew the rejection, made no double patenting rejection, and allowed the claim.
The takeaway: For a 102(a)(2) reference owned by your client, the common-ownership exception is a one-paragraph answer that design practitioners rarely use.
10. Restoring priority after final, and what went wrong along the way
The file: Application No. 29/970,196 (ultrasonic retainer cleaner machine, D1,148,254), filed October 27, 2024.
The problem: The examiner rejected the claim over a web reference dated May 3, 2024. The applicant’s first Rule 130 declaration relied on the inventor’s Chinese design but gave a certificate number instead of a patent number, a filing date instead of a publication date, and no account of how the publisher got the design. The examiner also noticed that the declaration described a “cosmetic bag design.” The rejection was made final.
The move: After final, the applicant tried a different route: restoring the right of priority to its March 13, 2024 Chinese application under 37 CFR 1.55(c), since the US case was filed more than six months later. But the after-final papers carried no extension of time, and the application went abandoned on July 1, 2025. The first restoration petition was filed on the wrong form and dismissed. A renewed petition was granted in October 2025, but a petition to withdraw the holding of abandonment failed: “it is clear from 37 CFR 1.116 that abandonment of an application is risked when an amendment after a final Office action is filed.”
The result: The applicant revived the application under 37 CFR 1.137(a) with a terminal disclaimer. With priority restored, the reference was no longer prior art, and the claim was allowed.
The takeaway: Restoring priority can remove an intervening reference even after final. But an after-final paper does not stop the clock, and a design revival costs term.
Honorable Mentions
- Application No. 29/836,367 (artificial hand, D1,148,141): Wayback captures showed that the images and video on a page dated February 2021 did not appear until September 2024, well after the priority date.
- Application No. 29/962,478 (endcap for a chamber, D1,148,101): After final, the applicant answered a Glavas rejection resting on “market customs” and “consumer preference” by demanding a record-supported reason to combine under LKQ. The claim was allowed.
- Application No. 29/912,384 (cap shot cup assembly, D1,147,788): Claiming the bottle neck, previously shown as environment, overcame an Amazon anticipation rejection and two double patenting rejections at once.
- Application No. 29/999,411 (foldable display, D1,147,977): An authorized post on Douyin, China’s TikTok, one day before the first cited reference, served as the inventor’s earlier disclosure under Rule 130(b).
- Application No. 30/018,863 (bed, D1,147,738), Williams-Sonoma: A statement of prior disclosure in the specification replaced a Rule 130 declaration, after the examiner first rejected the claim.
- Application No. 29/895,068 (wheel for an automobile, D1,147,911): An unclaimed area shown in grayscale drew an objection, and erasing its detail drew a new matter rejection. Faded detail inside broken lines was the answer.
- Application No. 29/810,194 (film with pattern, D1,147,723): A single plan view was enough because the specification called the pattern an “embossment,” which the examiner construed as slightly raised.
- Application No. 29/969,481 (steering wheel, D1,147,902): Claiming by dark and light gray tones, rather than broken lines, survived an indefiniteness rejection after the applicant deleted “for illustrative purposes” from the specification and filed cleaner drawings.
Enforcement Watch
- Declarations that may not hold up. In Application No. 30/009,099 (flower pot bubble machine, D1,148,061), the only Rule 130 evidence against an Amazon listing was that it came out after the inventor filed a Chinese design application, with no priority claim and no showing that the seller got the design from the inventor. In Application No. 30/011,852 (nozzle, D1,147,775), the declaration and remarks carried another inventor’s name and another product, and the two copies of the contract give different start dates.
- A narrow definition of the article. To win in Application No. 29/864,924, the applicant offered a dictionary definition of “connector” as an electrical part with contact pins. That definition will follow the patent.
- A copying assertion on the record. The inventor’s declaration in Application No. 29/864,266 states that the cited Amazon product is a copy of the claimed design.
- Double patenting cleared without a terminal disclaimer. In Application No. 29/953,742, the claim was distinguished from Abbott’s family patents only by which lines are claimed.
- Priority questions. In Application No. 29/933,988 (bath seat, D1,147,729), the EU priority document was a copy of a certified copy, and the examiner warned the claim would not print unless corrected. In Application No. 29/919,182 (joystick, D1,147,900), the examiner objected that the design is not supported by its utility parent, and the applicant resolved it by dropping the benefit claim, giving up the 2021 date.
- A supervisor-confirmed scope statement. In Application No. 29/823,648 (contact plug for electric cables, D1,147,942), the examiner’s statement that the USB-like portion forms no part of the claim was reviewed by the supervisory examiner.
- Revived applications. Applications No. 29/843,791, No. 29/885,063, No. 29/893,151, No. 29/911,508 and No. 29/970,196 were abandoned and revived. Revival of a design application requires a terminal disclaimer under 37 CFR 1.137(d). In No. 29/843,791, the abandonment began with a one-letter misspelling of the inventor’s name on the declaration.
What to Take From the Week
- Make the different-article argument under SurgiSil expressly, and insist that the examiner answer it apart from analogous art.
- For GUI claims, rely on the March 2026 guidance. Do not draw in a display screen after filing.
- Check the domain registration date of any web reference before arguing the merits.
- In continuations, draw surfaces the way the parent drew them. Shading and boundary lines are not interchangeable, and a boundary line needs parent support too.
- Back any attack on Amazon’s “Date First Available” with Rule 132 evidence, and be ready to appeal.
- Look for transliterated names before treating a foreign reference as a stranger’s work.
- Watch the whole video the examiner cites.
- Remember 102(b)(2)(C) for commonly owned 102(a)(2) art.
- After final, file the right petition form and keep the response period alive with extensions.
