Extensions

Term, Expiration, and Application History

An analysis of the prosecution history and legal status of US Patent 6,604,216 reveals a standard patent term with no adjustments or extensions. The patent is now expired.

Patent Term and Expiration

• Filing Date: February 17, 2000.
• Standard Term: 20 years from the earliest non-provisional filing date.
• Calculated Expiration Date: February 17, 2020.
• Patent Term Adjustment (PTA): A review of the patent's prosecution history indicates that there were no USPTO-caused delays that would warrant a Patent Term Adjustment. The time from filing (February 17, 2000) to issuance (August 5, 2003) was approximately 3.5 years, but no PTA was granted.
• Patent Term Extension (PTE): There is no record of a Patent Term Extension under 35 U.S.C. § 156. Such extensions are typically granted for patents covering products that undergo a lengthy pre-market regulatory review, such as pharmaceuticals or medical devices, and do not apply to this telecommunications patent.
• Final Status: The patent expired on February 17, 2020, and is no longer in force. All maintenance fees were paid during its term.

Continuity and Application History

• Application Number: The patent was granted from US patent application number 09/505,792.
• Provisional Application: The non-provisional application claims priority to US Provisional Patent Application 60/170,209, filed on December 10, 1999. A provisional application establishes an early effective filing date but is not itself examined.
• Continuation or Divisional Applications: A search of the USPTO's public records shows no evidence of any continuation or divisional applications being filed that claim priority to application 09/505,792. The invention described was pursued only through this single non-provisional application.

Patent Family

The patent family for US 6,604,216 is exceptionally small, consisting of only the single US patent. There are no foreign counterparts filed in other jurisdictions (such as the European Patent Office or WIPO) that claim priority to either the US provisional or non-provisional application. This indicates that the original assignee, Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson, pursued protection for this specific invention solely within the United States.