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Examiner Richard L Schnell

TECH CENTER 2400 · 1 ART UNIT · 145 DECIDED APPLICATIONS · LAST ACTION DEC 2021
ALLOWANCE RATE = SHARE OF DECIDED APPLICATIONS (ALLOWED + ABANDONED); PENDING EXCLUDED
OVERALL ALLOWANCE RATE · POOLED ACROSS 1 ART UNIT
63%vs 58% art-unit average+5 pts
higher than about 47% of the 144 examiners with published rates in art unit 2416
AU avg 58%
0%
100%
Each short mark is one of the 144 examiners with published rates in art unit 2416; the dot is this examiner. The tick is the art-unit average, computed across all 146 examiners in the unit — a broader group than the 144 published marks, so it can sit apart from them.

Examiner Richard L Schnell has allowed 91 of 145 decided applications.

91 allowed
54 abandoned
No applications pending.
DATA UPDATED JULY 22, 2026

What the data says.reading this examiner

Richard L Schnell maintains a pooled allowance rate of 63% across hundreds of decided applications in Technology Center 2400. This allowance rate reflects the percentage of applications he has allowed or abandoned, excluding pending cases. His public record spans a single art unit within the technology center. The 63% allowance rate is a historical measure of past dispositions and does not predict outcomes in any specific application.

How to read these numbers.

A pooled record aggregates statistics across all art units assigned to an examiner. The allowance rate shown reflects past decisions across that combined set of applications and describes historical performance only. Pooled figures do not account for differences among individual art units or predict the outcome of any particular application. They serve as background context on examiner record only.

These are aggregate statistics from this examiner's past public record — not predictions about any specific application. The per-art-unit figures below show how the record varies across art units. Our approach to patent prosecution →

The record, art unit by art unit.1 art unit

Each section benchmarks this examiner against that art unit's average. Figures are this examiner's own public record within the art unit; the overall rate above pools them.

◈ PRIMARY · ART UNIT 2416
145 APPS · 63% ALLOWANCE

Allowance ratewhere this examiner sits among peers

63%
higher than about 47% of the 144 examiners with published rates in art unit 2416
AU avg 58%
0%
100%
Each short mark is one of the 144 examiners with published rates in art unit 2416; the dot is this examiner. The tick is the art-unit average, computed across all 146 examiners in the unit — a broader group than the 144 published marks, so it can sit apart from them.

Disposition145 decided applications

91 allowed
54 abandoned
No applications pending.

Pendencymonths from filing

filed
first action 18.7mo
disposed 36.2mo
0
48mo
Art-unit average: first action 33.2 mo, disposed 47.8 mo.

Rejection groundsexaminer ● vs art-unit average ○

REJECTION RATE = SHARE OF THIS EXAMINER'S APPLICATIONS THAT DREW ≥1 OFFICE-ACTION REJECTION IN WHICH THE GROUND APPEARS

Grounds can co-occur, so the four don't sum to 100%. The art-unit figure is the unweighted mean across examiners in the art unit; §102 and §112 carry no art-unit benchmark.

§101 — Subject-matter eligibility
AU 32
30%
§102 — Anticipation (novelty)
no AU benchmark
96%
§103 — Obviousness
AU 78
96%
§112 — Written description & definiteness
no AU benchmark
59%

Interview benefit

Allowance rate for applications with an examiner interview versus without one.

without
43%
+29 pts
with
72%

A correlation, not proof that interviews cause allowances. Based on 99 decided applications with an interview and 46 without.

// FAQ

Questions about Examiner Richard L Schnell

  • What is Richard L Schnell's overall allowance rate?
    His pooled allowance rate is 63%, measured across hundreds of decided applications (allowed and abandoned, excluding pending).
  • How many art units does this examiner cover?
    His public record spans 1 art unit within Technology Center 2400.
  • Does the allowance rate predict my application's outcome?
    No. The pooled allowance rate is a historical statistic and is not a prediction of any specific application.
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METHODOLOGY & DISCLOSURES

Methodology. This page pools every art unit in which Examiner Richard L Schnell has a public record within Technology Center 2400. Statistics are computed from publicly available USPTO records, refreshed on a recurring schedule. This page's data was last updated July 22, 2026. The overall allowance rate is total allowed divided by total decided applications (allowed plus abandoned) across all art units — not an average of the per-art-unit rates; pending applications are excluded. Figures are rounded for display. Pooled sample: 145 applications.

Rejection rates. Each §-rate is the share of this examiner's applications that drew at least one office-action rejection in which that statutory ground appears; applications with no rejection on record are excluded, and because grounds can co-occur the four do not sum to 100%. The art-unit figure beside each is the unweighted mean of the per-examiner rates across the art unit, published for §101 and §103 only. Beside the overall allowance rate we show a benchmark: for a single-art-unit examiner it is exactly that art unit's average, labeled “art-unit average”; for an examiner spanning several art units it is the “weighted peer average” — the per-art-unit averages, weighted by this examiner's application count in each — labeled distinctly because it is a blended figure, not any single art unit's average. Both are built from the same per-art-unit averages the panels show.

Lynch LLP is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Examiner statistics are derived from publicly available USPTO data.

These statistics describe past examiner behavior and do not predict the outcome of any particular application. Past results do not guarantee future outcomes. Where this page compares an examiner's allowance rate to an art-unit average, that comparison is a factual description of the public record, not a characterization of any individual examiner's conduct or competence.

This page is for general informational purposes and is not legal advice. No attorney-client relationship is formed by viewing it. Full disclaimers →

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