The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is making it easier to get patents for transformative technology. Over the past decade, the USPTO has rejected growing numbers of patent applications, covering a variety of software from fintech to social networking to machine learning, under § 101 as abstract and patent-ineligible. That landscape is now shifting.
John Squires, confirmed as Patent Office Director on September 26, 2025, has moved to lower § 101 barriers for AI and software patents. In Ex parte Desjardins, which he designated precedential this month, the Director vacated the Patent Trial and Appeals Board’s § 101 rejection of patent claims for training machine learning models. He called the rejection “overbroad,” noting that it “essentially equated any machine learning with an unpatentable ‘algorithm’” without adequate explanation, and cautioned examiners and panels to avoid evaluating claims at “such a high level of generality.” He agreed with the applicant that “the claimed subject matter provides technical improvements over conventional systems by addressing challenges in continual learning and model efficiency by reducing storage requirements and preserving task performance across sequential training.” The ruling emphasized that “[c]ategorically excluding AI innovations from patent protection in the United States jeopardizes America’s leadership in this critical emerging technology.”
Desjardins makes the application of § 101 more favorable to a wider range of technologies in areas such as AI, machine learning, and cryptocurrency. With a smoother path to securing patents in these areas, and with Director Squires’ aim to keep “the door to the patent office wide open to transformative technologies,” startups and established companies alike now have a window to scale their portfolios faster than the law’s usual pace in adapting to technology. Keep in mind, however, that other rejection tools under §§ 102 (novelty), 103 (non-obviousness), and 112 (disclosure) remain unchanged. Director Squires encouraged focusing on these as the “appropriate tools to limit patent protection to its proper scope.” But when faced with § 101 rejections, consider citing Desjardins and explaining your technical innovations over conventional systems, emphasizing specific computational improvements in areas of enhanced efficiency or novel problem-solving approaches.