USPTO Funding Update: Senate appropriators have expressed skepticism over requests from the Patent and Trademark Office for more money to overhaul itself. Key senators in the debate, meanwhile, continue to urge members of the Appropriations Committee to craft language that would end the diversion of fees generated by PTO services.

In a committee report on the annual spending measure that funds PTO and other entities, Senate appropriators said the agency needs more funding to execute its five-year overhaul plan.
But the committee added that it still questions whether PTO's "past failure to attain these objectives was the result of inadequate funding" and whether the agency needs to hire "hundreds, if not thousands, of additional personnel" to achieve its objectives.