A follow up Provisional Patent Application - How should it be formatted?

[matchitisiw]

I filed a PPA and now I want to add more to it.
Do I just say, continued from the previous PPA and carry on describing the new material?
Do I re-file the first PPA again with the additional material added?
If I resubmit the original work do I leave it as before with the additions at the end of the description or do I rewrite the new material in to the original?

Thanks.

[jarel]

John:

You cn file the EXACT same one with the new matter added to it.

Do not make references to the other one. Your preference date for the new matter will be used for the NEW filing and, if you have kept it out of the public domain you can just use the NEW one..
PM me with questions and review this website..

http://provisionalpatentvideo.com/patent-instructions/Provisional_Patent/Patent.html

It is for Yahoo Answer folks and answers many questions proactively..

Make sure you deal with your Enabling Disclosure, Preferred Embodiment, as well as VARIATIONS... I deal with these in great detail on that link...


Here is how you would refer to TWO PPA's..

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application is related to U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/XXX,XXX, filed on June XX, XXXX, entitled "Widget Tool", and U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/YYY,YYY, filed on April XX, XXXX, entitled "Widget Tool Improvement", the entire contents of which are incorporated herein by this reference. The Applicants hereby claim the benefits of these earlier pending provisional applications under 35 U.S.C. Section 119(e).

[nissim42]

You can file as many PPAs as you want, completely distinct, or slightly modified. Nobody cares. Nobody is ever going to read them. When you draft the non-PPA (or multiple), incorporating one or more PPAs for content and priority, you get the earliest date you claim (as your "filing date" for starting the 20-year clock), but you only get the content priority from the first document you filed that disclosed that content.

Similarly, if you file a non-PPA and later add materials in a CIP (continuation in part), you may get stuck with the 20-year "filing" date from the original file, and the content priority of the later filing date of the new parts. In other words, file early, file often. If you think of anything important, file another PPA, so at least you get the priority of that filing date if it ever becomes an issue (which is quite rare).