What must be true about the claims in a U.S. application for it to be eligible for PPH?

For a U.S. application to be eligible for the Patent Prosecution Highway (PPH), the claims must be similar to or have a narrower scope than the corresponding claims that have been allowed in a previously filed application in another participating office. This alignment ensures that the examination process is expedited and focused on claims that have already been deemed allowable, thus facilitating a more efficient comparison and assessment of the innovations.

The essence of the PPH program is to streamline patent examination between different patent offices by allowing applicants to leverage favorable examination results from other jurisdictions. This is based on the premise that if an application has already received favorable determination in one office, it is likely that similar claims would also be acceptable in another. Therefore, the requirement that the claims must be similar or narrower ensures that they adhere to this comparative examination principle and increases the likelihood of quicker allowance, benefiting applicants seeking to obtain patents in multiple jurisdictions.

This aspect directly underpins the functioning of the PPH, while the other options do not align with the established rules for participation in the program. The emphasis is on the relationship of the claims to those that have already been allowed, which is why the correct understanding centers on the scope of the claims in question.