I am going Pro Se in reviving my patent application, any tips on how to answer office actions successfully?

Please don't try this pro se. I am an attorney and would not do it. You really need a patent attorney.

My standard disclaimer: I am not offering legal advice, assume I do not know the law in your state and that I am just making suggestions for starting points for when you do speak with an attorney. Do NOT rely on anything I write and contact a lawyer in your area immediately after reading my posting.

Please don't try this pro se. I am an attorney and would not do it. You really need a patent attorney.

My standard disclaimer: I am not offering legal advice, assume I do not know the law in your state and that I am just making suggestions for starting points for when you do speak with an attorney. Do NOT rely on anything I write and contact a lawyer in your area immediately after reading my posting.

As noted, you should continue to seek the counsel of a patent attorney.

Three reasons: the likelihood that you alone can persuade the Patent Office to revive your application is very small, your prior attorney may not have followed the rules that govern when a patent attorney may properly withdraw from a case (resulting in the abandonment of your application), and some patent attorneys -- though very, very, few -- may take in compensation for helping you an equity stake in the patent that issues. In short, it's not yet time to give up trying to find counsel.

Assuming you do give up, however, you should visit http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/mpep.htm and read up on how to attempt to revive abandoned applications. Two sections dealing with that subject are sections 711.03 and 1002.02(b). Read them and go from there. You should also buy and read the book "Patent It Yourself."

Looking at the big picture, though, you may not need patent protection. For many small businesses it's more important to get into the marketplace with a great product and build your niche with a good branding strategy -- that creates a "first mover advantage" which positions your company as the go-to business to buy the nifty new gizmo that you've developed. While knock-offs may subsequently drain some of your sales, your brand identity should continue to draw most of the customers who want to purchase the gizmo.

Small businesses are often better served by using a patent attorney to provide a "freedom to operate" opinion which would consider whether the nifty new gizmo infringes someone ELSE's patent or trademark rights.

This can be a complex task even for an experienced patent attorney. Please DO NOT ATTEMPT to do this on your own. Any mistakes you make (and you WILL make mistakes) can invalidate your patent down the line if it ever gets litigated.

At this point, it is very costly to revive your application (if it is at all possible in the first place), so you really should evaluate what you would want to do with your patent. Use a little bit of business sense here and make a decision on whether it makes sense to pursue this application.

First of all, speaking to Mr. Ballard's statement that some (not many) patent attorneys take payment by taking a stake in the patented invention, I would not recommend this payment scheme to any client. There is just too much potential for a major conflict of interest between the attorney and the client from many, many sources in this scenario (that's why you don't find a lot of patent lawyers who take a stake in the patents they prosecute). Rather, I would recommend working out a payment plan with a patent attorney (I have several payment plans going with clients at this moment, and they work well, both for the client and for me). You'll be able to do this more easily with a solo or a small-firm attorney than you will with an attorney in a medium-sized or large-firm attorney.

Your intentions for the use of sales proceeds are lovely, but they will mean precisely nothing to the USPTO in terms of issuing a patent.

As others have said, you NEED a patent attorney at this juncture. You're welcome to contact me for help with this matter if you wish.