The so-called "defense" is a response to the office action of the patent office. Most people may think that "defense" is a bad thing because it not only delays the authorization time, but also incurs additional costs. It is best to approve a patent application in one go, and direct authorization is best - this is a serious misconception. The reason is that any authorized patent is a provisional patent, which is the examiner's evaluation of the claims in the patent application based on the prior art retrieved. This includes three variables: the examined claims, the retrieved prior art, and the examiner's evaluation. In other words, even if the examiner authorizes you, it is only based on your own claims at that time. Compared with existing technology, the examiner's subjective judgment is not absolute. The ultimate power of patent rights is granted by the court, and there are often discrepancies between the court's views and those of patent office examiners. Therefore, if it is an important protective case, the more thorough the discussion with the patent office in the early stage, the more consolidated the rights will be in the later stage. Compared to the cost of later court interpretation, the cost of defense is actually very low, after all, the validity period of patent rights is 20 years, and for a patent with very valuable technology, the possibility of being challenged in the later stage is very high. In addition, claims that have not been defended usually represent a smaller scope of the claims, which means the applicant is at a disadvantage.
