THE EXAMINER’S INCENTIVES The Patent Office evaluates its patent Examiners primarily according to the number of applications they process. Examiners, therefore, have no incentive to spend very much time on any one application, as it is to their benefit to process applications as quickly as possible. The Examiner typically does not take the time to read and study an application at length. An Examiner usually does a quick search to discover all of the relevant patents and other public information pertaining to the claims in an application. The Examiner then typically sends the applicant a letter (Office Action) rejecting the claims as being obvious in view of the material he or she has discovered during his or her search. The applicant must then respond by carefully explaining and distinguishing each cited reference, thereby demonstrating to the Examiner that a patent should be issued. This routine saves the Examiner time since the applicant has spent his or her own time figuring out why the references cited by the Examiner are not particularly relevant – instead of the Examiner taking the time to do so. Thus, it is common that claims that are originally rejected by an Examiner may be frequently later allowed after the Examiner has had the opportunity to read the applicant’s response distinguishing the invention from the cited references. It should be noted that there are second-set-of-eyes quality checks at points in the prosecution to ensure a level of examination quality. Further, because Examiner time is at a premium due to the volume of patent applications to be addressed, it is often difficult for an Examiner to accurately identify differences between the claims and the references he or she locates that are deemed to be the closest “prior art” to those claims. As such, it is suggested that patent applicants view the examination process as a cooperative effort by the patent applicant and Examiner to (1) ensure that the Examiner has a full understanding of the invention, and (2) ensure the claims
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