Does the cheap/free pre-issuance submission really matter when you have to spend thousands of dollars on a reexamination fee whether or not the patent gets invalidated or modified in the end?
I get that this is to help cover the USPTO's reexamination costs. But whatever the reason, it's still really expensive to call bullshit. And as the grandparent comment laments, this is a real shame given the low quality of many patents that are granted.
In this case a third party did the job the USPTO should have done when the patent was first filed by actually reading the patents citations and finding that the new patent wasn't a novel innovation on the cited patent.
Wouldn't it be nice if the USPTO paid the third party his $6000 back if they determine that he's right the patent should have never been granted in the first place?
