Investing in patent search: tips for practitioners

What is the cost of a single missed reference in the IP world? It depends on the situation. Research programmes that spend millions to develop inventions which turn out to be unpatentable because of prior art, long drawn-out prosecutions with multiple rejections, post-grant invalidities and infringement litigation are just some of the possibilities. No search is perfect, and there is always the chance of missing something—but the better the search, the better the subsequent decision-making.