> * Prior use defense: if you used a method before it was patent, you don't have to pay to license the patent. This is perhaps the best way to actually protect

> * Prior use defense: if you used a method before it was patent, you don't have to pay to license the patent. This is perhaps the best way to actually protect yourself in some business situations where enforcing the patent and getting it in the first place is going to require too much effort for the given use case. You can just post a sealed copy of the invention to your solicitor, then crack on with making the product. If someone beats you to market and wants to sue you for copying their patent then you should be covered nicely, you have hard evidence you have not stolen 'their' idea. You also don't have to publish for the world to see what your key invention is. If it is a manufacturing technique that is required to make an existing product more affordably then you can keep your invention secret that way.