First, without invention, there is no patent and no patent strategy;
Second, not every technological achievement can be worth a hundred times and monopolize the market after applying for a patent. The key lies in whether the enterprise chooses the development goal accurately;
Third, only by choosing the appropriate technology development strategy according to the strength and foundation of our country and our enterprise can we accelerate the transformation of resources into products or services through technology. If there is only a patent without creative use, it is impossible to achieve economic benefits.
In the initial stage of patent strategy, it includes the strategy of encouraging invention, the strategy of selecting development goals and the strategy of technological development:
1. Strategies and strategies to encourage inventions: Encouraging inventions requires the cooperation of national strategies and enterprise strategies. Japan is the most typical and successful national strategy to encourage invention and creation. A series of measures can be taken to stimulate innovation and creation strategies at the enterprise level, such as:
(1) Establish a reasonable reward system;
(2) increasing investment in R&D;
(3) Establishing enterprise incentive mechanism;
(4) Establish rules and regulations for R&D in the era of patent strategy;
(5) Strengthen technology introduction from universities and research institutes at home and abroad, especially at home, and do a good job in patent management of Industry-University-Research's cooperative development.
Japan's Mitsubishi Company's lifelong multiple rewards for employees' inventions are worth learning from: after applying for a patent and before being approved, Mitsubishi Company will give "outstanding invention recognition" and award bonuses and certificates as long as it is a good invention, whether it is approved or not. If this invention is patented and implemented within the company, Mitsubishi will give the inventor "performance compensation". At least thirty thousand yen a year when it is implemented. If this invention is authorized to other companies, Mitsubishi will also allocate a certain proportion as the inventor's "performance reward" according to the rights obtained. If an invention is implemented inside and outside the company at the same time, the inventor's "performance reward" can be up to 6,543,800 yen a year. Inventors can still receive "performance pay" after leaving their jobs. Even after his death, his successor can renew it until the company no longer uses or licenses others to use the patent. In addition, Mitsubishi also has "registration recognition" for the cumulative number of patents. When employees get a certain number of domestic patents, they will be given a certain bonus. The presidents of various factories, business headquarters and Mitsubishi Corporation also have "workshop commendation", "minister commendation" and "president commendation", and the reward method is decided by the factory director, the head of the headquarters and the president.
2. Target selection strategy: The patent strategy of enterprises in the stage of target selection strategy is mainly manifested in the use of the information value of patent documents. Through patent analysis, we can accurately understand that:
(1) the growth stage of the existing technology;
(2) the development trend and possible application fields of new technologies;
(3) technical development of the industry;
(4) the most competitive technical field;
(5) R&D trend of competitors;
(6) The possible life, potential market and economic value of the new product.
When choosing the development goal of technology, the market forecast of some pioneering patented technologies has unique laws. For those unprecedented technologies and products, consumers know nothing about them and cannot conduct market research and forecast. Therefore, for the development goal of patented technology, some mainly rely on technical prediction; Some can only open up new markets by promoting their true value to potential buyers after the products are made; Moreover, because the forecast itself contains certain uncertainties and deviations, it may bring risks and affect the success or failure of enterprises. Therefore, the invention, idea or suggestion may be put forward from the grassroots level, or it may be put forward after discussion at the meeting attended by the heads of various units and experts, but the final decision is made by the top leaders of the enterprise.
3. Technology development strategy: There are roughly two kinds of technology development strategies.
One is a pioneering technology development strategy represented by the United States, and its achievements are mostly basic patents;
The other is the follow-up technology development strategy represented by Japan, and its achievements mostly belong to peripheral patents such as improved patents and applied patents. The advantages of the latter are high starting point, low cost and low risk.
At present, the technical level of Chinese enterprises is still backward in most fields. Therefore, we should adopt a follow-up strategy, closely follow the R&D work of foreign counterparts, keep abreast of the R&D trends and latest achievements of similar foreign enterprises, introduce new technologies in time, digest and absorb them as soon as possible, and then carry out independent improvement and innovation on the basis of imported technologies, develop better technologies or products, apply for patents in time, and protect our technological achievements by law. Whether the technology developed by an enterprise applies for a patent or is used as a technical secret or in other ways depends on the needs of the enterprise's patent strategy and business strategy. Usually, enterprises should establish a system, which is composed of management, technology, law, sales and other personnel to evaluate the inventions made by enterprises and decide whether to apply for patents. Once you decide to apply, you should analyze the country that applied for the patent. Generally, the "market-oriented" application strategy is adopted, that is, the country with the largest market or the largest population is given priority to apply for patents. But if the invention belongs to the high-tech category, such as microelectronics and genetic engineering, only a few enterprises can produce this product. In this case, the "market-oriented" application strategy may not be the best. At this time, we should consider the "production-oriented" application strategy, that is, apply for patents in countries where competitors are engaged in production and operation. In case of infringement, the patentee can take legal measures to confiscate the infringing product in the country of origin, regardless of which country the product will be sold. For countries with highly developed industries and broad markets, these two strategies can be used at the same time. In short, enterprises should consider applying for patents in countries with potential markets or potential competitors to protect their market interests and competitive advantages in these countries.
The patent application strategy mainly answers three questions: (1) Do all inventions have to be patented? (2) When to apply for a patent? (3) What kind of patent should I apply for?
1. The choice is correct. Some technological achievements need not be patented, so it is more beneficial to protect them with proprietary technology. For example, the "Coca-Cola" beverage formula in the United States has been the technical secret of enterprises for more than 100 years; Some inventions can be patented in some technologies and kept secret in others. Or cover up some technical know-how in the patent application documents.
2. Choice of application opportunities:
(1) For a basic invention, it is generally necessary to wait until its application research and peripheral research are generally mature before filing a patent application. Prevent other enterprises from continuing to improve their research on the basis of basic inventions, or preemptively applying for invention patents, resulting in the blockade and protection of their basic inventions;
(2) There are many competitors, or the market demand is large, or the technology is easy to be imitated, so it is necessary to apply for a patent as soon as possible;
(3) For the leading technology that is not easy to be imitated by this enterprise, you can apply for a patent when competitors are about to catch up, which on the one hand prolongs the protection period, on the other hand, it also avoids the premature disclosure of the technology and gives opponents an opportunity.
Selection of application type:
(1) Apply for a basic patent (basic patent strategy). The basic patent is an original invention, which has the possibility of wide application and the prospect of obtaining remarkable economic benefits. The basic patent has the following characteristics:
A. competitors can't bypass the basic patent to imitate;
B. In practical application, a series of technical problems need to be solved, thus a large number of related patents are derived;
C. The development cycle is long, the cost is high, and it needs the support of social and technical forces;
D. The development prospect is great, and some basic inventions will have a fundamental impact on industrial activities and even trigger a new industrial revolution. To apply for a basic invention patent, it is necessary to attach great importance to the peripheral patent protection before and after the application and form a patent protection network; For the technology that produces the basic patent, it is necessary to further store the technology and obtain the improved patent, so that it can still play a protective role after the basic patent expires.
(2) Applying for peripheral patent (peripheral patent strategy) is also called patent improvement. Peripheral patent strategy is the best strategy for Japanese enterprises. The so-called peripheral patent strategy refers to the strategy of using many different patents with the same principle to strengthen themselves around the basic patent and confront the basic patentee when relying solely on the basic patent can not protect themselves well. The deployment of improved patents and downstream patents around core patents can help this enterprise obtain the interactive authorization of core patentees. For example, Foxconn in Taiwan Province Province, Hon Hai in Taiwan Province Province, and Samsung in South Korea have tracked the core technologies of foreign companies, deployed a large number of peripheral patents, and created reliable killers.
A. In a country or condition with a prior application system, when it is known that an opponent is also developing the same technology project, and it is close to success, the core technology will be widely controlled by basic patents at first, and then the patents will be continuously and gradually applied and improved around it, and finally a patent network with basic patents as the core will be formed;
B. Apply for basic patent and peripheral patent at the same time as possible, so as to avoid the competition of other enterprises applying for peripheral patent after the basic patent is published first;
C. When the products of this enterprise can't bypass other people's basic patents, we can improve the basic patents to produce applied inventions, apply for peripheral patents, and form a wall (patent protection network) around the basic patents, so that the basic patentee can lose the activity space in this field, making it easy to infringe, forcing the basic patentee to give up competition, or to propose patent licensing negotiations to this enterprise.
(3) apply for a national defense patent. Although some inventions are not implemented by this enterprise for the time being, they should be applied as technical reserves or the basis for implementing updated inventions in the future, so as not to be preempted by other enterprises and form restrictions on themselves.
(4) apply for confusing patent. When the competition among peers is extremely fierce, in order to prevent opponents from clearly grasping the technological development direction of enterprises, they deliberately apply for patents for technologies that some enterprises do not need, so that opponents cannot track their own development. You can also hide your true identity in the "assignee" column of the patent. This is the usual competitive strategy of foreign companies. Many large western enterprises often use more than 100 as patentees of their own patents, and some companies even use more than 300 names to declare patents for their own technologies. For example, Aventis has more than 29,000 patents, only about 1% of which contain the word Aventis among the licensees. These patents secretly deployed in other names make it impossible for competitors to know their true strength, which is equivalent to burying some patent mines. Patent utilization strategy includes three aspects: using the patent applied by the enterprise, using the patent of other enterprises and using the patent of other enterprises. The selection, application and combination of specific strategies should scientifically analyze the factors such as enterprise scale, enterprise type, enterprise performance, enterprise reputation, enterprise technical strength, enterprise brand strength, enterprise information ability and enterprise development strategy between enterprises and competitors or partners, and flexibly select and implement them in practice.
1. Patent monopoly strategy, which does not grant permission to enterprises in any country, only pursues the exclusive interests of patented enterprises. However, enterprises should be able to bear the risks of market development and have investment conditions.
2. Licensing implementation strategy, allowing other enterprises to implement their own patents at a certain cost. This strategy is adopted under the unconditional implementation of such enterprises.
3. Licensing strategy, a strategy to license other enterprises to use their own patents and charge a certain royalty when the production capacity is far from meeting the market demand.
4. The strategy of combining patents with products. Enterprises holding basic patents allow other enterprises to use their own patents, but in exchange, they impose their products on each other to improve their position in the market competition.
5. The strategy of combining patents with trademarks. After the goods are put on the market, for greater benefits, the patent right and the related trademark right can be tied together for sale or licensing. Trademark plays a great role, but it takes some time and investment to gain a foothold in the market. In order to reduce the advertising investment of trademarks, we can adopt the strategy of compulsory use of trademarks as the exchange condition of patent rights.
6. Patent investment strategy, taking patented technology as shares, and gradually establishing joint ventures or joint ventures with local capital in various countries, and taking advantage of the patented technology of this enterprise in this company to grasp the leading position. Dupont in the United States is good at adopting this strategy.
7. Cross-licensing strategy. With the development trend of technology becoming more and more complicated, it is impossible for even large enterprises to monopolize technology, so the strategy of bringing their respective technologies closer to each other and signing licensing contracts with mutual patents has emerged, thus forming common technological advantages. In addition, in the case that the technology of other enterprises in the same industry is very close, or even the ownership of power is complex, in order to prevent confusion, cross-licensing strategy can also be adopted. It can be the exchange of similar technologies or different technologies to make up for their respective weak links.
8. Patent cooperation strategy. It is a cooperation strategy for enterprises to cooperate with each other's patents. Most of them appear in the form of production cooperation to prevent patent disputes.
9. The introduction of patent strategy, the enterprise itself is not engaged in technology development, and specializes in introducing excellent patented technologies from other enterprises.
10. Patent purchase strategy is a strategy to buy all competitors' patents, thus monopolizing the market. Different from the strategy of importing patents, the purpose of purchasing patents is not limited to importing technology, but ultimately to monopolize the market. The patent purchase strategy should be sufficient, otherwise it may violate the Anti-Monopoly Law.
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12. patent regression strategy, which can be adopted by both countries and enterprises.
It refers to the strategy that a country or enterprise digests and absorbs the patents of other countries or other enterprises after introduction, then innovates and sells the innovative technology to the original patent exporting country in the form of patents.
13. the strategy of combining patents with standards.
The United States spends more than 700 million dollars on the research and formulation of technical standards every year. Most of these standards are bundled with a large number of American patents. On the contrary, China only spends more than 80 million RMB each year to study and formulate technical standards. Since China publishes about 4,000 technical standards every year, the research and formulation cost of each standard is only about 20,000 yuan. At present, many developed countries, multinational companies and industrial alliances are striving to upgrade their patented technologies to standards in order to obtain the greatest economic benefits. "Technology patenting, patent standardization and standard monopoly" has become a new game rule of international competition under the condition of knowledge economy. The essence and characteristics of standards are the intellectual property rights of technology in the technical system. Because the patent right is regional and exclusive, once this standard is popularized, it will form some form of monopoly, especially in terms of market access, it will exclude products that do not meet the standard, and only regard products that meet its own standards as secret stories, so as to achieve the purpose of excluding dissidents. This is the key to the relationship between technical standards and intellectual property rights. We should be in line with the current international technical standards and the rules of the game of intellectual property policy, and work out the best scheme of combining our own technical standards with intellectual property policy. In recent years, China has also begun to invest heavily in researching and formulating technical standards in some major fields. For example, China has implemented the standard strategy in three areas (digital TV, EVD, plasma display screen), and Tsinghua University and Shanghai Jiaotong University have received more than 300 million yuan from the state to study and formulate the technical standards for digital TV; In the field of laser disc players, the Ministry of Information Industry of China has provided strong support for the research and formulation of EVD technical standards of Beijing Guo Fu Company. In the field of plasma display panels, Southeast University has received strong support. In recent years, China has also promulgated the technical standard of wireless communication encryption. In the process of formulating the above technical standards, the patents of China enterprises, especially the core patents, should be bound. The measures to implement patent strategy in standards include: trying to bring proprietary patented technology into the standard system; Establishing intellectual property alliance and participating in the formulation of standards; Appropriate use of technical barriers such as patent standards. As early as 1998, Philips established the "System Standards Licensing Department", which was responsible for the management of technical standards and patent licensing, and formed a "patent licensing special package" with its own enterprise characteristics. Patent improvement is carried out in other enterprises, or the patents of other enterprises hinder this enterprise. In order to protect this enterprise, it is necessary to adopt patent defense strategy to prevent or minimize the losses suffered by this enterprise:
1. patent map strategy, in the stage of choosing the development target of patent technology, we should make full use of patent documents to make patent maps and other tools, analyze and understand the patents of other enterprises, and guide the development of products in the direction of not infringing others' patents. Then, we should pay close attention to the patent trends and latest progress of other enterprises, and take this work as our daily work;
2. Literature disclosure strategy, in the case that it is not necessary to obtain exclusive rights, but it is not appropriate for other enterprises to apply for patents first, they can disclose technical content in magazines first. Although it failed to obtain a patent, it also achieved the purpose of preventing other enterprises from obtaining a patent;
3. Objection interference strategy can often prevent other enterprises from applying for patent rights, raise objections and request the Patent Reexamination Board to declare it invalid. In the patent infringement cases accepted by Chinese and foreign courts, and in the 337 cases accepted by the US International Trade Commission, the vast majority of defendants will counterclaim that the patent of the other party is invalid. In these cases, a considerable number of patents will become invalid. For example, a patent document about umbrella making in Taiwan Province Province of China constitutes prior art, but Patent examiners City of Chinese mainland missed the patent document. In view of the subsequent infringement litigation, the strategy of counterclaiming the invalidation of related patents is successful. In Chinese mainland, about 4,000 patent invalidation cases are accepted by the State Patent Office Reexamination Board every year, and about 2,000 cases will be declared invalid. That is to say, half of the millions of patents issued by China Patent Office may be overturned by missed foreign patents, articles in journals of various countries and other facts and rules. It is necessary for all kinds of enterprises to improve the quality of their own patents through commercial search and analysis, or to understand the lethality of others' patents. In fact, according to the requirements of "patentability factors" such as creativity, practicality, written description, enforceability and embodiment, the request for patent invalidation also has a great chance of winning. Some patent analysis companies in Britain and America often carry out deep processing on patent documents and even non-patent documents to help enterprises win invalid cases more smoothly. For example, Wisdomain Company of the United States processes original patent documents according to its own "parallel retrieval" strategy to help enterprises discover similar technologies. Many inventions and products often have a unified name after the industry matures. Before that, its names were very diverse. Some core electronic accessory inventions have hundreds of different names in the patent literature. Only by using the unified name mentioned above for "keyword search", people can't search all the unified technical topics at all, and even miss the main prior technologies (including patent documents and non-patent documents). When foreigners apply for patents in China, we should try our best to delay the examination and approval of patents by the Patent Office. It is not surprising that Japanese documents reported that Japan delayed the approval of American patent applications in Japan by 10 to 14 years. The most typical example is that Japan delayed the approval of Texas Instruments' semiconductor patent application for 30 years.
4. The strategy of obtaining technical information by objection, that is, obtaining more technical information through objection, further studying the basic invention for which others apply for authorization, making more advanced and perfect inventions, or making superficial changes to the basic invention, applying for a large number of peripheral patents, forcing the other party to cross-license, or forming a confrontational situation.
5. Peripheral patent strategy, based on the basic patents authorized by competitors, develop improved patents with better quality, or apply for a large number of peripheral patents.
6. Bypass the correct strategy, bypass the patent right of the other party, and develop non-conflicting technologies.
7. Loss of rights strategy, in the case that it is impossible to bypass the patent right of the other party, we should carefully study the patent right of the other party to see whether the products of this enterprise are within the protection scope of the right claim, and if not, give evidence.
8. preemption strategy. If the products of this enterprise are within the protection scope of the patent right of the other party, they can put forward their own right of first use.
9. The strategy of importing, purchasing and obtaining patent license, importing and purchasing the patent of the other party, or obtaining patent license of the other party.
10. Expired usage policy. Some basic patents cannot be broken. If the basic patent is about to expire, it can still be used after it expires.
If the patented technology of this enterprise is infringed by competitors, the following measures should be taken: warning the infringer; Require the other party to sign a patent licensing contract or a patent transfer contract; Expose infringement through news media; Ask the other party to compensate for the losses; Request the patent administration authority to handle it; Bring a lawsuit to the people's court. In the process of patent strategy implementation, it is very important to pay attention to the new development of R&D technology and to collect and analyze new information in this technical field, especially patent information.
First, help researchers obtain the latest patent technology information, adjust the research direction and avoid repeated research;
Second, it is conducive to stimulating the innovative ideas of researchers and shortening the research and development time;
Third, it is conducive to mastering the technological trends of competitors and taking corresponding countermeasures in time to avoid infringing others' patent rights.
By tracking and investigating the development trend of technology, the implementation plan of patent strategy is constantly adjusted according to the new situation, so as to make the implementation of patent strategy more effective and realize the goal of patent strategy. Patent literature is the medium that embodies the fundamental purpose of the patent system. It disseminates patent information, promotes scientific and technological progress and provides reference information for economic and trade activities. It is the basis of patent legal protection, and it is also the basis for patent institutions to examine and approve patents. It can be said that patent literature is a treasure house of human knowledge and the most novel, systematic, complete and standardized technical information source. Some people compare patent documents to world science and technology memoranda and technical encyclopedias. Compared with other scientific and technological documents, patent documents have the following characteristics:
1. has a wide range of contents, and the technical content and scope recorded in the patent literature theory are extremely extensive, which integrates technical, legal and economic information. It is a huge and extensive strategic information resource. 70% ~ 90% of the inventions in the world only appear in patent documents, but not in magazines, papers, conference reports and other media. Because patents are regional, and most patent documents in the world can be used for free, for example, only 60% of patent applications in Japan are requested by applicants, only 50% are authorized, and only about 2/3 of patents have completed the protection period. The proportion of Japanese patentees applying for patents in China is also very low, far less than 10%. Therefore, most technologies protected by patents in Japan can be used for free in China. By making good use of patent documents, people can save 60% research and development time and 40% research and development funds.
2. The reporting speed is fast, and the patent literature disseminates the latest technical information. Most countries in the world implement the principle of first application. For inventions with the same content, the patent right is granted to the person who applies first. Therefore, inventors usually try to file a patent application first. In Britain, Germany, Japan, China and other countries, the Patent Office published the invention specification within 18 months from the date of application, which greatly accelerated the process of technical exchange. On average, the time when the same invention appeared in patent literature was earlier than that in other media 1 ~ 2 years.
3. The system is detailed and practical. Patent documents are standardized, highly standardized and have a unified classification system, which is convenient for retrieval, reading and informatization. Emergency early warning of enterprise patent protection means that enterprises can protect the interests of enterprises, minimize losses, respond to sudden patent disputes in time, and give early warning of possible patent disputes. Establishing an emergency early warning mechanism for patent protection is an important part of enterprises' patent strategy. The establishment of enterprise patent emergency early warning mechanism needs perfect patent information resources and experienced professional and technical personnel and legal personnel as the foundation. Centralized use of patent information resources and human resources, the establishment of national and provincial, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the central government patent emergency early warning institutions to provide consulting services for domestic enterprises, suitable for China's national conditions. In addition, the government should encourage and attract patent intermediaries to enter enterprises, help enterprises improve their patent emergency and early warning capabilities, and formulate corresponding laws and regulations.
The emergency early warning mechanism for enterprise patent protection shall at least include the following tasks:
1. Before making a technology development project, the enterprise shall conduct patent novelty search for the project, understand the present situation and development trend of the existing technology, and conduct independent research and development on the basis of drawing lessons from the existing technology to avoid low-level repeated research; Patent information analysis plays a very important role in the establishment of patent early warning mechanism. The insiders believe that through comprehensive and rigorous patent information analysis, enterprises can find the blank points and development trends of technology, find existing and potential competitors, and establish the patent strategy of enterprises on this basis, so as to obtain the maximum benefits at the lowest cost;
2. In the process of project development and research, follow the development of related technologies and update patent retrieval information when necessary;
3. After the completion of the project, study and formulate a patent protection scheme with the project developer; 4. When a patent infringement lawsuit occurs, formulate a technical judgment report on patent infringement, and put forward technical solutions to avoid infringement when necessary;
5. To study the technological development status of the industry to which the enterprise belongs, track the patent technology development of competitors, formulate countermeasures and issue early warning; The main contents include: in which important industrial fields, which foreign companies have submitted patent applications, and what is the proportion? And what important technologies are involved in these patent applications, and what is the level of these technologies? When the above comparison results reach the pre-set alarm level, the state can issue early warning information through appropriate mechanisms to remind enterprises, industry associations, government agencies and research institutions in related fields to take countermeasures quickly;
6. Formulate enterprise patent application, patent technology utilization, patent licensing and transfer scheme. The specific contents of the enterprise patent emergency early warning mechanism mainly include:
(1) Know what competitors are doing?
1. Search the patent technology development information of competitors from the patent database, including patent application, withdrawal, patent authorization, termination and invalidation;
2. Search competitors' technological research and development information from the non-patent database, including enterprise publications, conference materials, project release, bidding, financing, advertising, cooperation, visits, etc.
(2) The emergence of independent patent right, the application and protection of patented technology, especially the measures to deal with the infringement of independent patent right.
1, formulate technology research and development strategy (whether to develop the first invention or improve the invention is determined by the technical ability of the enterprise);
2. Decide on the time, content, scope and area of the patent application;
3. Pay attention to the reply of patent examination opinions and the adjustment of protection scope;
4. Determine the implementation, licensing and transfer scheme after the patent application is authorized;
5. Improve the protection of patent rights (through defensive and offensive strategies).
(3) Management of patent rights and technical secrets.
The management of patent rights and technical secrets shall at least include the following contents:
1, which stipulates the patent technology license and production license;
2. Provisions on patent application and patent right transfer;
3. Provisions on enterprise employees' right to apply for invention and creation and the ownership of patent rights, as well as provisions on inventors' rewards to prevent technology transfer;
4, formulate regulations to prevent the disclosure of trade secrets (including technical secrets);
5. Time to start temporary measures and border measures;
6, declare the government incentives, including the preparation of documents and statistics, and prevent the disclosure of trade secrets.
(4) How to deal with the alleged patent infringement.
When an enterprise is accused of patent infringement, the enterprise should deal with it seriously, and the specific measures include:
1. Experienced professional technicians, legal personnel and patent agents make technical judgment reports on the existence of infringement;
2. Reasonable use of judicial or patent laws and administrative rules;
3. The counterclaim with invalid request;
4. Discuss the cooperation intention with the plaintiff through cross-licensing;
5, start the rapid response program, make full use of external resources.
(5) The warning is lifted
1, recent warning prompt (precursor of suspected infringement);
2. Give a warning in advance (report to the enterprise decision-making level at any time after studying the situation that competitors can find intermediary services with patented technology tracking);
3, as the defendant's countermeasures (see (4) above);
4, as the plaintiff's countermeasures, including the time of warning, the choice of administrative or judicial channels, the time of requesting treatment or prosecution, the preservation of evidence before litigation, border measures, etc.