the rejection of an application for a patent for invention can be either a preliminary examination in China National Intellectual Property Administration and a rejection after the applicant has stated his opinions or modifications, or a rejection after a substantive examination and the applicant has stated his opinions or modifications.
after substantive examination, if the examiner thinks that the application has substantial defects and cannot be granted a patent right, the applicant will be given at least one opportunity to state his opinions and/or modify the application documents. If the applicant fails to provide convincing opinions and/or evidence within the specified time limit, and the application documents are not modified in accordance with the provisions of the Patent Law and its detailed rules for implementation, or there are still defects in the modified application documents that are sufficient to be rejected with the reasons and evidence that have been notified to the applicant, the examiner may make a decision of rejection.