It takes money to prosecute a patent.
Patent office fees are not that high, but
patent LAWYER fees can be large.
If the patent concept is any good, international filing fees to get patent coverage in economically significant countries can be very very large.
So if there was a patent office action on the patent application, Raniere's lawyer had a deadline to try to overcome the patent examiner's objections and differentiate it from prior art etc. and that is what costs patent lawyer fees.