22nd Jul 2020
Artificial intelligence is increasingly an important tool in industry. Not just in computer science but in almost all fields of industry. And where an AI innovation provides a benefit to users, many would like to protect it with a patent. The European Patent Office (EPO) recognises this. In 2017 the EPO published a study on the ‘Fourth Industrial Revolution’ that identified AI as a key enabling technology. As we reported previously, the EPO has held a conference discussing the patentability of AI. And the EPO has recently announced that their Berlin branch is to become a centre of expertise in AI. So it is worth looking at how AI inventions can be patented in Europe.
15th Jul 2020
We have just finished watching the oral proceedings before the EPO’s Enlarged Board of Appeal (EBA) on case G1/19 concerning the patentability of computer simulations. We were not alone – some 1,600 people signed up to watch today’s oral proceedings by live stream. Unfortunately (but not unexpectedly) no decision was announced during the proceedings. However, we did get to hear some of the EBA’s thoughts on the issues.
8th Jul 2020
On 24th June 2020 the UK Supreme Court handed down their judgement addressing the question of breadth of claim and sufficiency. Although the decision is well written, its background is in biotechnology which is likely to dissuade a lot of people from reading it and/or understanding its broader implications. So with this in mind, here’s my attempt to explain Regeneron v Kymab sufficiency using … TELEPORTATION.
30th Apr 2020
The recent decision by a Board of Appeal at the European Patent Office (EPO) has provided some important guidance to the patent world on private and confidential input documents submitted as part of the process of developing a new technical standard. Specifically the decision addresses whether these documents form part of the state of the art for assessing a patent’s novelty and inventive step.
21st Jan 2019
We explore the reasoning behind the use of animal models, the acknowledged limitations of animal data for predicting treatment effects in humans and the approach taken by the EPO in assessing whether such data can be used to demonstrate a medical use invention.