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Talk:Boards of Appeal case law
Moving old notes here.
Key cases
In 2006, Hartmut Pilch summarised the EPO's policy of granting software patents as being mostly based on "adventurous landmark decisions of their Board of Appeal in 1986 [Vicom] and 1997".[1]
Newest first:
- 2014: TBA 3.5.06 denies patentability of a programming language
- 2010: T354/07 (overview: Bad News For Meta-Methodists)
- "[A]n invention which as a whole falls outside the exclusion zone of [art 52(2)] (i.e. is technical in character) cannot rely on excluded subject matter alone, even if it is novel and non-obvious (in the colloquial sense …), for it to be considered to meet the requirement of inventive step. … [I]t cannot have been the legislator's purpose and intent on the one hand to exclude from patent protection such subject matter, while on the other hand awarding protection to a technical implementation thereof, where the only identifiable contribution of the claimed technical implementation to the state of the art is the excluded subject-matter itself. It is noted that here the term 'contribution' encompasses both means (i.e. tangible features of the implementation) and effects resulting from implementation"
- 29 June 2007, Gameaccount Ltd T 1543/06:
- (year??) T0154/04
- 15th November 2006, Duns Licensing Associates T 0154/04 - which was mentioned in Symbian v. Comptroller General (2008, UK) as having considered the Aerotel v. Telco (2006, UK) ruling
- "The claimed method requires the use of a computer. It is therefore technical in character and constitutes an invention within the meaning of art 52…"
- (year??), File search method/Fujitsu T1351/04:
- (year??), Sharp T1188/04
- T935/97 and T1173/97 - mentioned here: [1]
- 1990, IBM Corp./Computer-related invention (1988) T115/85 - application upheld
- 1990, IBM Corp./Data processor network (1988) T06/83 - application upheld
- "a method for obtaining and/or reproducing an image of a physical object or even an image of a simulated object (as in computer-aided design/computer-aided manufacturing … systems) may be used e.g. in investigating properties of the object or designing an industrial article and is therefore susceptible of industrial application. Similarly a method for enhancing or restoring such an image, without adding to its informational content, has to be considered as susceptible of industrial application ... a claim directed to a technical process which process is carried out under the control of a program (… in hardware or in software) cannot be regarded as relating to a computer program as such …, as it is the application of the program for determining the sequence of steps in the process for which in effect protection is sought ... Generally claims which can be considered as being directed to a computer set up to operate in accordance with a specified program (whether by means of hardware or software) for controlling a technical process cannot be regarded as relating to a computer program as such … making a distinction between embodiments of the same invention carried out in hardware or in software [is] inappropriate"
- 1987 (or 1986?), Vicom/Computer-related invention T0208/84:
