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Tuesday, May 03, 2005

New EPO BoA Case Law Concerning CII.

On March 17, 2005, the Technical Board of Appeal 3.4.3 of the

European Patent Office (EPO) has taken a decision confirming that non-technical features cannot support the inventive step. The headnote of

case T 0531/03 says:

"[...] 1. In the assessment of inventive step, features relating to a non-invention within the meaning of Article 52(2) EPC (so-called "non-technical features") cannot support the presence of inventive step [...].

2. An attempt to take into account the contribution of non-technical and technical aspects on an equal footing in the assessment of inventive step would not be in conformity with the EPC, since the presence of inventive step would in such an approach be attributed to features which are defined in the EPC as not being an invention [...]"

This case law looks to be completely in line with the pending EU Draft Directive on the patentability of computer-implemented inventions as endorsed by the EU Council.

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