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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 June 2021
This article uses the advancements in artificial intelligence as the starting point for consideration of the role of human inventorship in European patent law. It argues that human inventorship is a necessary condition for the existence of an invention and inventive step, with the result that only products of human inventorship merit European patents. It identifies failings of European authorities to reflect this adequately in their approaches to determining patentability. Finally, it recommends recognising human inventorship as an implicit patentability requirement being an aspect of the statutory requirements for an invention and inventive step and extending applicant's disclosure duties correspondingly.
DPhil candidate, CDT in Cyber Security and Faculty of Law, University of Oxford. This article incorporates the author's doctoral research which is funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).
I am grateful to Professor Justine Pila for her comments on earlier versions of this article and to the attendees at the European IP Institutes Network Innovation Society (EIPIN-Innovation Society) conference in January 2020 for commenting on the first draft of this article.
1 European patent applications EP 18 275 163 and EP 18 275 174 were refused by the EPO in a reasoned decision of 27 January 2020, appeal pending. In the UK, two patent applications GB1816909.4 and GB1818161.0 designating DABUS as the inventor were refused by the UK IPO's decision BL O/741/19 of 4 December 2019. On appeal, they were halted by the High Court in Stephen Thaler v The Comptroller-General [2020] EWHC 2412 (Pat), [2020] Bus.L.R. 2146. An appeal to the Court of Appeal is pending: Simmons-Simmons, “Court of Appeal to Consider If AI System Can Be a Patent Inventor”, available at https://www.simmons-simmons.com/en/publications/ckk2ji0621aip0954oyl31re9/court-of-appeal-to-consider-if-ai-system-can-be-a-patent-inventor (last accessed 4 February 2021).
2 Stephen Thaler [2020] EWHC 2412 (Pat), at [5].
3 This is inferred from the non-existence of artificial general intelligence (AGI): “[B]ased on the majority view that AGI has not yet arrived current AI could neither invent nor author without human intervention.” R. Hughes, “Is It Time to Move On from the AI Inventor Debate?”, available at https://ipkitten.blogspot.com/2020/12/is-it-time-to-move-on-from-ai-inventor.html (last accessed 31 January 2021). Or, similarly, this is inferred from the lack of systems’ “initiative” to invent: “In all these examples, artificial intelligence did not take the initiative to invent. … In that sense, artificial intelligence does not invent autonomously”: Blok, P., “The Inventor's New Tool: Artificial Intelligence – How Does it Fit in the European Patent System?” (2017) 39 European Intellectual Property Review 69Google Scholar.
4 “At the other end of the spectrum, computers generate works under circumstances in which no human author or inventor can be identified”: Abbott, R., “Artificial Intelligence, Big Data and Intellectual Property: Protecting Computer-generated Works in the United Kingdom” in Aplin, T. (ed.), Research Handbook on Intellectual Property and Digital Technologies (Cheltenham 2020), 324Google Scholar. Similarly, in Yanisky-Ravid, S. and Liu, X., “When Artificial Intelligence Systems Produce Inventions: The 3A Era and an Alternative Model for Patent Law” (2018) 39 Cardozo Law Review 2215Google Scholar.
5 The issues of normative desirability of the grant of intellectual property or sui generis protection for AI-generated objects that do not meet existing patentability criteria, including human inventorship, lie outside the scope of this article.
6 An accessible overview of other kinds of AI can be found in J. Drexl et al., “Technical Aspects of Artificial Intelligence: An Understanding from an Intellectual Property Law Perspective” (2019) Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition Research Paper No. 19-13, available at https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3465577 (last accessed 12 January 2021).
7 Rosenblatt, F., The Perceptron: A Theory of Statistical Separability in Cognitive Systems (Project Para) (New York 1958)Google Scholar.
8 Roberts, A. and Wooldridge, M.J., Artificial Intelligence (London 2018), 40Google Scholar.
9 M. Taddy, “The Technological Elements of Artificial Intelligence” (2018) NBER Working Paper No. 24301, available at https://www.nber.org/papers/w24301.pdf (last accessed 12 January 2021).
10 Russell, S.J. and Norvig, P., Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach, 3rd ed. (Harlow 2016), 729Google Scholar.
11 Di, W. et al. , Deep Learning Essentials: Your Hands-on Guide to the Fundamentals of Deep Learning and Neural Network Modeling (Birmingham 2018), 87Google Scholar.
12 L. Hardesty, “Explained: Neural Networks”, available at https://news.mit.edu/2017/explained-neural-networks-deep-learning-0414 (last accessed 12 January 2021).
13 Wooldridge, M., The Road to Conscious Machines (London 2020), 188Google Scholar.
14 Ibid.
15 Stokes, J.M. et al. , “A Deep Learning Approach to Antibiotic Discovery” (2020) Cell 688, 689CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed.
16 Ibid.
17 World Intellectual Property Organization, “Revised Issues Paper on Intellectual Property Policy and Artificial Intelligence”, available at https://www.wipo.int/meetings/en/doc_details.jsp?doc_id=499504 (last accessed 19 March 2021), at [15](i).
18 Russell and Norvig, Artificial Intelligence, 1–2.
19 This is recommended also by Shemtov, who states “[a]n approach that is both theoretically sound as well as practically workable should focus on the respective contributions of the various persons in the chain of creation”: N. Shemtov, “A Study on Inventorship in Inventions Involving AI Activity”, available at http://documents.epo.org/projects/babylon/eponet.nsf/0/3918F57B010A3540C125841900280653/$File/Concept_of_Inventorship_in_Inventions_involving_AI_Activity_en.pdf (last accessed 26 October 2020).
20 Kostylo, J., “Commentary on the Venetian Statute on Industrial Brevets (1474)” in Bently, L. and Kretschmer, M. (eds.), Primary Sources on Copyright (1450–1900) (Cambridge 2008)Google Scholar, available at www.copyrighthistory.org (last accessed 12 January 2021).
21 Ibid.
22 Long, P.O., “Invention, Authorship, ‘Intellectual Property’ and the Origin of Patents: Notes toward a Conceptual History” (1991) 32 Technology and Culture 846, 881CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
23 MacLeod, C., Inventing the Industrial Revolution (Cambridge 2009), 11Google Scholar.
24 Statute of Monopolies 1623. Quoted in Kostylo, “Commentary”.
25 Edgeberry v Stephens (1693) 90 E.R. 1162 (K.B.).
26 J. Madison, “Federalist No. 43”, available at https://guides.loc.gov/federalist-papers/text-41-50#s-lg-box-wrapper-25493407 (last accessed 21 March 2021).
27 Mossoff, A., “Who Cares What Thomas Jefferson Thought about Patents – Reevaluating the Patent Privilege in Historical Context” (2007) 92 Cornell Law Review 953, 1006Google Scholar.
28 Encyclopaedias list only human beings and no other intelligent entities as inventors. For instance, B. Duignan, “Inventors and Inventions of the Industrial Revolution”, available at https://www.britannica.com/list/inventors-and-inventions-of-the-industrial-revolution (last accessed 12 January 2021).
29 Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property of March 1883 (latest version, Stockholm 1967, with 1979 amendments), Article 4ter: “The inventor shall have the right to be mentioned as such in the patent” read in conjunction with Bodenhausen, G., WIPO Guide to the Application of the Paris Convention (Geneva 1968), 64Google Scholar, wherein it is explained that the right under Article 4ter is “commonly called a moral right”.
30 Ricketson, S., The Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property: A Commentary (Oxford 2015), 389Google Scholar. There are no indications that the drafters would have regarded inventors as including any other entities than human beings. Human inventorship was not debated as a potential condition for patent validity because the Paris Convention did not aim to harmonise substantive patent law. See ibid., 443 et seq. In contrast, the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) sets out substantive patentability criteria such as invention or inventive step. However, it does not define those notions and they are left to be defined “in good faith” by the Members: Correa, C., Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights: A Commentary on the TRIPS Agreement, 2nd ed. (Oxford 2020), ch. 9Google Scholar.
31 Article 62 EPC.
32 P. Hess, “EPC 2000, Art 62” in R.J. Hacon and J. Pagenberg (eds.), Concise European Patent Law, 2nd ed. (Alphen an den Rijn 2008), 67.
33 Article 81 EPC and Implementing Regulations to the EPC, Rule 19(1).
34 Travaux préparatoires to the EPC 1973, Minutes of the Munich Diplomatic Conference for the Setting up of a European System for the Grant of Patents, M/PR/I, para. 265, available at https://www.epo.org/law-practice/legal-texts/epc/archive/epc-1973/traveaux.html (last accessed 29 March 2021).
35 Implementing Regs., Rule 19(3): “If the applicant is not the inventor or is not the sole inventor, the European Patent Office shall communicate to the designated inventor the information in the document designating him.”
36 Articles 78 and 90 EPC.
37 Implementing Regs., Rule 41.
38 Ibid., Rule 19.
39 EPO decision of 27 January 2020 on patent applications EP 18 275 163 and on EP 18 275 174, under appeal.
40 Melullis, K.J., “Patentfähige Erfindungen” in Benkard, G. (ed.), Europäisches Patentübereinkommen (Munich 2002), 301Google Scholar.
41 Ibid.
42 Travaux préparatoires to the EPC 1973, Texts Drawn Up by the Drafting Committee of Main Committee I at the Meeting on 12 September 1973, M/74/I/R 1, available at https://www.epo.org/law-practice/legal-texts/epc/archive/epc-1973/traveaux.html (last accessed 29 March 2021).
43 Haedicke, M., “§3 Ownership A. Inventor and inventor right” in Haedicke, M. and Timmann, H. (eds.), Patent Law: A Handbook on European and German Patent Law (Baden 2014), 244CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
44 Article 61 EPC and the Protocol on Jurisdiction and the Recognition of Decisions in respect of the Right to the Grant of a European Patent (Protocol on Recognition), art. 1. See further Patents Act 1977, s. 7(2), Patentgesetz of 16.12.1980 (BGBl. 1981 I S. 1) (“German Patent Act”) §6, the Code de la propriété intellectuelle, art. L611-6.
45 Patents Act 1977, s. 7(3).
46 A person gains the status of an inventor when he “makes an invention, so he himself acquires knowledge how to solve a particular technical problem with certain technical means … and he discloses his knowledge … as an instruction that can be used for technical implementation”: Steuervorrichtung, Decision of 18 May 2010 – X ZR 79/07 (GRUR 2010, 817), at [28].
47 “The law attributes, … the ownership to the invention to a person who originated it”: Sirinelli, P., Code de la propriété intellectuelle, 19th ed. (Paris 2019), 572Google Scholar.
48 Patents Act 1977, s. 7(3).
49 Yeda Research v Rhone-Poulenc Rorer International Holdings Inc. [2007] UKHL 43, [2008] 1 All E.R. 425, at [20].
50 Ibid., Lord Hoffmann referred to Laddie J. in University of Southampton's Applications [2004] EWHC 2107 (Pat), [2005] R.P.C. 11, at [39].
51 Henry Brothers v MOD [1997] R.P.C. 693, 706 (Ch.).
52 IDA v The University of Southampton [2006] EWCA Civ 145, [2006] R.P.C. 21, at [39].
53 L. Bently et al., Intellectual Property Law, 5th ed. (Oxford 2018), 627.
54 Article 60(3) EPC.
55 Article 138(1)(e) EPC (Article 138 Revocation of European Patents/Artikel 138 Nichtigkeit europäischer Patente/Article 138 Nullité des brevets européens).
56 Patents Act 1977, s. 72(1)(b) in conjunction with s. 72(2).
57 German Patent Act, Nullity Proceedings and Compulsory Licence Proceedings (Nichtigkeits- und Zwangslizenzverfahren), §81(3).
58 Cour de cassation, Decision of 14 February 2012, n° 11-14.288.
59 Intellectual Property Office, “Manual of Patent Practice” (2016), at [13.12]. The accuracy of the inventor's designation is not verified by the German Patent and Trade Mark Office, German Patent Act, §37.
60 Stephen Thaler [2020] EWHC 2412 (Pat.), at [29].
61 An argument along these lines was made by Marcus Smith J. in ibid., at [45].
62 Pila, J., The Subject Matter of Intellectual Property (Oxford 2017), 9CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The monograph is focused on European and UK law.
63 Sherman, B., “What Does It Mean to Invent Nature?” (2015) 5 U.C. Irvine Law Review, 1193, 1203Google Scholar. The article analyses US and Australian doctrine.
64 Melullis, “Patentfähige Erfindungen”, 310.
65 Haedicke, M., “§3 Ownership A. Inventor and Inventor Right” in Haedicke, M. and Timmann, H. (eds.), Handbuch des Patentrechts (Munich 2012), at [1], [5]Google Scholar.
66 Ginsburg, J.C., “The Concept of Authorship in Comparative Copyright Law” (2003) 52 DePaul Law Review 1063, 1078Google Scholar.
67 Ibid.
68 Originality or “intellectual creation” as provided in the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (Paris Act of 24 July 1971), as amended on 28 September 1979 (“Berne”), Article 2(1). “ʻ[I]ntellectual creation' is implicit in the conception of a literary or artistic work”: S. Ricketson and J.C. Ginsburg, International Copyright and Neighbouring Rights: The Berne Convention and Beyond, vol. I, 2nd ed. (Oxford 2006), 402.
69 In copyright law, this is more straightforward because no act of state administration is required for copyright to subsist. Berne, Article 5(2). In contrast to patent law, the UK copyright law contains a legal fiction of an author for computer-generated works in the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, s. 9(3). As this provision constitutes a deviation from the general principle of authorship requiring a human creator of authorial works and is strictly limited to UK copyright, it is not discussed here at any length. For further details, see Bently et al., Intellectual Property Law, 117–18.
70 “[M]odern patent lawyers so rarely ask the question: what is the invention? … Although the requirements for patentability do not include a discrete requirement that applicants be able to show that they have created an invention, it is clear that the invention occupies a pivotal place in patent law”: Pottage, A. and Sherman, B., Figures of Invention: A History of Modern Patent Law (Oxford 2010), 3CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
71 For instance, in German law (until the reform in 1968) there were no separate requirements for an invention and inventive activity. Rather, the achievement or the contribution to the art was understood as the main patentability criterion. See R. Nack, “Inventions and Their Amenability to Patent Protection” in Haedicke and Timmann (eds.), Patent Law, at [24]. Or, ʻ[t]he definition of an invention as being a contribution to the art …'. See Factor-9/JOHN HOPKINS, T 1329/04 of 28 June 2005, EP:BA:2005:T132904.20050628, at [12].
72 An invention is required to involve an “inventive step”, or “inventive activity” pursuant to Article 56 EPC. Similarly, Aplin chooses novelty and inventiveness when giving an account of creativity in patent law. Aplin, T., “Creativity and the Law” in Martin, L. and Wilson, N. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Creativity at Work (Basingstoke 2018)Google Scholar. Put in other words, “creativity reappeared in the form of the requirements of originality and non-obviousness, in which applicants had to show, in effect, that their respective works were creative”. Sherman, B. and Bently, L., The Making of Modern Intellectual Property Law: The British Experience, 1760–1911 (Cambridge 1999), 200Google Scholar.
73 The settled jurisprudence of the EPO on the interpretation of the EPC should normally be followed. Actavis Group PTC EHF v ICOS Corporation [2019] UKSC 15, [2020] 1 All E.R. 213, at [56].
74 Estimating Sales Activity/DUNS LICENSING ASSOCIATES, T 0154/04 of 15 November 2006, EP:BA:2006:T015404.20061115, at [5].
75 The EBA is a quasi-judicial body of the EPO. It is tasked with ensuring a uniform application of the EPC, deciding points of law of fundamental importance and with a limited judicial review of decisions of the Boards of Appeal. Articles 112 and 112a EPC.
76 Tomatoes/State of Israel, G 0001/08 of 9 December 2010, EP:BA:2010:G000108.20101209.
77 Even though the referral concerned interpretation of Article 53(b) EPC primarily, this question hints at the category of “as such” non-inventions under Article 52(2) EPC and their saving through a step of technical nature. Thus, the EBA started answering the question by defining what technicity and invention under Article 52(1) EPC mean.
78 Tomatoes, at [6.4.2.3], and the same at [6.4.2.1]. The same also Broccoli/PLANT BIOSCIENCE, G 0002/07 of 9 December 2010, EP:BA:2010:G000207.20101209, at [6.4.2.1].
79 Ibid., at [6.4.2.1]. It may be objected that the EBA contrasts “human” to “natural/biological intervention” in this decision. Rather it contrasts the effects of a human intervention and natural “intervention” of sexual crossing on the resulting subject matter. The EBA distinguishes between technical steps that (1) merely enhance or assist the biological processes and those that (2) change the result. In principle, inventions in all technical fields secure their technical character through human intervention in the nature. This applies to inventions in computer science (e.g. utilising electricity), chemistry (e.g. utilising properties of various materials), mechanics (e.g. utilising natural laws of motion), etc.
80 Ibid., at [6.4.2.3].
81 Simulation Method, G 0001/19 of 10 March 2021, EP:BA:2021:G000119.20210310, at [75].
82 Ibid, at [46], [47].
83 Though both decisions imply intentionality or purpose, the EBA does not specify this further. Nonetheless, it follows that in Tomatoes and Simulation method inventions are understood as creations, i.e. reproducible results of a process involving human intervention. Some scholarship mentions “accidental inventions”, i.e. “accidental discoveries, [which] at least at the moment of the serendipitous event, lack conception”. Seymore, S.B., “Serendipity” (2009) 88 North Carolina Law Review 185, 191Google Scholar. However, neither the accidental event of discovering a substance nor the discovered substance amount to an invention in the sense of Tomatoes. The “serendipper” can turn a discovery into an invention by acquiring knowledge about how to re-create it, how to incorporate it into a process with industrial application, etc.: see more in the following section.
84 Tomatoes, at [6.4.2.3]. This comes from the part of the decision where the EBA interprets the “essentially biological process” exception to patentability. In sum, (1) if there is a technical step in a process then the process is an invention; (2) if the technical step in a process which is based on the sexual crossing of plants and on subsequent selection only serves to perform the process steps of the breeding process then such a process is excluded; (3) if, however, the technical step within such a process determines the result to some extent then the process is outside the exception and bounces back to constitute an invention.
85 Ibid., at [6.4.2.1].
86 To put it differently, an invention “must represent an objectively determinable and causally determined result of human intervention in the physical world that is also repeateable”: Pila, J. and Torremans, P., European Intellectual Property Law, 2nd ed. (Oxford 2019), 157CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
87 R. Gajac, “Comparative Study of Substantive Law in Force in the Countries Represented on the Committee of Experts on Patents” EXP/Brev (53), 18 as reproduced in Pila, J., The Requirement for an Invention in Patent Law (Oxford 2010), 138Google Scholar. The Comparative Study was prepared in 1953 under the auspices of the Council of Europe.
88 M. Vivant and J.M. Brugière, “Réinventer l'invention?” (2003) 8 Propriétés Intellectuelles 286 quoting P. Roubier, Le droit de la propriété industrielle, vol. 2 (Paris 1954), 90.
89 Passa, J., Droit de la propriété industrielle, 2nd ed. (Montchrestien 2013), 74Google Scholar quoting P. Mathély, “Le nouveau régime des brevets d'invention” (1969) Annuaire Propriété Industrielle 1, spec. 9.
90 However, further in the text Nack does not connect this activity-based distinction with patentability of a subject matter. Nack, “Inventions”, at [149].
91 S. Thorley et al. Terrell on the Law of Patents, 15th ed. (London 2000), at [2-69] (not included in the 19th ed.); S. Sterckx and J. Cockbain, Exclusions from Patentability: How Far Has the European Patent Office Eroded Boundaries (Cambridge 2012), 115.
92 Sterckx and Cockbain, Exclusions, 133.
93 Melullis, “Patentfähige Erfindungen”, 346.
94 Directive (EU) 98/44/EC (OJ 1998 L 213 p.13), art. 3.
95 Special edition 4/2007 Revision of the European Patent Convention (EPC 2000) Synoptic presentation EPC 1973/2000 – Part I: The Articles Part II Chapter I Article 52 EPC.
96 “Oxford English Dictionary”, Online Edition December 2020 at https://www.oed.com/ (last accessed 27 April 2021).
97 Gajac, “Comparative Study”, 3–7 as referred to in Pila, The Requirement, 139.
98 Rote Taube, Decision of 27 March 1969, X ZB 15/67 (IIC 1970, 136) 138. Also see J. Straus, “Biotechnologische Erfindungen – ihr Schutz und seine Grenzen” (1992) GRUR 252, 258.
99 TRIPS, art. 27(1) prohibits discrimination on the grounds of the field of technology.
100 These include a discovery, scientific theory or mathematical method, aesthetic creations, a scheme, rule or method for performing a mental act, playing a game or doing business, or a program for a computer or the presentation of information.
101 Estimating Sales, at [8].
102 Ibid.
103 Odour Selection/QUEST INTERNATIONAL, T 0619/02 of 22 March 2006, EP:BA:2006:T061902.20060322, at [2.2].
104 Estimating Sales, at [5b].
105 Odour Selection. Similarly, “where an intrinsically non-technical solution (mathematical algorithm) seeks to derive a technical character from the problem solved, the problem must be technical”: Classification Method/COMPTEL, T 1784/06 of 21 September 2012, EP:BA:2012:T178406.20120921, at [2.3].
106 Programs for Computers, G 0003/08 of 12 May 2010, EP:BA:2010:G000308.20100512, at [10.7].
107 C. Birss et al., Terrell on the Law of Patents, 19th ed. (London 2020), at [2–10].
108 Biogen Inc. v Medeva plc. 38 B.M.L.R. 149, [1997] R.P.C. 1, at [41]–[42] (H.L.).
109 Aerotel Ltd. and Telco Holdings Ltd. [2006] EWCA Civ 1371, [2007] Bus.L.R. 634, at [40].
110 Gemstar-TV Guide International Inc. v Virgin Media Ltd. [2009] EWHC 3068 (Ch.), [2010] R.P.C. 10, at [41]–[43]; AT&T Knowledge v Comptroller General of Patents [2009] EWHC 343 (Pat), [2009] Bus.L.R. D51, at [39]–[41]; HTC Europe Co. Ltd. v Apple Inc. [2013] EWCA Civ 451, [2013] R.P.C. 30, at [154].
111 HTC Europe [2013] EWCA Civ 451, at [57]–[59].
112 Ibid., at [154] et seq.
113 Passa, Droit, 68.
114 Pollaud-Dulian, F., La propriété industrielle, 2nd ed. (Paris 2011), at [159]Google Scholar.
115 Azéma, J. and Galloux, J.-C., Droit de la propriété industrielle, 8th ed. (Paris 2017), 158–59Google Scholar.
116 Steuerungseinrichtung für Untersuchungsmodalitäten, Decision of 20 January 2009, X ZB 22/07 (GRUR 2009, 479), at [11].
117 Logikverifikation, Decision of 13 December 1999, X ZB 11/98 (GRUR 2000, 498), 500.
118 Ibid.
119 Nack, “Inventions”, at [13].
120 In one case the required technicity was acknowledged because the claimed process run on a computer involved “typical steps of processing, storing and transmission of data via technical devices”: Erfindungen mit Bezug zu eräten und Computerprogrammen, Decision of 24 February 2011, X ZR 121/09 (GRUR 2011, 610), 612. Also, in an earlier case, the underlying computer program was found inherently patentable as it fulfilled the technicity criterion by virtue of serving to processing, storing and transmission of data via a technical device. Steuerungseinrichtung, 480.
121 Article 52(1) EPC.
122 English version: Inventive step, German version: Erfinderische Tätigkeit (inventive activity) and French version: Activité inventive (inventive activity).
123 A mere disadvantageous modification of the closest prior art does not constitute an inventive step. T 2197/09 () of 20.11.2014, EP:BA:2014:T219709.20141120, at [5.4].
124 Article 31 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties 1969.
125 Gajac, “Comparative Study”, 16, copy on file with author.
126 Kühnemann Report on Technological Progress and Creative Effort as Patentability Criteria. EXP/Brev (60), 5, available at https://rm.coe.int/090000168072965b (last accessed 29 March 2021).
127 Proceedings of the first meeting of the Patents Working Party held at Brussels from 17 to 28 April 1961, Document IV/2767/61-E, 18, available at https://www.epo.org/law-practice/legal-texts/epc/archive/epc-1973/traveaux.html (last accessed 29 March 2021).
128 Two Identities/COMVIK, T 0641/00 of 26 September 2002, EP:BA:2002:T064100.20020926, at [6]. Estimating Sales, at [5e].
129 As acknowledged elsewhere, “while the exercise of (mental) labour and effort is a necessary condition for an invention to be non-obvious, it is not a sufficient condition”: Bently et al., Intellectual Property Law, 591.
130 Naturally, there are many ways how a technical problem can be solved. Some may start from a pre-defined technical problem and devise a solution to it, e.g. the example of identifying halicin. This will be typical for solutions offered by AI-driven systems. Others may start with finding an object and then devising its purpose or implementation to solve technical problems. See the section on “Origin of an invention” in the EPO, Guidelines, Part G, Chapter VII, at [9].
131 P. Johnson, “EPC 2000, Art 56” in Hacon and Pagenberg (eds.), Concise European Patent Law, 52.
132 Combustion Engine, T 0426/88 of 9 November 1990, EP:BA:1990:T042688.19901109, at [6.4].
133 Genentech/Expression in Yeast, T 445/91 of 20 June 1994, EP:BA:1994:T045591.19940620, at [5.1.3.3].
134 EPO, Guidelines for Examination (Munich 2021), Part G, Chapter VII, at [5].
135 Pozzoli SPA v BDMO SA, [2007] EWCA Civ 588, [2007] Bus.L.R. D117, at [23].
136 Actavis UK Ltd. v Novartis AG [2010] EWCA Civ 82, [2010] F.S.R. 18, at [41].
137 Generics (UK) Ltd. v H Lundbeck A/S [2007] EWHC 1040 (Pat.), [2007] R.P.C. 32, at [72], in this part confirmed by the Court of Appeal in H. Lundbeck A/S v Generics (UK) [2008] EWCA Civ 311, [2008] R.P.C. 437, at [24] (C.A.).
138 Actavis v ICOS [2019] UKSC 15, at [62], [67]–[72].
139 A. Keukenschrijver et al., Patentgesetz: Kommentar, 8th ed. (Berlin 2016), §4, at [25].
140 C.D. Asendorf and C. Schmidt, “Erfindung auf Grund erfinderischer Tätigkeit” in G. Benkard (ed.), Patentgesetz (Munich 2015), §4, at [21].
141 C. Ann, “Erfinderische Leistung” in R. Kraßer and C. Ann (eds.), Patentrecht, 8th ed. (Munich 2016), §18, at [11].
142 Passa, Droit, at [190].
143 Cour de cassation, Decision of 8 October 2002, INPI database.
144 Nichia Corporation v Argos [2007] EWCA Civ 741, [2007] Bus.L.R. 1753, at [13].
145 A list of secondary factors was provided by Justice Laddie in Haberman v Jackel Int. Ltd. [1999] F.S.R. 683, 699–701.
146 Actavis v ICOS [2019] UKSC 15, at [71]. Positec Power Tools (Europe) Ltd. v Husqvarna AB Chancery Division [2016] EWHC 1061 (Pat), [2016] Bus.L.R. 714, at [8].
147 Alcan/Aluminium Alloys, T 465/92 of 14 October 1994, EP:BA:1994:T046592.19941014, at [9.5].
148 Keukenschrijver et al., Patentgesetz, §4, at [116].
149 Ibid., at [48]–[49]. Cour de cassation, Decision of 19 December 2000, INPI database.
150 Disiloxan, Decision of 27 February 1969, X ZB 11/68, 7.
151 All in The National Industrial Property Institute, “La délivrance des brevets et des certificats d'utilité” available at https://www.inpi.fr/sites/default/files/directives_brevets_version_octobre_2019_2.pdf (last accessed 31 January 2021), 96.
152 Sherman and Bently, The Making, 44.
153 Ibid.
154 M. Fisher, “Classical Economics and Philosophy of the Patent System” (2005) I.P.Q. 1, 8–10.
155 Ibid.
156 F. Machlup, An Economic Review of the Patent System, Committee Print (Washington 1958), 23–24.
157 Ibid., 36.
158 Bently, L., “Patents and Trade Secrets in England: The Case of Newbery v. James (1817)” in Dreyfuss, R.C. and Ginsburg, J.C. (eds.), Intellectual Property at the Edge: The Contested Contours of IP (Cambridge 2014), 312–13Google Scholar.
159 R. Burrell and C. Kelly, “Parliamentary Rewards and the Revolution of the Patent System” [2015] C.L.J. 423, 439–41.
160 If the exchange-for-secret theory could stand alone, then, for instance, the designation of an individualised human inventor or the dependency of entitlement on the inventor would not have to be required.
161 Kitch, E., “The Nature and Function of the Patent System” (1977) 20 Journal of Law and Economics 265CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
162 Ibid., 266.
163 An AI-driven system could be defined as a system that can perform tasks such as decision-making, problem-solving, etc which normally require human intellectual activity. This proposal stems from definitions of AI offered in Russell and Norvig, Artificial Intelligence, 1–2.
164 Implementing Regs. See also EPO, Guidelines, Part F, Chapter II, at [4].
165 Similar arguments were made by Sherman in relation to disclosure of biological resources and indigenous knowledge with a view to learning their role in scientific and technical developments: Sherman, B., “Regulating Access and Use of Genetic Resources: Intellectual Property Law and Biodiscovery” (2003) 25 European Intellectual Property Review 7, 307–08Google Scholar.
166 By analogy N.P. de Carvalho, “Requiring Disclosure of the Origin of Genetic Resources and Prior Informed Consent in Patent Applications without Infringing the TRIPS Agreement: The Problem and the Solution” (2000) Washington University Journal of Law and Policy 371, 372, 382.
167 If this were accepted, a further thought should be given as to where to place the burden of proof.
