3 12

I – Informationconcerningepi

59 CommitteeReports

68 EPOInformation:Seminar„Boardsofappealandkeydecisions“

69 EuropeanPatentAttorneysExcessLiability

II – ContributionsfromepiMembersandothercontributions

71 Article123(2)EPC,RecentCaseLawandaChessboard,byChristianKöster

78 MonumentalChangestoU.S.PatentLaw:IssuesRelatedtotheImplementationoftheLeahySmithAmericaInventsAct,byP.StephensonandR.S.M.Gorman

87 StatisticalAdviceforPassingtheEQEPre-Exam,byO.Griebling

89 LetterstotheEditor

G 10904 F | ISSN 1434-8853 | Art.-Nr. 56356203 | September 2012

Information

Institut der beim Europäischen Patentamt zugelassenen Vertreter

Institute of Professional Representatives before the European Patent Office

Institut des mandataires agréés près l’Office européen des brevets

InstitutderbeimEuropäischenPatentamtzugelassenenVertreterInstituteofProfessionalRepresentativesbeforetheEuropeanPatentOfficeInstitutdesmandatairesagréésprèsl‘Officeeuropéendesbrevets

Redaktionsausschuss / Editorial Committee / Commission de RédactionWalterHolzerTerryJohnsonThierrySchuffeneckerAlbertWiedemann

Postanschrift / Mailing address / Adresse postale epiP.O.Box26011280058MunichGermanyTel: +4989242052-0Fax:+4989242052-20Email:info@patentepi.comwww.patentepi.com

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Anzeigen / Advertisements / Publicité CarlHeymannsVerlagEineMarkevonWoltersKluwerDeutschlandGmbH

Druck / Printing / Imprimeur Grafik+DruckGmbH,MünchenISSN1434-8853©Copyrightepi2012

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Table of Contents

Editorial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

I – Information concerning epi

Committee Reports

Report of the Professional Qualification Committee,by P. Rambelli . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59Report of the European Practice Committee,by F. Leyder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62Report of the Harmonisation Committee,by F. Leyder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63Report of Biotech Committee, by Ann de Clercq . 64Report of the EPO Finances Committee,by J. Boff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Education and training

epi Tutors’ Meeting in Berlinon September 18, 2012. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67epi Mock EQEs and epi Seminars 2012 . . . . . . 68Tutors wanted . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68EPO Information: Seminar „Boards of appealand key decisions“ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68

Information from the Secretariat

Next Board and Council Meetings. . . . . . . . . 69European Patent Attorneys Excess Liability. . . . . 69epi meeting room for epi members . . . . . . . . 67European Patent Attorneys Excess Liability. . . . . 69

Important Information for epi Members havingtheir place of registration in Switzerland . . . . . . 70Deadline epi Information 4/2012. . . . . . . . . . 58Contact Data of Legal Division. . . . . . . . . . . 70Dates of forthcoming issues of epi Information . . 63epi Disciplinary bodies and Committees . . . . . . 93epi Board . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . U3

II – Contributions from epi Members andother contributions

Articles

Article 123(2) EPC, Recent Case Law and aChessboard, by Christian Köster . . . . . . . . . . 71Monumental Changes to U.S. Patent Law: IssuesRelated to the Implementation of the LeahySmith America Invents Act, by P. Stephensonand R. S. M. Gorman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78Statistical Advice for Passing the EQE Pre-Exam,by O. Griebling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

Letters to the Editor

Über Jurisprudenz im Patentrecht, von G. Kern . . 89Beitrag angeregt durch den Artikel von HerrnDr. A. Kumm: „Die Crux mit der erfinderischenTätigkeit und die schweizerische Chance ihreroperablen Bewertung“ (epi Information 1/2012,S. 22/23), von S. V. Kulhavy . . . . . . . . . . . . 90

Information 3/2012 Table of Contents 57

Editorial

T. Johnson (GB)

The summer is drawing to a close, not that there hasbeen much to speak of weather-wise from the UK side ofthe Channel. While economic woes continue to causeconcern, the Olympics have perhaps taken our minds offthe weather and the world-wide economy, so we con-gratulate all of those from the member States who tookpart in the Olympics, particularly if medals of any colourwere won.

The marathon is one of the Olympic events, and bringsto mind two IP marathons of continuing interest. One isof wider interest to applicants, business, Member Statesand our members, namely the fate (?) of the UnitaryPatent. This is particularly so bearing in mind the stanceof the European Parliament in response to the EuropeanCouncil’s seeming agreement to cancel clauses 6-8 of

the draft law on the Unitary Patent. We await theParliament’s deliberations with interest.

A second marathon, more on the epi home front, isthe work being done not least by the Editorial Com-mittee, to create a re-vamped epi website, which it ishoped will be more user-friendly and accessible to users.Outside consultants have been involved, and they havemade a positive contribution in the Committee’s view. Itis hoped to give a presentation of the new web-site toCouncil at the Hamburg Council meeting on 10thNovember 2012.

Stamina, perseverance, (and perhaps a little hope) areneeded to complete a marathon, so we hope for asuccessful conclusion to the two IP marathons referredto above.

58 Editorial Information 3/2012

Nächster Redaktions-schluss für epi Information

Informieren Sie bitte den Redaktions-ausschuss so früh wie möglich überdas Thema, das Sie veröffentlichenmöchten. Redaktionsschluss für dienächste Ausgabe der epi Informationist der 2. November 2012. Die Doku-mente, die veröffentlicht werdensollen, müssen bis zu diesem Datumim Sekretariat eingegangen sein.

Next deadline forepi Information

Please inform the Editorial Commit-tee as soon as possible about thesubject you want to publish. Dead-line for the next issue of epiInformation is 2nd November 2012.Documents for publication shouldhave reached the Secretariat by thisdate.

Prochaine date limite pourepi Information

Veuillez informer la Commission derédaction le plus tôt possible du sujetque vous souhaitez publier. La datelimite de remise des documents pourle prochain numéro de epiInformation est le 2 novembre2012. Les textes destinés à la pub-lication devront être reçus par leSecrétariat avant cette date.

Report of the Professional Qualification Committee

P. Rambelli (IT)Chair of PQC

A PQC meeting was held in Vienna at the EPO premiseson 30 March 2012, attended by 27 representatives. Themeeting was also attended by Mr Tony Tangena, epiPresident, Ms Gabriele Leissler-Gerstl, epi Vice-President,Ms Mihaela Teodorescu, epi Vice-President and Presid-ium PQC liaison member, and Mr Karl Rackette, Directorof Education, all as invited guests.

Mr Richard Flammer, Principal Director PatentInformation and European Patent Academy gave anopening speech focusing on the willingness by theEPO President to improve the present situation of theEuropean patent attorneys’ profession by increasing thenumber of EQE qualified patent attorneys, particularly inthose countries where at present the number of EQEqualified representatives is not satisfactory (less thanfive). The improvement plan requires a comprehensiveapproach to the training for EQE, which could be carriedout by the EP Academy, in cooperation with epi andnational Patent Offices. Such a comprehensive approachwould involve the definition of standard EQE preparationcourses and further improvement of the e-learningmodules. There is a need to tailor the EQE preparationcourses to the needs of individual countries and PQC canhave a relevant role, particularly in the cooperation withNPOs for customised training.

The EPAcademy has funds to subsidy and develop EQEtraining; it is however necessary to synergise the existingfunds and manpower resources in order to achieve theintended goals.

To achieve said intended goals, at the present date, theEPO has set up the EQE Candidate Support Project (CSP)with the specific aim of ensuring that candidatesselected to participate attain an adequate level of knowl-edge such that they successfully pass the EQE.

A core element of the project is the provision of anextensive training programme, jointly developed by theEPO, the epi and CEIPI, with the NPOs as active stake-holders.

The 21 candidates from 19 selected countries (thosewhere the number of EQE qualified representative is lessthan 5), already enrolled for the pre-examination 2013,have been invited to apply for the training programmewhich will take place in the period from September 2012to February 2013. The candidates who will be eventuallyselected will receive free training and tuition, trainingmaterial and customised tutoring and coaching for thepreparation of the pre-examination.

The training project is intended to be continued in2013for the preparation to the EQE 2014.

In the following, the major PQC activities carried out orin progress, in the recent period, will be briefly discussed.

1. Pre-examination and pre-examination training

The first pre-examination was held in Munich on 5 March2012 and the pre-examination paper and relating Exam-iner’s Report have been made available on the EPOwebsite. The paper includes 10 legal questions and 10claim analysis questions, each including 4false/truestatements.

The pre-examination was sat by 390 candidates with asubstantial reduction (about 35-40%) with respect tothe number of first sitters in previous EQEs.

The results, published in May 2012, show a pass rateclose to 99%. On the basis of the available preliminarycomments from candidates and tutors, the pre-examin-ation was considered easier than expected (in compari-son with the difficulty of the Mock pre-examination testsreleased by the EPO in 2011); the very high pass rateseems to indicate that the pre-examination, for the timebeing, has acted as a filter at the time of enrolment,rather than as a filter based on difficulty of the test itself.

1.1 Pre-examination trainingPQC has cooperated with the EP Academy in the pre-examination training course, which was held in theperiod from November 2011 to February 2012.

For the purpose of the pre-examination course, arelevant amount of new training material was developedad hoc both by the epi tutors and EPO Examiners.

Particularly epi tutors have been directly involved inproviding simple and multiple questions relating to thelegal part of the pre-examination and case studies for theclaim analysis part and as lecturers in virtual classrooms.

A preliminary survey carried out by the Academyamong the candidates enrolled with the pre-examin-ation course shows that the information made availableon the website and the training material were con-sidered as satisfactory, although improvement is neededparticularly in connection with the virtual class rooms.Virtual class rooms are considered the appropriate toolfor training candidates in individual countries; however,it is agreed that the tutors involved should get a special-ised training for giving online courses.

Preparation for the next e-learning course due to startin the first week of September 2012 is now welladvanced. The course is divided into a series of modules,each of which is three-week long (each module will bereleased onto the website every three weeks).

The number of epi tutors assisting the Academy hasbeen raised to 15.

Our special thanks goes to the epi tutors who havepositively answered to our call for available tutors andwho contributed a very important part of the trainingmaterial.

Information 3/2012 Committee Reports 59

I–In

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2. CPE seminars

In the year 2011 we celebrated the ten-year anniversarysince the first CPE seminar was organised by the PQC inCopenhagen (28 May 2001) on the topic “Oral proceed-ings at the EPO”. Mr Daniel Thomas, EPO Directorchaired that seminar; in the same year, the second CPEseminar on the same subject was held in Milan on 13December.

At that time, epi took responsibility for the practicalarrangement of the seminars, Mr Thomas provided thecase study and PQC members were directly involved,both in providing didactic material for the seminar and asactors for the Mock oral proceedings.

Clearly, since then the situation has changed and CPEseminars are an established reality.

In year 2012, the following CPE seminars are envis-aged.

2.1 Guidelines-2DAY seminarsThe 2012 substantially revised edition of the Guidelinesfor Examination has been made available in its Englishdraft on the EPO website in March 2012. The Guidelineswere published in all three official languages in June2012 and became legally binding. In September 2012the paper publication is expected.

The revised Guidelines edition has a totally new struc-ture and a new content, so that information to the usersis deemed to be necessary.

To this end, specific seminars, called “Guide-lines2DAY” seminars, have been organised by the EPAcademy and epi with the coordination of the epiDirector of Education.

The goal to be achieved is helping EP practitioners inmastering the changes in the Guidelines, thereby toincrease efficiency in daily work; the targeted audienceare EPA of “average skill in the art”. The language for theseminars will be mainly English, but national language isnot to be excluded in some targeted countries.

The first kick-off seminar was held in Munich on 11-12June 2012, with 140 participants.

National seminars (one day) have already been sched-uled in September-December 2012 in Milan, Copen-hagen, London, Eindhoven and Istanbul.

2.2 Further CPE seminarsIt is intended to continue to offer the traditional CPEseminars, in spite of the quite heavy burden caused bythe new Guidelines 2DAY seminars. The offered/re-quested topics include for 2012:– Amendments– Mock opposition– Opposition and appeal– PCT– Oral proceedings– Understanding Examiner’s Communication– Patent portfolio management.

The first seminar on “Patent Portfolio Management”was held in Munich on 7 December 2011, with fourspeakers: Mr Tony Tangena, Mr Dieter Reinhardt, Mr

Peter Bittner and Prof. Alexander Wurzer. It wasattended by 38 participants.

A Train the Trainers follow-up seminar was held inWarsaw on 23-24 March 2012 on the topics:– National law relating to EPC– National phase of Euro-PCT applications and success-

ful opposition in chemistry.

CPE seminars have been held in Oslo on “EPC2DAY”, inHelsinki on “Mock Oral Proceedings” and in Istanbul on“EPO Procedures”.

Since 2010 CPE seminars have been developed andoffered also for administrative staff and paralegals. InOctober 2012 seminars for paralegals will be offered inMunich on the new topic “Handbook of Quality Pro-cedures before the EPO” and in Warsaw on “PCT”.

3. epi tutorials

The summer and autumn tutorials for year 2012 havealready been announced on the epi website, accordingto the usual format and schedule. The summer tutorialoffers to the trainees a choice among examinationpapers of 2009, 2010 and 2011 and the autumn tutoriala choice among examination papers of 2010, 2011 and2012.

The PQC Working Group on epi tutorials is presentlyworking on defining proposals for improvement of thetutorials to provide more customised training. The Work-ing Group is also focused on improvement in the estab-lishment of a tutor’s network and on improvement andharmonisation of tutoring capabilities.

As a first step to achieve such a goal, an epi tutors’meeting has been organised in Berlin in September2012.

4. Working Group online self-testing

The above-identified Working Group was establishedunder the Memorandum of Understanding. Accordingto the latest report received from Derek Jackson, theWorking Group activity has recently be overshadowed bythe Academy/epi pre-examination course, which hastaken many of the ideas from the Working Group, aswell as the time available, and introduced them into thee-learning course for the pre-examination.

The Working Group completed a paper A chemistryexercise and paper D exercise, both of which had beenon the Academy website for some time but wereremoved when the pre-examination course was intro-duced. In addition, there is a partly finished paper A E/Mexercise. Material has been gathered for a priority dateexercise, which is about 50% complete.

It is a preliminary conclusion by the Working Groupmembers that indeed a considerable amount of trainingfor EQE can be carried out as “e-learning exercises”. Thisis confirmed by recent development in the trainingmaterial for the pre-examination course. Bottle necksin the development of the e-learning exercises are how-

60 Committee Reports Information 3/2012

ever the need to find people available to provide thenecessary exam-like case studies and finding the bestway to convert the case study material into a e-learningmaterial.

5. Mock EQEs

Mock EQEs were held in:– Helsinki, 1-3 November 2011 with a feedback session

in the period 30 November-2 December 2011 with 18participants,

– Munich, 5-7 December 2011, with a feedback sessionin the period 31 January-2 February 2012 with 20participants.

A Mock EQE has been scheduled in Helsinki for the year2012. 15–17 October 2012 Mock EQE, 14–16 Novem-ber 2012 Feedback session

6. EQE statistics

PQC believes that appropriate statistics on the EQEconstitute an essential tool in order to tailor the needsfor EQE training in individual countries. The EP Academyshares the same view. Whereas the recent statisticspublished by the EPO for 2010 and 2011 EQE do notallow to evaluate the EQE pass rate of the overallexamination or of individual papers with reference tofirst sitters, it is believed that first sitters’ performanceprovides relevant information in order to better evaluateneeds for additional or improved training.

Also, the introduction of the pre-examination requiresthe publication of detailed statistics on the candidates’performance, possibly allowing differentiating betweenperformance in the legal part and claim analysis part.

It has been agreed with the European QualifyingExamination Board and the EP Academy that moredetailed statistics will be released in the near future bothfor the pre-examination and EQE.

7. EQE 2013: fee increase

The decision of the EPO President of 2 February 2012(O.J. EPO 3/2012, page 210), which is binding forpayments made after 1 April 2012, has increased thebasic fee for the EQE which is now fixed at E 200.

The new basic fee corresponds to:

– ~ 43% increase with respect to 2012(basic fee E 140),

– ~ 67% increase with respect to 2010(basic fee E 120),

– ~ 122% increase with respect to 2009(basic fee E 90).

In view of the newly applicable basic fee, the cost for thefull examination is as follows:– EQE year 2013:

• 5 basic fees (registration + 4 papers) = E 1000– Pre-examination:

• 2 basic fees (registration + 1 paper) = E 400;the pre-examination also requires additional traveland accommodation costs.

In addition to the above, the fee structure according tothe IPREE requires for year 2013:– 150% of the basic fee for sitting a paper for the third

time (computed as off 2010)– 200% of the basic fee for sitting a paper for the

fourth time (computed as off 2010).

The only good news is that the announcement of theEQE 2013 contemplates examination fee subsidies forcandidates permanently resident and working in EPOmember states: AL, BG, HR, CY, CZ, EE, MK, GR, HU, LV,LT, MT, PL, RO, RS, SK, SI or TR.

The fee increase has been justified by the EPO onaccount of the too low cost coverage of the EQE activ-ities by the fee income. Whereas epi was indeed con-sulted prior to the fee increase by the EPO, the epiposition according to which measures should be taken inorder to reduce the EQE cost, prior to deciding any feeincrease, was not successful. A specific report on such anissue is provided by the epi President.

8. Director of Education

Since July 2011, Mr Karl Rackette acted as Director ofEducation of the epi on the basis of an “independentconsultant agreement”.

Following his resignation by the end of July 2012, theDoE position is presently vacant.

At present, Ms Martina Fromm and Ms JacquelineKalbe of the epi Secretariat are in charge of all organi-sational activities relating to education and trainingevents.

Information 3/2012 Committee Reports 61

Information aboutepi membership and membership subscription

orRules governing payment of the epi annual membership fee

is available on the epi website www.patentepi.com

Report of the European Practice Committee

F.Leyder (BE)Chair of EPPC

Report of the EPPC Chairman

This report completed on 14.08.2012 covers the periodsince my previous report dated 22.05.2012.

The EPPC is the largest committee of the epi, but alsothe one with the broadest remit: it has to consider anddiscuss all questions pertaining to, or connected with,practice under (1) the EPC, (2) the PCT, and (3) the futureEU Patent Regulation, including any revision thereof,except all questions in the fields of other committees:Biotech, OCC, PDC, LitCom, and EPO Finances.

The EPPC is presently organised with seven permanentsub-committees (EPC, Guidelines, MSBA, EPO-epiLiaison, PCT, Trilateral & IP5, and Unitary Patent).Additionally, ad hoc working groups are set up whenthe need arises.

DG3

1. MSBAThe tradition of annual meetings with the Chairmen ofthe Boards of Appeal will continue, and the date of the19th meeting has been set for 03.12.2012.

UNITARY PATENT

2. European patent with unitary effect in the partici-pating Member States

On 29.06.2012, the Council reached an Agreement on“the last outstanding issue of the patents package”, butadded: “We suggest that Articles 6 to 8 of the Regu-lation implementing enhanced cooperation in the areaof the creation of unitary patent protection to beadopted by the Council and the European Parliamentbe deleted.”

The European Parliament is obviously unhappy aboutthis suggestion, and, on 02.07.2012, voted to postponeits vote on the European patent, due two days later.Discussions will resume in September.

The EPPC will continue to monitor the developments.

PCT

3. PCT Working GroupThe 5th session of the PCT Working Group was heldfrom 29 May to 1 June 2012. The working documentsand a Summary by the Chair are available on the WIPOwebsite: http://www.wipo.int/meetings/en/details.jsp?meeting_id=25017

In general, the Working Group noted the contents ofthe documents. These included some proposals by the

EPO; the concerns raised by some delegations on thoseproposals which would affect national laws or nationalphase processing led the EPO to agree to further elabor-ate on the proposals for further discussions at the nextsession of the Working Group.

The Working Group approved the proposals foramending the PCT Regulations as necessitated by theAmerica Invents Act, with a view to their submission tothe Assembly in October 2012.

EPC

4. 126th AC meetingThe EPO proposal to amend Rule 53(3) EPC has beenaccepted by the Administrative Council on 26.06.2012,and already published in the O.J., for entry into force on01.04.2013.

epi had raised objections, essentially submitting thatthe amended rule would infringe Article 113(1) EPC andfurther would be unfair in cases where the translationwould not be required.

5. 42nd CPL meetingThe Chairman of the Committee on Patent Law hasindicated that the next meeting would take place on09.10.2012. At the time of drafting this report, it wasunclear whether there would be any item relating to theEPPC.

6. 7th SACEPO/WPR meetingThe EPO has indicated that the next meeting would takeplace on 16.10.2012. At the time of drafting this report,no agenda item was known.

GUIDELINES

7. 3rd SACEPO/WPG meetingCompletely revised Guidelines entered into force on20.06.2012. The EPO had promised to revise the Guide-lines on an annual basis, and indeed has indicated thatthe next Working Party on Guidelines would meet on14.11.2012.

In preparation for that meeting, the Guidelines sub-committee met on 01-02.08.2012 and drafted a long listof proposals for amendment. Suggestions from epimembers are welcome at any time (eppc@patent-epi.com).

62 Committee Reports Information 3/2012

SACEPO

8. 44thSACEPO meetingThe 44thmeeting of the Standing Advisory Committee tothe EPO took place on 20.06.2012. The Presidentdelivered his report on the development of the Europeanpatent system and answered all questions from themembers. He joined us again for the lunch.

The agenda items related to the EPPC were:

– PCT reform – EPO proposal to strengthen the PCT: theseries of proposals already submitted to the PCT WG.

– Raising the Bar – follow-up: epi repeated its objectionsabout the way the EPO alleges having solved allinformation problems for Rule 36(1) EPC when themeasures taken (mention on the front page of therelevant communication and in the European PatentRegister) actually relate to paragraph (a) only.

Report of the Harmonisation Committee

F. Leyder (BE)Secretary of Harmonisation Committee

Secretary of Harmonisation Committee

This report completed on 14.08.2012 covers the periodsince my previous report dated 22.05.2012.

The Harmonisation Committee deals with all ques-tions concerning the worldwide harmonization of PatentLaw, and in particular within the framework of WIPO.

1. 44thmeeting of SACEPODuring the 44th meeting of the Standing AdvisoryCommittee to the EPO, the EPO reported on the dis-cussions with the other IP5 Offices, DE, FR, GB and DK inthe so-called Tegernsee meetings. The written report,which was submitted just a few days before the meeting,contained as Annex II a questionnaire. Due to the latecirculation of the questionnaire, it could hardly be dis-

cussed during the meeting, and written replies wererequested.

On the basis on the past discussions inside epi and ofcomments on the questionnaire by SACEPO membersappointed by epi and by members of the HarmonisationCommittee, our chairman drafted a paper that has beenforwarded to the EPO.

2. Meeting of the Harmonisation CommitteeThe committee will meet on 07.09.2012, together withthe President and Vice-Presidents, to re-evaluate theposition of epi with regard to harmonisation in the lightof the amendments to the US Patent Law resulting fromthe America Invents Act.

Information 3/2012 Committee Reports 63

Nächste Ausgabe · Forthcoming issue · Prochaine édition

Issue Deadline Publication

4/2012 02 November 2012 30 December 2012

Report of Biotech Committee

A. De Clercq (BE)Chair of Biotech Committee

The items below have been presented by the epi BiotechCommittee at the last Council meeting (some morerecent matters have been added):

1. Position paper on the CJEU Brüstle case

A position paper dated February 2, 2012 on the BrüstleCJEU case (stem cells) has been prepared by the BiotechCommittee and presented to the EPO at the 6th meetingof SACEPO WPR on February 3, 2012. The EPO is stilldeciding its policy on this issue. It will be very importantto get more guidance on how the EPO will implementthis CJEU decision.

2. Sequence Listings

The EPO is perceived as not being very user friendlyregarding Sequence Listings. The epi Biotech Committeemembers think the EPO should delay sending the Com-munication that asks for a Sequence Listing anddemands a fee. Also the policy on requiring a SequenceListing on a divisional application is illogical. It is not clearwhy applicants cannot refer to a sequence listing on aparent case, when the sequence listing on the divisionalis exactly the same. EPC 2000 allows making reference tocertain parts of a previous application, so it is not clearwhy this would not be possible for Sequence Listings.

3. Subsequent filing of PCT documents online atthe EPO

The EPO should also allow the filing of subsequentdocuments online for PCT applications filed at the EPO.At the moment, applicants cannot file subsequent docu-ments like Sequence Listing on-line for an internationalapplication where the EP is the receiving office.

4. Patentability objections based on sequencealignments

When Examiners refer to their internal sequence align-ments in lack of novelty (or other) objections, the Exam-iner could be requested to routinely provide the align-ment that they are relying upon in their objection. TheEPO should make available on-line access to sequencelistings submitted by applicants. For example, in anobjection where there is 95% identity over a certainlength, and yet the claim requires a minimum of 90%,we should ask the EPO to provide their alignment.

5. Wrinkly tomato case

On the wrinkly tomato case (EP 1211926 patent), ahearing took place on 8 November 2011 before the TBA,and is now the subject of a further referral to theEnlarged Board of Appeal (the second referral to theEnlarged Board in the same case).

On June 27, 2012 the EBA made available the ques-tions which are to be replied to in this second referral inthe same case to the EBA (G2/12).

The questions are:

1. Can the exclusion of essentially biological processesfor the production of plants in Article 53(b) EPC have anegative effect on the allowability of a product claimdirected to plants or plant material such as a fruit?

2. In particular, is a claim directed to plants or plantmaterial other than a plant variety allowable even ifthe only method available at the filing date for gener-ating the claimed subject-matter is an essentiallybiological process for the production of plants dis-closed in the patent application?

3. Is it of relevance in the context of questions 1 and 2that the protection conferred by the product claimencompasses the generation of the claimed productby means of an essentially biological process for theproduction of plants excluded as such under Article53(b) EPC?

Amicus curiae briefs may be filed before the end ofNovember 2012 and the epi Biotech Committee intendsto prepare observations for epi upon agreement withEPPC.

On June 28, 2012 the sole opponent (Unilever) with-drew its appeal. Nevertheless, the proprietor was also anappellant and thus G2/12 will continue.

This case relates to G1/08 and G2/07 which relate topatentability of essentially biological methods (Art. 53(b)EPC).

The issue in G2/12 relates to the patentability ofproduct claims on conventionally bred (non-GMO) plants(such as product-by-process claims).

6. Unity

The epi Biotech Committee is of the opinion that weshould continue to request the EPO to be sensible aboutdisunity in biotech cases. Increasingly, Examiners areraising disunity objections with a large number of inven-tions, and are not searching subsequent dependentclaims.

64 Committee Reports Information 3/2012

7. Deposits and expert solution

The EPO keeps a list ofpossible experts for the expertsolution (Rules 32 and 33 EPC). However, they claim thelist has never been used. There have been a few requestsfor samples but the list has never been called into play. Infact, the expert solution has never been used as far as thepeople at the EPO are aware. It was suggested that thismay be because the parties either come to an agreementon sharing the deposited material or they come to anagreement between themselves as to the expert to beused. It therefore seems that the list may be a waste oftime. The EPO therefore has a first proposal that the listshould not be maintained and that the parties, if neces-sary, should agree between themselves. I said that if thelist is really never used, it seems pointless to keep it up todate.

The epi Biotech Committee has discussed this pointand came to the conclusion that it does not wish toabolish the expert solution.

Our Committee has not received statistics on howmany times the expert solution has been put into prac-tice and we intend to discuss this topic further at our nextCommittee meeting.

We agree that the expert solution was used morefrequently in earlier times in respect of deposits, wherethe deposit was a novel microorganism, and the deposi-tor did not wish competitors to have access to the fullgenome of the microorganism and the patent applica-tion typically related to one gene only.

Nowadays, there are a large number of applicants thatstill request the expert solution.

The procedure is mostly meant as a security measureto avoid sequencing errors in the written disclosure or forinstance for cases where micro-organisms (or otherbiological material) have to be characterized to meetthe requirements of Art. 83 EPC.

Some members experienced problems with obtainingsamples from the USA (ATCC, NRRL) because of securitymeasures instituted by the EU, and where the depositaryinstitutions seems not really competent in complyingwith the import regulations to the EU. Also somemembers have experienced a number of instances,where the EPO has authorized the delivery of a samplein spite of the applicant having requested the expertsolution.

We believe it is “unfair” of the EPO to ask us forindicating experts to be entered on the list. It is in our

view definitely a task for the EPO, possibly in collabor-ation with the depositary institutions, to identify suchexperts.

We cannot understand that the EPO has commentedthat the system is not being used. Many applicants stilluse it according to our members, when we file applica-tions. However, it may have been extremely rare that theexperts are being used.

On the other hand, it can be expected that applicantand requester will not voluntarily agree to share thedeposit (normally they are competitors).

In conclusion, the epi Biotech Committee insists thatthe option to request the expert solution in the frame-work of depositing biological material should be kept asa possibility for the applicants who so desire. As a policy,many applicants and representatives always request theexpert solution in order to keep the best possible controlover our strains which are valuable assets. By restrictingthe delivery of a deposited strain to an independentexpert the risk that a valuable strain comes into the handof a competitor before a patent is issued is minimized.

For this reason we will also insist that the list ofindependent experts is kept as it is.

8. Next Committee meeting

The Biotech Committee will meet again on November 5,2012 in Munich.

9. Next meeting with the EPO Biotech Directors.

A delegation from the epi Biotech Committee will meetwith the EPO Biotech Directors on November 6, 2012 inMunich.

10. Associate members

It was agreed to admit, as further associate members tothe epi Biotech Committee, Bo Hammer Jensen (DK) andStefan Murnaghan (IE).

11. Member from ES

The epi Biotech Committee at present does not have afull member from ES, but temporarily have agreed toadmit Mr Francisco Bernardo Noriega as associatemember.

Information 3/2012 Committee Reports 65

Report of the EPO Finances Committee

J. Boff (GB)Chair of EPO Finances Committee

Refund of fees

Decision J25/10 questioned the practice of the Office inthe way it decides on partial refunds of the examinationfee. The reasoning of the decision also affects the refundof the search fee.

J25/10 did not say that it is wrong to give refunds thatcomplied with present RRF 11(b) or Rule 9(1): it said thatif a refund is refused there had to be a concrete andverifiable act sufficient to justify refusal. It appears thatthe Office is presently unable to point to such an actindicating commencement of the search or examination.

Epi is pressing the Office to consider that despatch ofthe relevant search or examination report is a concreteand verifiable act, and that refunds should be given up tothe date of despatch of the relevant search or examin-ation report.

It is important to retain the refund mechanism, as thisencourages cases to be withdrawn without wastingexaminer time. Less wasted examiner time means moreproductive examiner time.

Budget and Finance Committee meeting May 2012

Small entity fees

For a three year trial period a fee reduction is to beintroduced, to be funded from the co-operation pro-gramme, for certain member states with working agree-ments on search co-operation (CA/47/12).

The four countries concerned are Cyprus, Greece,Malta and Turkey. The reduction is of 50% of the searchfee on national applications from these countries. Thereduction will only be given to applicants who meet thecriteria of being: –a) natural personsb) SMEs as defined by the European Commission’s rec-

ommendation of 6 May 2003, i. e. staff < 250, turn-over < EUR 50m or balance sheet < EUR 43m, no morethan 25% of capital held by another company

c) universities or not-for-profit research institutes

The number of applications that can benefit from theprogram is to be limited to 100 dossiers a year percountry.

It was noted by epi that: –• There may be problems in the definitions – at present

a millionaire in one of the four favoured countrieswould get a discount: but a person on average incomeoutside the favoured countries would not

• A company with 249 employees is not small [what-ever the EU says] and could afford patent fees

• Some universities are very wealthy and need noassistance.

• Although this proposal is directed to search fees onnational applications, once small entity discounts startto be given there will inevitably be political pressure toprovide discounts on EP applications.

The trial program was approved by the BFC and sub-sequently at the Administrative Council.

EPOQUE Net dissemination and pricing policy(CA/27/12 Rev. 1)

This largely technical document concerning access toEPOQUE tools included the requirement that non-Member States should commit to allowing their appli-cants to name EPO as an ISA.

It appears that the EPO is still keen to be the mostactive ISA despite the facts that: –• the EPO lose money on each international search

performed• one third of PCT applications never proceed to a

European application• performing International search for non-European

applicants is equivalent to a subsidy from Europe tothe rest of the world

• an examiner searching a PCTapplication is not search-ing or examining a European application

• European applicants generally do not have the luxuryof choosing their ISA

• the net effect is to hinder European industry and helpthe rest of the world.

The EPOQUE policy has been approved by the Adminis-trative Council.

66 Committee Reports Information 3/2012

epi Tutors’ Meeting in Berlin on September 18, 2012

We are proud to inform you that an epi tutors meetingwill be organised in Berlin on September 18, 2012.

As this would be the first meeting after a long time, wewould like to start with a short introduction about epi,followed by presentations of different working fields forepi tutors and of the working group of the ProfessionalQualification Committee dealing with all matters con-cerning epi tutors.

After a coffee break we would like to continue withworkshops to gather input from you on certain projects.

Enrolment form and further useful information can befound here:

https://www.patentepi.com/patentepi/en/forms/120918_epi_Tutors_Meeting_Berlin_Cover.php

Information 3/2012 Education and Training 67

epi Mock EQEs and epi Seminars 2012

epi will organise a series of Mock EQEs (for EQE candidates) and epi seminars (for patent attorneys and paralegals)

Scheduled seminars:

8.10.2012 Munich: “epi/EPO – seminar for paralegals and administrative staff”12.10.2012 Vienna: “Guidelines2DAY” seminar15.–17.10.2012 Helsinki: “Mock EQE”18.10.2012 Warsaw: “PCT – seminar for paralegals and administrative staff”19.10.2012 London: “Guidelines2DAY” seminar14.–16.11.2012 Feedback Session Mock EQE Helsinki19.11.2012 Madrid: “Guidelines2DAY” seminar26.11.2012 Eindhoven: “Guidelines2DAY” seminar10.12.2012 Helsinki: “Guidelines2DAY” seminar17.12.2012 Istanbul: “Guidelines2DAY” seminar

Further information about these events can be found here: www.patentepi.com –> EQE and Training.

Tutors wanted

As epi is always looking to add new tutors to its currentgroup we would like to know whether you are – inprinciple – interested in participating in this activity. Incase you decide to volunteer your commitment is con-ditional: you will always be asked whether you are willingto tutor in a specific event.

Please volunteer by filling in the form available on theepi website (www.patentepi.com –> EQE and Training).

For any further queries, kindly contact theepi Secretariat (education@patentepi.com).

Seminar „Boards of appeal and key decisions“

EPO, European Patent AcademyF. Rety (FR)

On 8/9 November, in Munich, the European PatentOffice is hosting a second seminar on the boards’ caselaw and recent developments. At this event, entitled“Boards of appeal and key decisions”, EPO and otherexperts will talk about issues which feature prominentlyin the daily work of IP managers and patent attorneys.About 100 attendees are expected.

The programme includes presentations and dis-cussions on the following topics:– Petitions for review: an overview after more than four

years of case law– Disclaimers and their use as an instrument of patent

prosecution

– Patentability of computer-based inventions; humanembryonic cells; plants and fruits

– Substantive requirements for sufficiency of disclosureand industrial applicability

– Amendments before and after grant

The seminar will also look at the appeal procedure andhow to keep up-to-date on the case law. Attorneys andjudges will talk about the case law from their perspec-tive, and short workshops on novelty and inventive stepwill round off this special event.

For more information and to register, visitwww.epo.org/boa-seminar

68 Education and Training Information 3/2012

Next Board and Council Meetings

Board Meetings

87th Board meeting on 6th October 2012 in Istanbul (TR)88th Board meeting on 23rd March 2013 in Stockholm (SE)89th Board meeting on 28th September 2013 in Riga (LV)

Council Meetings

73rd Council meeting on 10th November 2012 inHamburg (DE)

74th Council meeting on 19th/20th April 2013 in Vienna (AT)

European Patent Attorneys Excess Liability

Dear epi-member,

The Institute of Professional Representatives before theEuropean Patent Office gives all members the possibilityto get access to an additional excess professional liabilityprogramme.

As from the day you subscribe to this insurance, coveris provided for claims made by reasons of any actual oralleged wrongful act committed within the frameworkof the Patent Attorney activities.

The indemnity of basic professional liability insuranceschemes is often limited to EUR 1.022.584. Therefore,the epi excess liability insurance scheme indemnifies

losses when they exceed EUR 1.022.584/equivalent (ex-cess liability policy). Its limit of indemnity is further EUR1.533.876 per loss so that – together with the basicinsurance – a total loss of EUR 2.556.460/equivalent iscovered. There is a collective indemnity limit to EUR15.338.756 per year for all participating epi-members.

The cover runs for 12 months from 1.October of eachyear. epi-members joining the scheme in the course of aninsurance year will receive an invoice on a pro-rata basis.

The Funk International GmbH, which is epi’s Insurancebroker, will be pleased to help if you have any furtherquestions.

Please do not contact the epi Secretariat.

Funk International GmbH Contact person: Ms Stefanie RiemerIB Professional Risks Phone: +49 (0) 40 35914-279Postfach 30 17 60 Fax: +49 (0) 40 35914-73-27920306 Hamburg Mail to: s.riemer@funk-gruppe.deGermany

Information 3/2012 Information from the Secretariat 69

Important Information for epi-Membershaving their Place of Registration in Switzerland

We would like to inform you about the “non-admitted-complex of problems”.This topic is relevant for all Swiss Patent Attorneys.

Insurers are not willing to draw risks in Switzerland.Therefore contracts in Switzerland are no longer per-formed in our excess professional liability programme.

The reason is the “non-admitted” ban initializedthrough the insurance law of many countries (e.g. Swit-zerland, Brazil, China). This insurance law obliged to

secure risks, which are situated in Switzerland, throughan authorized local licensed insurer.

Insurer, policyholder or supervising broker who wouldviolate the local applicable regulatory law must take intoaccount legal consequences of nullity of the insurancecover to the relevance of regulatory and criminal provi-sion relating to companies and persons acting so.

The Swiss Co-Broker GWP Insurance Brokers AG isresponsible for future contracts.

Please use the following contact details:

GWP Insurance Brokers AG contact person: Mr Stefan EngelerFeldstrasse 42 Phone: +41 31 959 00 02CH-3073 Gümligen Fax: +41 31 959 00 19Switzerland

Contact Data of Legal Division

Update of the European Patent Attorneys database

Please send any change of contact details to the Euro-pean Patent Office so that the list of professional rep-resentatives can be kept up to date. The list of pro-fessional representatives, kept by the EPO, is also the listused by epi. Therefore, to make sure that epi mailings aswell as e-mail correspondence reach you at the correctaddress, please inform the EPO Directorate 523 of anychange in your contact details.

Kindly note the following contact data of the LegalDivision of the EPO (Dir. 5.2.3):

European Patent OfficeDir. 5.2.3Legal Division80298 MunichGermany

Tel.: +49 (0)89 2399-5231Fax: +49 (0)89 2399-5148legaldivision@epo.orgwww.epo.org

Thank you for your cooperation.

70 Information from the Secretariat Information 3/2012

Article 123(2) EPC, Recent Case Law and a Chessboard

Christian Köster1(DE)

1. The basic principle

The Enlarged Board of Appeal of the EPO has elaboratedon the fundamental concept behind Article 123(2) EPC2

in decision G 1/933. Stating that an applicant cannot addsubject-matter not disclosed in the application to achievean unfair advantage and jeopardize the legal security ofthird parties4. Decision G 1/93 deals, in particular, withthe possible conflict between Article 123(2) and Article123(3) EPC and has been viewed and commented onfrom different points of view5. However, the basic prin-ciple elaborated in G 1/93 must certainly be welcomedby anyone who has ever been in the situation of defend-ing a third party against amended claims tailored tocover the third party’s business; but evidently unsup-ported by the original application. There is good reasonfor provisions in the EPC to prevent an applicant fromacquiring an unjustified legal position.

At the application stage, it is Article 123(2) EPC itselfwhich safeguards the legal certainty of third parties. Inopposition proceedings the requirement of Article123(2) EPC is enshrined in Article 100(c) EPC; in limi-tation proceedings under Article 105b EPC it must beobserved according to Rule 95(2) EPC. The standards forassessing whether an amendment finds basis in theunderlying application are the same in all these cases.The same assessment standards must also be appliedwhen a divisional application is examined for compliancewith the requirements of Article 76(1) second sentence,first half sentence, EPC, as was explicitly confirmed inG 1/056. Whilst there is no ex officio examination ofcompliance with Article 76(1) EPC in limitation proceed-ings, Article 100(c) EPC provides a basis for such anexamination in opposition proceedings. Likewise, a freshapplication filed in accordance with Article 61(1)(b) EPCmust comply with the requirements of Article 76(1)EPC7, such that again no extension beyond the originaldisclosure is permissible. Once granted, a Europeanpatent may also be declared null when its subject-matterextends beyond the content of the application as filed, asstipulated in Article 138(1)(c) EPC.

In all proceedings and irrespective of the applicableprovision in the law, it is therefore always the content ofthe first application filed with the office which is decisivefor determining whether an amendment is supported bythe original disclosure. The original disclosure is equallyfound in description, claims and drawings8, and it is wellknown that it only encompasses subject-matter which isdisclosed “directly and unambiguously”9. Several testshave been developed in the case law to assess whetherparticular subject-matter after amendment is found inthe original application in a direct and unambiguousmanner.

2. The several tests

Following the elaborations in the case law book, threetests can be mentioned which are regularly applied bythe EPO for testing whether an amendment is in con-formity with the requirements set out in particularlyArticle 123(2) EPC. These three tests will now be brieflydiscussed.

2.1 Novelty testThe basic idea of the novelty test is that no subject-matter should be created by amendment which results insubject-matter which – compared to the application asfiled – would be new10. Since the development of thistest it has at first been considered particularly useful inthe case law, even where amendments amounted todeletions11. In the context of generalizations, comparedto the original disclosure, a strict application of thenovelty test has not been accepted. Instead, it was heldthat the test for additional subject-matter and thenovelty test are only similar in that they both ultimatelyask whether or not the tested subject-matter is directlyand unambiguously derivable from the relevantsource12. Limits of the novelty test were also discussedin other decisions13, and the current version of the caselaw book even comes to the conclusion that the recentcase law makes no reference to the novelty test any-more14.

Information 3/2012 Articles 71

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1 Patent Attorney (ckoester@dennemeyer-law.com)2 The wording of Article 123(2) EPC underwent a minor editorial change when

the EPC2000 entered into force, i. e. formerly used indefinite articles werereplaced by a definite article. It is not apparent that this change has anyinfluence on procedural or material aspects of Article 123(2) EPC.

3 O.J. EPO 1994, 5414 Id., point9 of the Reasons5 See e.g. Wheeler, GRUR Int. 1998, 199, „Der „Konflikt“ zwischen Artikel

123(2) und (3) EPÜ“; Laddie, GRUR Int. 1998, 202, „Die unentrinnbare FalleÜberlegungen aus dem Vereinigten Königreich“; Brinkhof, GRUR Int. 1998,204, „Kollision zwischen Artikel 123(2) und (3) EPÜ“; Rogge, GRUR Int.1998, 208, „Zur Kollision zwischen Artikel 123(2) und (3) EPÜ“; Pfeiffer, epiInformation 1/2003, 21, „Zu EPÜ Art. 123(2) und (3)“

6 O.J. EPO 2008, 271,point5.1 of the Reasons7 See Article 61(2) EPC

8 G 11/91,O.J.EPO 1993, 125, Headnote 1, and G 2/95, O.J. EPO 1996, 555,Headnote

9 A terminology used e.g. in the Headnotes of G 3/89 and G 11/91, O.J. EPO1993, 117 and 125; see also Case Law of the Boards of Appeal of theEuropean Patent Office, Sixth Edition, July 2010 (hereinafter abbreviated inthe footnotes as „Case Law of the Boards of Appeal“, also referred to in thisarticle as the „case law book“),Section III.A.7, 346

10 T 201/83, O.J. EPO 1984, 481, point 3 of the Reasons11 T 136/88, point 4.1 of the Reasons12 T 194/84, O.J. EPO 1990, 59, Headnote; confirmed in T 118/89, point 3.2 of

the Reasons13 E.g. T 133/85,O.J. EPO 1988, 441, point 5of the Reasons; T 177/86, point 5of

the Reasons; T 150/07, point 1.1.4of the Reasons14 Case Law of the Boards of Appeal,Section III.A.7.3, 354

This conclusion, although found in some case law aswell15, however appears to be at odds with the “excep-tions” referred to in the very same paragraph in the caselaw book. The Guidelines still explicitly refer to thenovelty test as the applicable test in the case of additions,namely in the paragraph which illustrates the field ofapplication of Article 123(2) EPC16. This seems to be aclear indicator that this test is considered a useful tool atfirst instance. This view, expressed in the Guidelines, isfurther supported by quite recent case law; specificallyby decision T 1374/07, which makes reference toT 201/83 and considers the novelty test applicable atleast where the amendment is by way of addition17. Thiswas also confirmed by the Enlarged Board of Appeal indecision G 2/10 that no amendment may create novelsubject-matter18.

It can probably be said that the novelty test haslimitations, but that it is still considered in the case lawas a suitable method for determining whether or notamended subject-matter is sufficiently supported, i. e.directly and unambiguously disclosed in the originalapplication. Decision T 60/03 puts it this way: “Whereasthe “novelty test” may assist in determining the allow-ability of an amendment, it cannot override the basiccriteria.”19 It is not the only tool for assessing supportwithin the original disclosure, but one which can be, andin fact is, used where deemed applicable.

2.2 Essentiality testAmendments are possible by way of addition, but also byway of deletion or replacement; which two cases shouldbe distinguished20. This is where the essentiality test maycome into play. Essential means essential for the inven-tion, and a feature fulfilling this criterion cannot beremoved from an independent claim without contraven-ing Article 123(2) EPC21. Following decision T 260/85, astepwise test was developed in the case law for theassessment whether a deleted feature is essential22; thetest is sometimes also called the three-point test. The firstpoint is whether the feature was not explained as essen-tial in the original application. The second point iswhether the feature is not indispensable for the functionof the invention before the background of the solvedtechnical problem. The final third point is whether theoccurred replacement or removal requires no real modi-fication of other features to compensate for the change.Only when all three points can be answered in theaffirmative is essentiality denied and a replacement orremoval of a particular feature may be allowable.

The three-point essentiality test is also referred to inthe Guidelines23 and has been applied in more recent

case law24. It was even considered also suitable for thescenario in which a feature in a claim is generalized andthe scenario in which a feature is isolated from anembodiment set out in a description25. Evidently, theessentiality test is another tool for assessing complianceof amendments with Article 123(2) EPC.

2.3 Deducibility testContrary to the order in this article, the “deducibilitytest” is the first test which is discussed in the case lawbook in the section referring to tests for assessing theallowability of an amendment26. The deducibility testthus seems to be given particular emphasis. A reasoncould be that one may see the deducibility test as anumbrella under which the novelty test and the essen-tiality test can be united. In fact, in T 514/88 the noveltytest and the essentiality test were considered non-contradictory and pose the same question; namelywhether there is consistency between the amendmentand the original disclosure27. In this context, it was alsodemanded by the Board of Appeal that the disclosure ofthe subject-matter, after amendment in the underlyingapplication, fulfills the two almost notorious criteria, i. e.directness and unambiguousness28.

In the already mentioned decision G 2/10, theEnlarged Board of Appeal did not refer to a “deducibilitytest”, but called the relevant test the “disclosure test”29.This test nevertheless seems to be one asking for a directand unambiguous disclosure because in G 2/10 thisprinciple, as laid down in G 3/89 and G 11/91, is referredto as the “‘gold’ standard”30. The requirement thatamended subject-matter must be directly (or clearly)and unambiguously disclosed in the originally filed docu-ments also appears to be accepted as the decisive assess-ment standard by national courts of the EPC memberstates31.

Furthermore, for particular scenarios, it seems thatadditional (sub)criteria have been developed in the EPO’scase law. In case of a so-called intermediate generaliza-tion, for example, the features of the generalizedembodiment must be “separable”32, and such a gener-alization must further be recognizable “without any

72 Articles Information 3/2012

15 T 150/07, point 1.1.4 of the Reasons16 Guidelines forExamination in theEuropean Patent Office, June 2012 (herein-

after abbreviated as „Guidelines“), H-IV, 2.217 T 1374/07, point 2.2 of the Reasons18 G 2/10, O.J. EPO 2012, 376, point 4.6 of the Reasons with reference to G

2/98, O.J. EPO 2001, 41319 T60/03, point 2 of the Reasons20 T 404/03, Catchword21 T 260/85, O.J. EPO 1989, 105, Headnote 222 T 331/87, O.J. EPO 1991, 22, Headnote23 Guidelines, H-V, 3.1

24 T 775/07, point 2.1 of the Reasons25 T 404/03, point 10 of the Reasons26 Case Law of the Boards of Appeal, Section III.A.7.1, 347ff; the term

„deducibility test“ is however only used in this article as an abbreviationfor a „Direct and unambiguous deducibility of amendments from theapplication as filed“

27 T 514/88, O.J. EPO 1992, 570, point 2.4 of the Reasons28 Id., point 2.7 of the Reasons29 G 2/10, Loc. cit., point 4.5.1 of the Reasons30 G 2/10, Loc. cit., point 4.3 of the Reasons31 See e.g. the decision from the Court of Appeal of England and Wales,

European Central Bank v Document Security Systems Incorporated [2008]EWCA Civ 192, and the decision from the German Federal Supreme Court,BGH GRUR 2010, 910, Fälschungssicheres Dokument, which in parallel casescome to the same conclusion as regards an unallowable extension beyondthe original disclosure and which with respect to disclosure requirementsrefer to „clearly and unambiguously“ and „unmittelbar und eindeutig“,respectively. The corresponding decision from the French Court of Appealdated 17 March 2010, RG n° 08/09140, concludes that the skilled personwas not enabled by the original application to deduce the claimed invention(„…ne permettait a l’homme du métier de déduire…“). It is, however,interesting that the concerned patents were national parts of an EP patentwhich was granted after an application appeal procedure before the EPO.

32 T 461/05, point 2.6 of the Reasons („dissociables“)

doubt”33 in order to be allowable under Article 123(2)EPC. It does therefore not come as a surprise that theBoards of Appeal typically apply Article 123(2) EPC in arestrictive manner when it comes to intermediate gen-eralizations34. But even restrictively applying Article123(2) EPC can hardly mean limiting the original dis-closure to what is explicitly disclosed, given that it isaccepted in the case law that applications also maycontain an implicit disclosure35. Also, adding terms notoriginally disclosed is not automatically prohibited, and apure semantic analysis of relevant passages of the orig-inal disclosure is not sufficient for assessing the allow-ability of amendments36. Accordingly, the amendedsubject-matter need not necessarily be found in theoriginal application in an explicit and furthermore literalmanner, but still must be found therein in a direct andunambiguous manner; whatever that precisely meansfor the actually judged case.

In summary it can be said that there are currently threeso-called “tests” for original disclosure, the comparablyspecific tests for novelty and essentiality, and the broadertest for deducibility. All three tests are applied these daysby the Boards of Appeal and the first instances, respect-ively, of the EPO for judging whether or not an amend-ment is in accordance with Article 123(2). It is not knownto the author whether Teschemacher had these threetests in mind when referring to the three yardsticksapplied within the EPO, the first being strict, the secondstricter and the third brutal37. When it comes to lists andfields of features, respectively, it seems that the applicant– and also the draftsman prior to the filing of theapplication – should be prepared for any of theseapproaches. A chessboard may serve as an example.

3. How to claim a chessboard

Obviously, a chessboard is not patentable. For the pur-pose of this article, it will only be an illustration of howinformation can be presented. Almost everyone knowsthat a chessboard has 64 squares, with eight linestypically denominated a to h and eight rows typicallydenominated 1 to 8, and also typically with a framesurrounding the 64 squares. This gives rise to at leastthree different kinds of representation of the information“chessboard”, and it is quite instructive to study whatthe consequences of these possible presentations arewith a view to amendments. The study is made in reverseorder and will assume that the most valuable part of thechessboard is the square “e4” so that even if prior artanticipates other parts of the chessboard, “e4” shall becovered by an amended claim.

3.1 Representation by a frameThe first discussed disclosure of a chessboard is theaforementioned frame. It is not uncommon to usegeneral terms in a patent specification for describingand summarizing technical aspects of the inventionwhich is believed to have been made. So in order tocover the most valuable part “e4” without unduly lim-iting the claim from the outset, the frame surroundingthe chessboard could be used as a characterizing fea-ture. Such a characterization will however becomeproblematic once prior art38 is discovered which dis-closes a particular part of the framed area, say forexample the square typically denominated “e7”.According to the general principle that a specific dis-closure takes away the novelty of a generic claimembracing that disclosure39, the frame would be antici-pated by the prior art disclosure of “e7”. At this point, anamendment of the claim using the frame as a definitionis required to restore novelty.

One possibility for doing so could possibly be removingthe anticipating prior art element from the subject-matter defined by the frame, namely by disclaiming thatelement. The valuable “e4” would then still be covered.However, in this scenario the only representation ofsubject-matter is the frame itself, nothing else. There isaccordingly no reference to a disclaimer by which “e7”may be removed from the framed area, so that any useddisclaimer would be a so called undisclosed disclaimer.As is well-known, unless particular conditions are fulfil-led which are not of interest for the discussion herein,the disclaimer solution is thus not allowable in thepresent scenario40. Different ways out of the anticipationare not available because the original disclosure containsno other definitions or levels of generalisation apart fromthe frame. Especially, “e4” is not mentioned individually.Then, irrespective of the applied test for assessing theamendment, claiming the “chessboard minus e7” or themore limited “e4” will fail for non-compliance withArticle 123(2) EPC.

In this scenario, no subject-matter is patentable any-more due to the limited original disclosure. Of course,this situation is the reason for drafting applications suchthat there are fall-back positions in case unexpected andnovelty-destroying prior art must be dealt with. Onepossibility for such fall-back positions is to provide lists offeatures which are more specific compared to the gen-eral term covering them.

3.2 Representation by listsChess notation uses the eight rows and eight linesmaking up the chessboard. In fact, this has already beendone above when referring to “e4” or “e7”. There arelines a to h and rows 1 to 8. This makes it possible tounambiguously identify “e4”. But really unambigu-ously? Following the logic of T 181/8241, according towhich the definition of a C1 to C4 alkyl bromide does not

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33 T 962/98, Catchword34 For a discussion of case law on intermediate generalisations, see Pentherou-

dakis, GRUR Int. 2008, 699, „Zulässigkeit von Änderungen der Patent-ansprüche nach Art. 123 (2) EPÜ im Hinblick auf die Problematik der sog.‚Zwischenverallgemeinerung‘ (intermediate generalisation)“; see also CaseLaw of the Boards of Appeal,Section III.A.2

35 See e.g. T 1125/07, point 3.2 of the Reasons36 T 1269/06, point 2 of the Reasons37 Teschemacher, Mitteilungen der deutschen Patentanwälte, 2008, 289, 294,

„Aktuelle Rechtsprechung der Beschwerdekammern des EPA – Notizen fürdie Praxis“

38 In the sense of Article 54(2) EPC39 See e.g. Guidelines, G-VI, 540 G 1/03,O.J.EPO 2004, 413, and G 2/03, O.J. EPO 2004, 44841 O.J. EPO 1984, 401

represent a listing of each of the chemically possibleeight alkyl bromides, the disclosure “a to h” probablydiscloses “a”42, but not necessarily “e”. In order to be onthe safe side in this respect, it would be required todefine lines a, b, c, d, e, f, g and h in combination withrows 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8. Again, it shall be assumedthat prior art unfortunately discloses “e7”, so thatamendments are required to obtain protection for“chessboard minus e7”, or at least for the valuable“e4”. The less ambiguous aim, i. e. protection for “e4”,is analysed first.

In the scenario discussed here, the definition of thechessboard is realized using two indices, one numberand one character, i. e. by two lists of indices. Now thealarm bells are ringing. Whilst a chess player, who is askilled person when it comes to chessboards, wouldcertainly have no problems to make the correct movewhen instructed to move a piece to e4, according to EPOcase law a simultaneous selection from two lists typicallycreates novel subject-matter43. The natural question iswhether this principle is also applicable when it comes toamendments. According to e.g. decisions T 727/00 and T686/99 it in fact does, because a multiple selectionwithin two lists of alternative features is considered togenerate a fresh particular selection44. The novelty test isapplied and the fresh particular selection is thereforesomething which goes beyond the original disclosure.

According to the basic decision T 12/81, one require-ment for creating new subject-matter by selection ofelements from two lists is that those lists must each be a“list of certain length”45. In decision T 727/00 referred toabove, the first list had six members and the second listtwenty-three members, which in the Board’s opinionwas sufficient for satisfying the required certain length.Would this also hold true for the chessboard, for the twolists with eight elements each defining the chessboard bymeans of indices? At first sight, it appears that the caselaw is not unambiguous in this respect.

In the already mentioned decision T 1374/07, it washeld that a twofold selection from the same list of eightmembers is in fact nothing else but a selection from twoidentical lists of eight members46. Applying the quitelively novelty test, the Board then identified an extensionbeyond the original disclosure. The difference of thedecided case to the chessboard example is merely thatthe lists defining the latter are not identical, but insubstance this difference changes nothing. A field ofeight times eight members is basically created in bothcases47, and according to the cited case law, anamended claim directed to claim “e4” would evidentlybe considered contravening Article 123(2) EPC.

However, there is different case law which seems toindicate that selections from lists are not necessarily inconflict with the original disclosure. According to deci-sion T 607/05, two lower limits of an array were combin-able in a claim in agreement with Article 123(2) EPC48.When the underlying application is inspected, it wouldbe difficult not to identify two lists from which thoseparameters were selected, although both lists are foundin the same sentence. In effect, a twofold selection froma first list of five explicit numbers and a second, differentlist of again five explicit elements had been made. Thecreated field of twenty-five elements is apparentlysmaller than the chessboard, so that the shorter thelists, and hence the smaller the generated fields become,the better the chances for compliance with the require-ments of Article 123(2) EPC might be. This is, however,not predictable. A selection from an even smaller field oftwenty-four elements, generated by a list of eightmembers and a list of three members, respectively,was held to be in contravention to Article 123(2) EPCin decision T 137/0449.

It could therefore be asked what is the lowest limit ofelements in a list such that the list still has a “certainlength” in the sense of the above cited case law. A firsthint is already found in decision T 7/86, which withrespect to lists only deals with novelty issues, but which iscited in decision T 1374/07 as support for the view onselections from two lists in the context of inadmissibleextensions beyond the original disclosure. The documentrelevant for judging a disclosure arising from two lists, incase T 7/86, contained two lists for two substituents on achemical entity, one list having five members and one listhaving only two members. Despite these relatively shortlists and the just ten possible combinations derivablefrom the two lists, the Board in T 7/86 with explicitreference to T 12/81 came to the conclusion that the twolists did not result in a disclosure of all individual com-pounds.

It must thus be expected that a selection from two veryshort lists can still result in the creation of somethingnovel, i. e. of something not originally disclosed. Thisexpectation is fully met by the quite recent decision T1710/0950 in which the concept of non-disclosure due toselection from two lists seems to have reached its climax.In the underlying case, one examined claim was writtenin the Swiss-type claim format and defined an adminis-tration of a specific medicament in tablet form whichhad a particular dosing strength. An example was citedin support of the given definition which in a first sug-gested treatment referred to the claimed dosing strengthand the possibility to administer the medicament in theform of tablets or liquid formulations. A second sug-gested treatment for a different purpose in the sameexample referred to a dosing strength not claimed, andagain mentioned the possibilities of tablets or liquidformulations as dosage forms. The Board took the

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42 In T 181/82, the C1 alkyl bromide, methyl bromide, was considereddisclosed.

43 T12/81, O.J. EPO 1984, 401; see also Case Law of the Boards of Appeal,Sec-tion I.C.4.1.1b), and the reference to the „two-lists principle“ in theGuidelines, G-VI, 8(i)

44 T 727/00, point 1.1.4 of the Reasons; T 686/99, point 4.3.3 of the Reasons45 T 12/81, Loc. cit., point 13 of the Reasons („Auflistung gewissen Umfangs“)46 T 1374/07, point 2.2 of the Reasons47 Provided the same member could be selected twice from the list disclosed in

the case underlying T 1374/07.

48 T 607/05, point 10 of the Reasons49 T 137/04, point 3.1 of the Reasons50 A petition for review of T 1710/09 had been filed pursuant to Article 112a

EPC (case number R 16/11), but was rejected as clearly unallowable.

example into account and identified two alternatives forthe dosing strength and two alternatives for the dosageform51. Another variable mentioned in this context in thedecision, namely the dosing interval52, is factually irrel-evant because that variable was fixed in the example inthe original disclosure to a once-daily dosing regimen. Itseems to follow that compared to the explicit example inthe underlying application, two lists with two memberseach were identified. The combination of one memberof the first list with one member from the second list wasfound to go beyond the original disclosure. In somedecisions of the EPO’s case law, the minimum number ofelements for a list of “certain length”53 is thus appar-ently defined, it is two.

When the same assessment standards as in the justdiscussed ruling are applied, it seems that “e4” couldnever be claimed on the basis of the definition by lines a,b, c, etc. and rows 1, 2, 3, etc., respectively, withoutcontravening the requirements of Article 123(2) EPC. Insuch a scenario, the novelty test is applicable in order tosolidify the deducibility test. No matter how manyelements are contained in the originally disclosed lists,any selection from the lists including e.g. “e4” wouldmost likely fail the test.

The fact that “e4” thus cannot be claimed withoutviolating Article 123(2) EPC under the current practice ofat least some Boards of Appeal also answers the questionwhether one would be able to obtain the “chessboardminus e7”. In order to cover all sixty-three remainingcouples of lines and rows, sixty-three times a twofoldselection from two lists would have to be made, therebysixty-three times going beyond the original disclosure54.Instead of presenting features in lists, it is of course alsopossible to originally disclose in a very specific manner allconceivable elements and feature combinations. Pre-senting features in an enumerative manner will thereforebe discussed next.

3.3 Representation by enumerationIn this scenario, the original disclosure shall explicitlyrefer to each of the sixty-four squares of the chessboard.This can be done by using the indices of the two listsreferred to above, i. e. by writing down each and everycombination, namely a1, a2, a3, etc. up to h8. Thesituation shall be the same as in the above scenarios,“e7” is known and “e4” of certain value.

The first aim is trying to achieve protection for the“chessboard minus e7”. Due to the nature of the originaldisclosure in this scenario, “e7” is part of that disclosure,i. e. part of a list enumerating sixty-four separateelements. It could be opined that there can be noobjection when deleting “e7” as one element from along list of elements, that is, when making a one-di-

mensional restriction, as it seems to be the view in somecase law55.

However, it is somewhat questionable whether thisapproach is still true and can be maintained in the light ofmore recent case law from the Enlarged Board ofAppeal. In the author’s view, there is no logic or materialdifference between actually deleting “e7” from a list of64 elements on the one hand and defining at the end ofthe list that “e7” is excluded, i. e. disclaiming it. The finallist does either not contain the element in question or it isunequivocally defined that the element in question isdisclaimed. The message to any third party is the same:“e7” is not part of the claim.

Provided it is correct that a deletion of one elementfrom a list is equal to a statement that a particularelement is not part of the list and thereby equal to adisclaimer, what is actually done by deleting an elementis disclaiming this originally disclosed element withoutmentioning the disclaimer in the claim. In decision G2/10, it was ruled that disclaiming originally disclosedsubject-matter is only admissible if the remaining sub-ject-matter passes the deducibility test, i. e. that it isdirectly and unambiguously disclosed to the skilled per-son in the application as filed56. Whether the EnlargedBoard of Appeal’s instructions in this respect, namelythat the deducibility test in such a case requires a tech-nical assessment of the overall technical circumstancesof that individual case57, will be of much help in thefuture is yet to be seen. It can however not be ruled outthat without a specific mention of the remaining sub list,disclaiming one element from a certain list might not beallowable in light of G 2/10. Nothing else should thenapply to deletions. This is because deletions are hardlysomething other than disclaimers, removing disclosedsubject-matter, which disclaimers are simply unmen-tioned in the amended claim.

For the chessboard example, this would require thatafter deleting/disclaiming “e7”, the conglomerate of theremaining sixty-three elements needs to be deduciblefrom the original disclosure. The direct and unambigu-ous disclosure of the group of sixty-three elements doesnot necessarily need to be explicit, but may also beimplicit, and the skilled person as the addressee of theoriginal disclosure must take common general knowl-edge into account when assessing the deducibility58.However, relying on an implicit disclosure is more dan-gerous as an implicit disclosure can usually be more easilydenied than an explicit disclosure. Thus, in order to try tosafeguard an original disclosure of the subgroup ofsixty-three elements right from the beginning, there isprobably no other way but explicitly mentioning it in thespecification. A problem is that it is typically unknown inadvance which subgroup of sixty-three elements shouldbe disclosed to the skilled reader in a direct and unam-biguous manner as a security measure should one of the

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51 T 1710/09, point 3.3b) ofthe Reasons52 T 1710/09, point 3.3c) ofthe Reasons53 Or of „some length“, as it is stated in T 1710/09 atpoint4.3 ofthe Reasons

with reference to T 12/8154 Deletion of especially row „7“ might help to restore novelty over the

disclosure of „e7“ and keep „e4“. The deletion of features – in the chosenpicture of „squares“ – from the original disclosure is discussed in section 3.3,and the principles of deleting „squares“ and „rows“, respectively, should bethe same.

55 See e.g. T 978/99, point 4.1 of the Reasons;similarly in T 633/09, point3.3.3(a) of the Reasons

56 G 2/10, Loc. cit., Headnote 1a57 G 2/10, Loc. cit., Headnote 1b58 G 2/10, Loc. cit., Headnote 1a

squares of the chessboard already be known from theprior art. The draftsman is thus left with only one choice,and that is disclosing all sixty-four possible subgroups ofsixty-three squares. Should the applicant be afraid ofprior art anticipating two squares, all possible subgroupswith sixty-two elements each should also be explicitlydisclosed – and so forth for all conceivable permutations.

For a moment, it is sufficient to look at the subgroupseach containing sixty-three elements. Logically, there aresixty-four such subgroups which will necessarily be pre-sented as alternatives in the original disclosure. In sixty-three of the subgroups, the valuable element “e4” willbe present. Accordingly, those groups will typically beattributed the same weight in the original disclosure.When facing anticipation by “e7”, it would however berequired to extract the particular subgroup without“e7”, i. e. to select one subgroup from a number ofsubgroups which are all of equal weight. This is unfor-tunate because where alternatives are of equal weightand no preference is attributed to them, a singling outthereof appears to be inadmissible59. That is, even thecumbersome exercise of writing down each and everyconceivable permutation might not help if no preferenceof the one or the other permutation is clearly indicated.The reason is that according to decision T 1710/09, analternative can be admissibly extracted from the originaldisclosure only provided this alternative is given a par-ticular weight in the specification60. Although the citeddecision assesses a combination of features in this con-text, it could indeed be understood to prohibit theselection of one element out of a series of elements ofequal weight even where no second selection is made.One relevant passage of the decision reads as follows:

“In all cases, the alternatives are of equal weight, nopreference is indicated by specific words or in any otherdirectly recognisable way and their singling out forreasons of original disclosure is not allowed.”61

Is this a kind of “singling-out test” or which kind oftest is applied? In fact, explicit reference to decision T12/81 is found in T 1710/0962, so that the novelty testseems to be used by the Board in the latter decision.However, subject-matter which is not novel in the senseof Article 54 EPC (because a skilled addressee wouldseriously contemplate applying the technical teachingsof a relevant prior art document in the range of over-lap63), can apparently still be novel according to thenovelty test used in the mentioned decision for assessingthe allowability of amendments. This is because at leastaccording to decision T 1710/09, when it comes toamendments there shall be no room for asking whatthe skilled person would seriously contemplate64. Thenovelty test in the context of amendments thereforeseems to be very strict, probably even stricter than thenovelty test in the context of novelty itself. With the

approach adopted in T 1710/09, it cannot be ruled outthat selecting one element from a single list of elementsof equal weight is not permissible and creates anunallowable extension.

Such an approach might in fact be in line with G 2/10.Selecting one element out of a series of elements ofequal weight cannot reasonably be seen to be differentfrom deleting all other elements from the original series.As argued above, this factually means that all otheroriginally disclosed elements of the series are disclaimed,so that the remaining element would have to be directlyand unambiguously disclosed to the skilled person in theapplication as filed. Without a particular weight beingattributed to the selected/remaining element, a directand unambiguous disclosure of that element as anindividual may be questionable. For example, an originaldisclosure may refer to alternative chemical compoundsfor a certain purpose. If later one of these compounds ischosen, this might lead to a forbidden singling out of onecompound. Such a singling out is used in G 2/10 toillustrate which standards must be applied when testinga disclaimer disclaiming positively disclosed subject-matter for conformity with the original disclosure65.

Alternatively, such a singling out can be also seen as aone dimensional shrinking of the original list to oneelement. When read together, decisions G 2/10 and T1710/09 might thus suggest that a one-dimensionalrestriction of a list of elements is impermissible unlessthe remaining element(s) is/are given a particular pref-erence in the original application. With such a conclusionand when “e7” is known in the present scenario, evendisclosing all possible subgroups of sixty-three squaresincluding “e4” as equally suitable alternatives shouldconsequently be insufficient to obtain protection for“chessboard minus e7”. This amended subject-matteris then not validly claimable anymore.

For the far more limited subject-matter “e4”, thesituation is probably more comfortable. In this scenario,“e4” is explicitly disclosed and – given its value – it isreasonable to assume that it is provided with someparticular weight in the specification, in other words itis given a certain priority among the sixty-four disclosedsquares. Then, irrespective whether it is “selected” fromthe one-dimensional list of sixty-four elements orwhether all elements apart from “e4” are “deleted”from the list, “e4” is directly and unambiguously dis-closed, even in the sense of G 2/10 and T 1710/09,respectively. In the scenario discussed here it shouldhence be possible to draft a claim directed to “e4” incompliance with Article 123(2) EPC. Contrary to therepresentation by a frame or the representation by lists,respectively, at least the most valuable element of theinvention can be saved despite the partly anticipatingprior art. The reason is that the disclosure of the inven-tion in the original application is divided into smallsections with particular weight being placed on the mostrelevant section. This leads to a comparison of the

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59 T 1710/09, point 3.5.2 of the Reasons60 T 1710/09, point 4.2 of the Reasons61 T 1710/09, point 3.5.2 of the Reasons62 T 1710/09, point 4.3 of the Reasons63 T 26/85, O.J. EPO 1990, 22, Headnote I64 T 1710/09, point 4.1 of the Reasons 65 G 2/10, Loc.cit., point 4.5.4 of the Reasons

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discussed types of original disclosure as to allowableamendments and the resulting subject-matter.

3.4 Comparison of the discussed types ofrepresentation

When studying the second discussed type of represen-tation, the representation by lists, it is seen that inprinciple this type of representation is well known asillustrated by the indices regularly found on a chess-board. In patent drafting, lists have traditionally beenused quite frequently. However, an unintentionally over-broad disclosure using lists, which is in part anticipatedby prior art, may result in a completely unpatentableapplication. Neither the original disclosure minus theprior art disclosure nor the unambiguously novel andmost valuable part of the made invention may ultimatelybe claimable any more under the provisions of Article123(2) EPC.

The two other discussed types of representing fea-tures, i. e. the frame and the permutations, are almostcontrary to each other. The inventive concept is in bothcases initially believed to be quite broad, and protectionfor the entire concept is sought. However, when a frameis chosen for the representation, this means all or noth-ing. If no prior art within the frame comes up, the entireframe may be patentable. With prior art falling into theframe, no limitations by way of amendment are possibleand nothing will be patented. On the other hand, thevery detailed disclosure of all possible features and per-mutations can also win the total protection if there is nonovelty-destroying prior art. In case a partial anticipationoccurs, it could happen that the claimable aspect of theinvention must be limited down to very specific andhence very limited subject-matter.

4. Conclusions and suggestions

Drafting a fresh application is an interesting, yet defini-tively not simple exercise in view of the requirements foran original disclosure should amendments becomerequired at a later stage due to conflicting prior art.For a patent attorney, there is a natural duty to define anew invention in rather broad terms so as to develop anintellectual property right which is of real value for theclient. However, with broad terms, there is always therisk that a single anticipation sinks the entire vessel. This

is the situation illustrated by the frame of the chess-board.

It is therefore usually tried to split up a broad term intosmaller elements. Already for a two-dimensional defini-tion, it appears not advisable to group such elements inlists, because combinations of elements from lists areimmediately suspicious of creating something new andtherefore not originally disclosed. The fictitious skilledperson is not a chess player; in EPO case law rows andlines are not sufficient to define a square.

The discussed recent case law may further suggestthat enumerating permutations detailing a broaderterm, i. e. enumerating explicitly disclosed combinationsof elements, is also of limited use. For the chessboard,this means that explicitly naming all squares as well as allconceivable sub-groups of squares is not necessarily away out in case one square belongs to the prior art.When no preference is attributable to a specific sub-group of such enumerated permutations or squares, orto a single permutation or square, even a one-dimen-sional shrinking of the original disclosure could possiblyviolate the provisions of the EPC which govern amend-ments. This is a conclusion which may be drawn from G2/10 and further case law. From the applicant’s perspec-tive, such a conclusion is certainly unpleasant.

As aforesaid, sometimes people identify threeapproaches applied by the EPO for assessing amend-ments, the strict, the stricter and the brutal. At present,there seems to be a tendency in the Boards of Appeal’scase law to confirm this bon mot. Of course, there can beno doubt that third parties’ interests must be safe-guarded, and Article 123(2) EPC and the equivalentprovisions prohibit a misuse of the applicant’s freedomto draft and amend patent claims. The other side of thecoin is a danger of an undue restriction of the very samefreedom enjoyed by the basic users of the EPC system,applicants and patentees. The author concurs with theviewpoint that Article 123(2) EPC not only defines aprohibition, but should also be understood as an offer toutilize and exploit the original disclosure in order toachieve the deserved protection for the entire patentablesubject-matter of the original application66. Whichevertest for assessing whether or not amendments are sup-ported by the original disclosure is used, balancing of allrelevant interests, including those of applicants andpatent proprietors, must not be underestimated.

66 Blumer in: Singer, Stauder, Europäisches Patentübereinkommen, Art. 123,marginal no. 32, with reference to Kraßer, GRUR Int. 1992, 699,702, and toZeiler, Mitteilungen der deutschen Patentanwälte, 1993, 353

Monumental Changes to U.S. Patent Law: Issues Related to theImplementation of the Leahy Smith America Invents Act

Philip Stephenson1 (GB), R.S.M. Gorman (US)

I. INTRODUCTION

The historic legislation known as the Leahy SmithAmerica Invents Act2 (hereafter referred to as the“AIA”), was signed into law on 16 September 2011and is considered the biggest reform to U.S. patent lawssince 18363.

At its broadest level, the AIA changes the legacyU.S. patent law system from “first-to-invent” to whatit is termed a “first-inventor-to-file” system4 (alsoreferred to by some alternatively as “first-to-file-with-grace”), thereby somewhat harmonizing the U.S. sys-tem with that of other countries. In addition, the AIA alsoprovides other significant changes, including authoriz-ation for the United States Patent and Trademark Office(hereafter referred to as the “USPTO”) to re-examinegranted patents through a framework of inter partes andpost-grant proceedings5, a change which that may alterthe landscape of patent litigation dramatically. The AIAwill eliminate old interference proceedings for resolvingpriority contests among near-simultaneous inventorswho both file applications for the same inventionbecause priority will now be determined based on filingdate, and will be replaced by new derivation proceed-ings6. Such derivation proceedings are designed toensure that the first to file an application is actuallythe original inventor, and that the application was notderived from another inventor7. Also, significantchanges have been made to the understanding ofnovelty as defined under 35 U.S.C. 1028, and this mayyield certain benefits for filings that originate in foreigncountries. Prior art definitions are also included, withsome notable changes including the defining of prior artwith reference to the effective filing date only, and notthe date of invention, as well as also providing for theexpansion of prior art to include foreign offers for saleand public use9.

Administratively, the AIA provides for Congressionalappropriations oversight over the USPTO budget suchthat the official functions of the USPTO would be at no

net cost to the U.S. taxpayer10. Within this oversight, theUSPTO Director will be able to adjust fees to meet marketconditions as needed, and many fees have already, or willincrease11. Additionally, the USPTO is required to estab-lish three or more satellite offices around the country,including one in Detroit12. Additionally, effective in2013, the current Board of Patent Appeals and Inter-ferences (“BPAI”) will be replaced by the Patent Trial andAppeal Board (“PTAB”)13.

Each of the above changes will have different dates ofimplementation. Not all of the changes took effect uponthe actual signing of the law in September 2011. Fur-thermore, exactly how certain aspects of the law will beimplemented by the USPTO through different rule prom-ulgations, will significantly affect the importance ofsome of these changes as well.

The AIA is therefore quite extensive in reach, and theentirety of it cannot be fully described in one articlealone. To that end, the present goal is to discuss theaforementioned broad changes and to provide practicetips for foreign attorneys and corporate intellectualproperty management, so that they can be better awareof the revisions under the AIA and how the revisions maybear on tactical and strategic patenting planning.Accordingly, what follows is a categorical listing of someof the changes and the expected rules to be imple-mented therefrom.

II. FIRST-INVENTOR-TO-FILE SYSTEM ANDCHANGES TO PRIOR ART DEFINITIONS

Under the AIA, the U.S. patent law system will changefrom a “first-to-invent” (“FTI”) system to a “first-inven-tor-to-file” (“FITF”) system on March 16, 201314. Underthis change, an application will now be subject to theFITF system if the application at any time contained aclaim with an effective filing date on or after March 16,2013, or if a claim is made for priority benefit from anyapplication that may have contained such a claim at anytime. This change represents both significant conceptualand practical changes, because the U.S. patent lawsfrom 1836-2011favoured granting patents based uponinventive work done in secret, a potentially problematicdynamic, given that it raised questions regarding theauthenticity and proof of timing as to when the allegedpatentable work was actually performed by the inventor.Under the “first-inventor-to-file” system, the AIA nowfavours granting patents to inventors who take affirm-

78 Articles Information 3/2012

1 Philip Stephenson, Chartered UK and European Patent Attorney, BaileyWalsh & Co. LLP, Leeds, UK & Robert S.M. Gorman Attorney at Law, GormanLaw Offices, New York, NY© Copyright 2012, Robert S.M. Gorman

2 The full text of the Leahy Smith America Invents Act (AIA), designated asPublic Law 112–29, signed into law on 16 September 2011 is available athttp://www.uspto.gov/aia_implementation/20110916-pub-l112-29.pdf .

3 Gongola, Janet, USPTO Patent Reform Coordinator, comments introducingthe AIA implementation on 30 September 2011, at http://www.uspto.gov/aia_implementation/blog.jsp.

4 Ibid.5 AIA, Section 6.6 AIA, Section 3.7 Ibid.8 Ibid.9 Ibid.

10 AIA, Section 22.11 AIA, Sections 10 and 11.12 AIA, Section 23.13 AIA, Section 7.14 AIA, Section 3, 35 USC §§100, 101, 102 & 103.

ative steps to make an invention public before filing, sothat the public can promptly benefit from the disclosure.

True first-to-file (“FTF”) systems generally provide thatthe first entitled person to file a patent application, forany invention that is not in the public domain, will receivethe patent rights, even if someone else invented it first. Itis not uncommon for many to assert that the U.S. nowhas a FTF system that brings the U.S. in harmony withmost of the world15. However, due to the clear differ-ences outlined above it is more accurate to term theU.S. system under the AIA as a FITF system because it hasat least one distinguishing factor from most FTF systems,familiar to European attorneys and practitioners. Spe-cifically, the AIA provides a one year grace period fromthe time of disclosure of the invention by either theinventor (or someone who rightfully obtained the inven-tion from the inventor), during which the inventor hasthe ability to obtain patent protection, thereby earningthe alternative nickname of a “first-inventor-to-file-with-grace” (“FITFG”) system16. Accordingly, such a disclos-ure by the inventor can act as a bar to anyone else filingfor patent protection on the invention (even wheresomeone else has independently invented it first) yetprovides a one year window for the disclosing inventor toobtain patent protection.

A. Changes to NoveltySection 3 of the AIA makes dramatic changes to thenovelty requirement in the U.S. patent system. Accord-ingly, 35 U.S.C. §102 has now been reformed with arequirement for “public accessibility” of subject matterin order for it to be considered “prior art”. Such “publicaccessibility” essentially means that disclosures must beavailable to the public (35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1)) or that earlierU.S. patent filings must have been subsequently madepublic (35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2)). Note that “public accessi-bility” is not explicitly defined in the AIA, and will likely beclarified by forthcoming USPTO regulations or legalprecedent. Also, aspects that are beneficial to certaininventors and collaborative inventor groups are pro-vided, such as retaining the legacy one year inventorgrace period for disclosures, and disallowing co-workers’and collaborators’ earlier patent filings as “prior art” foruse in novelty determinations. Overall, the knownaspects of novelty have been replaced with similar, yetdifferent guidelines on novelty that lends a single, com-mon understanding of “prior art” as a definition for bothnovelty and non-obviousness.

Within the FITF system, each patent application isgiven an “effective filing date”, defined as either theactual filing date of the patent application, or the filingdate of the earliest patent application from which prior-ity is claimed, including foreign applications (e.g., ParisConvention based priority under 35 U.S.C. 119) andinternational applications (e.g., PCT based priority under

35 U.S.C. 365). Assessments of novelty are based onwhether any prior art was available before the “effectivefiling date”, as defined by the new 35 U.S.C. 102(a). Tothis end, the new 35 U.S.C. 102(a) has two parts, 35U.S.C. 102(a)(1) and 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) that specificallydelineate respective classes of prior art.

The new 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) essentially combineselements of legacy novelty sections 35 U.S.C. 102(a)and 102(b) such that a given patent application will berejected if the claimed invention was patented,described in a printed publication, in public use, on sale,or “otherwise available to the public” before the effec-tive filing date. The AIA expands the scope of availableprior art compared to previous definitions by removingthe legacy limitation to prior art from “this country [theU.S.]” and references to “a foreign country” as it per-tains to bars for “public use” and “on sale”. Fur-thermore, the AIA adds the verbiage “otherwise avail-able to the public” to the new 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1).Hence, the new 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) contains no geo-graphical limitations, thereby expanding available priorart to any subject matter that is publicly available any-where in the world, prior to the filing date of the patentapplication. Thus, any public use or sale abroad thatoccurs prior to the filing date of the U.S. application canbe used as prior art against the patent application. Thisdefinition of “prior art” will no doubt be familiar topatent attorneys practicing before the EPO and Euro-pean national offices.

The new 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) further defines prior artfor any publications of U.S. patent applications and PCTpublications designating the U.S., as well as U.S. pat-ents, where such references name another inventor. Insuch cases, these references are deemed prior art as oftheir earliest “effective filing date”, regardless of pub-lication date, so long as that date is before the “effectivefiling date” of the claimed invention. Further to thispoint, publications of U.S. applications having a claim ofpriority to a non-U.S. application may be consideredprior art for both novelty and non-obviousness assess-ment as of the filing date of their foreign priority claim.Note, however, that where a publication or patent dis-closes subject matter obtained directly or indirectly fromthe inventor or a joint inventor, or where the subjectmatter disclosed had been publicly disclosed by theinventor or a joint inventor (or another who obtainedthe subject matter disclosed directly or indirectly fromthe inventor or a joint inventor), before such subjectmatter was filed, it is not deemed prior art under 35U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as of its earliest filing date, but may stillbe prior art under new 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as of itspublication date. In the case of PCT publications, thelanguage of the application will not affect the status ofsuch publications as prior art under this section. Clearly,35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) mirrors the definitions of prior art or“state of the art” in Art. 54(3) EPC, however a corre-sponding “novelty only” proviso present in the secondsentence of Art. 56 EPC is not present and thereforeprior art which is relevant to novelty only in Europe canbe assessed for relevance to inventions in the U.S.

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15 See, e.g., „The Global Impact of the America Invents Act“, WIPO Magazine(December 2011) at http://www.wipo.int/wipo_magazine/en/2011/06/arti-cle_0002.html.

16 See, e.g., „The America Invents Act for Academic Scientists“, ScienceMagazine, 3 February 2012 at http://sciencecareers.sciencemag.org/ca-reer_magazine/previous_issues/articles/2012_02_03/caredit.a1200013.

Furthermore, new 35 U.S.C. 102(b) provides for a oneyear grace period and two distinct classes of exceptionsto the prior art determinations under 35 U.S.C. 102(a),found respectively in sections 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(1)(A) and35 U.S.C. 102(b)(1)(B) which will be unfamiliar to Euro-pean practitioners. The one year grace period under new35 U.S.C. 102(b)(1) is measured from the priority date ofan application rather than the earliest filing date in theU.S., thereby offering foreign applicants a potentialadvantage when claiming foreign priority. As it relatesto the prior art exceptions, the first exception is con-tained within new 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(1)(A) which providesthat a “disclosure” made by the inventor or otherwiseobtained directly or indirectly from the inventor one yearor less prior to the “effective filing date” will not bedeemed prior art, thereby giving an inventor the advan-tage of not having his own work considered as prior artunder 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) if it is disclosed within one yearof his earliest filing date. The second exception is con-tained within new 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(1)(B) which providesthat any disclosure made one year or less before theeffective filing date of a claimed invention where “thesubject matter disclosed had, before such disclosure,been publicly disclosed by the inventor or a joint inventoror another who obtained the subject matter discloseddirectly or indirectly from the inventor or a joint inventor”will not be deemed prior art under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1).This provides the inventor protection from a disclosure bya third party if it was disclosed after a previous disclosureby the inventor, before the patent application was filed.Separately, the AIA also provides through new 35 U.S.C.102(b) (2) (C) and 102(c) for the exclusion of prior artunder new 35 U.S.C. 102(a) (2) as of its earliest filingdate for purposes of obviousness and novelty for areference owned by same company or subject to jointresearch agreement, however, such a reference may beavailable as prior art under new 35 U.S.C. 102(a) (1) as ofits publication date.

B. Changes to ObviousnessThe AIA provides that obviousness will be assessed basedon the “effective filing date” of the application, insteadof the “time of invention” as required presently. Hence,the revised 35 U.S.C. 103 provides a basis for rejection ofpatent applications when the differences between theclaimed invention and the prior art references are of thetype that the whole of the claimed invention would havebeen seen as obvious before the “effective filing date”.Essentially, where there is any prior art from before theeffective filing date that would make the claimed inven-tion obvious, the USPTO will then reject the applicationbased on obviousness.

III. POST GRANT PROCEEDINGS/EVALUATING THEVALIDITY OF PATENTS

The AIA provides interested parties increased options tochallenge or otherwise re-evaluate the validity of apatent by maintaining the existing ex parte re-examin-ation process, by replacing the inter partes re-examin-

ation with an inter partes “review” and also by addingthree other types of post grant review proceedings:

Post-Grant Review Proceedings (Section 6): The AIAcreates a new administrative construct called “post-grant review” that allows settlement of disputes invol-ving patent quality and scope (i. e., virtually all issues ofpatent validity). Effective one year after enactment of theAIA, any third party may petition the USPTO to reviewthe validity of an issued patent within nine months of itsissuance. Although superficially similar to oppositionproceedings before the EPO, under the post-grantreview process a patent may be challenged on anygrounds of patentability, and the petition will be grantedwhere the petitioner demonstrates that “if suchinformation is not rebutted, [it] would demonstrate thatit is more likely than not that at least one of the claimschallenged in the petition is unpatentable”. Comparedto existing re-examination which is limited to consider-ation of only patents and printed publications in view ofprior art, the new post-grant review insteadencompasses a greater scope of review and provides alower burden of proof, and the petition can be sup-ported by patents, printed publications, as well as sup-porting factual or expert opinion evidence that relates toassertions that any claim is invalid for prior art reasons,and/or for other reasons, such as allegedly unpatentablesubject matter (i. e., 35 U.S.C. § 101 matters) or forindefiniteness reasons (i. e., 35 U.S.C. § 112).

New Chapter 32 therefore institutes the post-grantreview process and generally applies only to patentswhich issue under the new FITF rules (e.g., applicationsfiled eighteen months after enactment), except for“business method” patents which are covered by sep-arate, transitional post-grant review rules discussedbelow. Notably, interferences instituted less than oneyear after enactment of the AIA may be dismissed(without prejudice) by filing of a petition for post-grantreview.

Inter-Partes Review Proceedings (Section 6): TheAIA provides for a new type of proceeding, inter partesreview, that grants one who is not the owner of a patentthe right to file a petition to institute inter partes reviewof a patent. The new proceeding represents a transitionfrom an examiner based inter partes patent “re-examin-ation” to a “review” proceeding at the new Patent Trialand Appeal Board (PTAB). The proceeding will allow forlimited discovery, settlement, oral hearings, protectiveorders and many litigation style specifics. Accordingly,the old inter partes re-examination process is thereforescheduled for termination on September 15, 2012, to bereplaced by the new “inter partes review” on September16, 2012.

Such inter partes reviews will be governed by newrules in Chapter 31 that will apply to the institution andconduct of any inter partes review commenced afterenactment as to all patents, whether issued before, on,or after enactment. In the interim, current Chapter 31continues to control inter partes re-examinations filed

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before enactment. However, effective as September 16,2011, the standard for triggering an inter partes (but notan ex parte) proceeding has been changed. The newstandard has now been elevated from the old standardof making a showing regarding issues that raise a “sub-stantial new question of patentability” (“SNQ stan-dard”), to a higher standard which asks whether thereis a “reasonable likelihood that the requester will prevailwith respect to at least one of the challenged claims”(“reasonable likelihood standard”). In any case, interpartes proceedings will be limited to issues involvingrelevant patents, printed publications, and relatednovelty and non-obviousness questions, and accordingly,the grounds for this type of review is more narrow thanthat of the post-grant review.

The petition for inter partes review must be filed nolater than one year after a patent is granted. Inter partesreview is available after the nine month post grant reviewperiod has expired, and is thereby a subsequent option tofiling of the post grant proceedings. Once an inter partesreview petition is filed, the patent owner may thereafterfile a response to the petition that sets forth reasons whyno inter partes review should be instituted based uponthe failure of the petition to meet specific requirements.The AIA prohibits the Director from authorizing an interpartes review to commence unless the Director deter-mines that the information presented in the petition, andany response thereto, shows that there is a reasonablelikelihood that the petitioner may prevail on at least oneof the claims challenged in the petition, thereby limitingfrivolous proceedings.

The Director’s determination as to whether to institutean inter partes review pursuant to a petition must bemade in writing within three months after receiving aresponse to the petition, or if no such response is filed,the last date on which such response may be filed. Thedetermination by the Director is not appealable.

Supplemental Examination (Section 12): The AIAprovides that a patent owner may ask for “supplementalexamination” to consider new or corrected information.Proposed rules indicate that materials submitted will belimited to no more than 10 items, otherwise separaterequest and fees will need to be submitted for eachgrouping of 10 items beyond that17. If a validity issue israised through the submissions, the USPTO will re-exam-ine the patent, except if an allegation of invalidity overthat art has already been made in a patent infringementaction, in an International Trade commission (ITC) section337 proceeding, or in a detailed statement of the basesof invalidity or unenforceability of the patent by theapplicant for an Abbreviated New Drug Application(“ANDA”). In providing for the examination, the AIAprohibits the assertion of an inequitable conduct defenseagainst the owner of a reissued patent based upon theinformation considered, reconsidered, or corrected dur-ing a supplemental examination. This essentially provides

an alternative to having a court consider certain miscon-duct and validity issues in subsequent patent infringe-ment litigation.

Transitional Business Method Review (Section 18):Within one year of the enactment of the AIA, the Actprovides that the Director of the USPTO will issue rules topermit someone being accused of infringing a businessmethod patent to petition the USPTO to review thevalidity of the patent. Such review will only apply to abusiness method patent which “claims a method orcorresponding apparatus for performing data processingor other operations used in the practice, administration,or management of a financial product or service.” Thefunctions of the program are the same as other post-grant proceedings initiated by the AIA, and allows forany party to request a stay of a civil action if a relatedpost-grant proceeding is granted. This review processwill expire eight years after the U.S. Patent and Trade-mark Office issue the rules governing this review process.

IV. MISCELLANEOUS CHANGES

The AIA also provides for numerous other stand-alonechanges worthy of brief mention as follows:

Inventor’s Oath or Declaration (Section 4): The AIAchanges the language in the inventors oath or declar-ation by requiring that the affiant swear that “theapplication was made or was authorized to be madeby the affiant or declarant; and such individual believeshimself or herself to be the original inventor or anoriginal joint inventor of a claimed invention in theapplication.” Noteworthy is the fact that this languagefrom the inventor’s oath or declaration may instead beincluded in the assignment.

Prior User Rights Defenses to Infringement (Sec-tion 5): The AIA expands prior-user rights defenses (i. e.,defenses to infringement based upon prior commercialuse) and makes such defenses applicable to subjectmatter consisting of a process, or consisting of amachine, manufacture, or composition of matter usedin manufacturing or other commercial process. Pre-viously, such defenses were limited to business methodclaims. However, under this revision, the defense is notavailable where the subject matter of the patent wasdeveloped pursuant to a federal funding agreement, orby a non-profit institution of higher education or anaffiliated technology transfer organization.

Pre-issuance Submissions by Third Parties (Section8): The AIA allows, for a fee, any third party to submit forthe record and for consideration any patent application,any patent, published patent application, or otherprinted publication of potential relevance to the examin-ation of the application, if such submission is made inwriting within specified timelines. Any such submissionmust set forth a concise description of the relevance ofeach submitted document and must include a statement

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17 Federal Register, Vol. 77, No. 16, Wednesday, January 25, 2012, USPTOProposed Rules at p. 3667.

affirming that the submission is in compliance with theAIA. Note that the AIA apparently does not provide forsubmitting (now expanded) prior art that includesforeign sales or uses in pre-issuance submissions by thirdparties because pre-issuance submissions are limited torelevant patent applications, patents, published patentapplications and/or other printed publications.

Best Mode Requirement (Section 15): The AIAremoves the patentee’s failure to comply with the bestmode requirement as a defense to patent infringement.Accordingly, while 35 U.S.C. §282 has been amended toeliminate best mode as a defense to patent infringe-ment, 35 U.S.C. §112, first paragraph (and the guidanceunder MPEP §2165) still maintains best mode as acondition for patentability (although not necessarily forpriority purposes in provisional and non-provisionalapplications). Therefore, the best mode requirement stillexists and remains available as a basis for a rejection of anapplication by an Examiner.

Marking (Virtual and False) (Section 16): The AIAallows a manufacturer to “virtually mark” patentedproducts by writing the word “patent” or “pat.” on aproduct, along with a reference to an internet websitethat the public can access free of charge in order to learnmore about the specific patent. This may be done in lieuof physically marking a product with a patent number.Additionally, the AIA clarifies that the patent holderwould remain protected after the patent expires if he“virtually” marks the product and posts updatedinformation on the internet. The AIA also eliminatesthe existing problem of predatory “false marking” claimsby opportunistic parties. The AIA does this by requiring,among other things, that a person suffer a “competitiveinjury” as a result of false marking in order bring a civilaction in federal court for compensatory damages.

Advice of Counsel (Section 17): The AIA provides thatthe failure of a defendant to obtain advice of counsel orthe failure to present such evidence to the court or jurycannot be used to prove that the defendant wilfullyinfringed the patent.

Jurisdiction and Procedural Matters (Section 19):Under the AIA, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the FederalCircuit has jurisdiction over appeals involving compulsorypatent counterclaims. Instead of the District Court forthe District of Columbia, the Eastern District of Virginia isnow the venue for appealing decisions of the USPTOBoard of Appeals and PTA determinations. Perhaps moreimportantly, the AIA also tightens existing requirementsby prohibiting the joining of causes of action or defensesin a suit by parties who are unrelated in a patentinfringement action, thereby preventing non-practicingentities (also known as “patent trolls”) from dragging allaccused infringers into lawsuits in distant courtsthroughout the U.S. Under the AIA, plaintiffs will nowhave to file multiple lawsuits against unrelated defen-

dants instead of simply filing one single lawsuit namingunrelated multiple defendants.

New Priority Examinations (Section 26): The AIArequires that the USPTO provide prioritized examinationof applications for products, processes, or technologiesthat are important to the national economy or nationalcompetitiveness at no extra aggregate cost. Additionallya “Track I” prioritized examination is available for a fee of$4,800 (reduced 50% for small entities) in addition toother costs, for applications of a certain size and numberof claims. The Track I prioritized examination does notapply to international, design, reissue, or provisionalapplications or to re-examination proceedings, but itmay be available for continuing applications.

The stated USPTO goal for final disposition (e.g., mail-ing notice of allowance, mailing final office action) isexpected to be on average 12 months from the date ofprioritized status18. However, the prioritized exam maybe terminated without a refund of any prioritized examfees if the patent applicant petitions for an extension oftime to file a reply or to suspend action or if the applicantamends the application to exceed the claim restrictions.Also, the program is limited to a maximum of 10,000applications per fiscal year.

Human Organism Prohibition (Section 33): EffectiveSeptember 16, 2011, no U.S. patent may issue on aclaim directed to or encompassing a human organism.This “change” merely codifies old USPTO policy whichalready prohibited patenting a human organism, andprovides that non-naturally occurring, non-human multi-cellular living organisms, including animals, are patent-able subject matter.

Fee Increases, Discounts and Electronic Filing Incen-tive (Section 10): The AIA provides for setting fees,which the USPTO has announced includes a 15% sur-charge on all fees charged or authorized under 35 U.S.C.§41 (a), (b), and (d)(1). However, the 15% surchargedoes not apply to international stage PCT fees, certainpetition fees, and enrolment fees. For each originalapplication filed by paper, the USPTO has established a$400 additional fee (reduced by 50% for small entities)although design, plant, and provisional applications areexcluded. Patent fees for filing, searching, examining,issuing, appealing, and maintaining patent applicationsand patents are eligible for discounts as follows: (i) a50% discount for small entities that qualify for reducedfees under 35 U.S.C. 41(h)(1); and a 75% discount for“micro entities” as defined in 35 U.S.C. 123, as added bySec. 10(g) of AIA. Also, under the fee setting authority ofthe USPTO Director, it is anticipated that the large entityfees for long application specifications (e.g., more than100 pages in length) will rise 29% and claims sets inexcess of 3 independent claims will rise 84% and claim

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18 Gongola, Janet, USPTO Patent Reform Coordinator, „Status Report: USPTOImplementation of the America Invents Act, 2 December 2012, p. 5, athttp://www.uspto.gov/aia_implementation/20111202-patent_reform_im-plementation-iu.pdf.

sets with more than 20 total claims will rise 67%19.Similarly, the fee for lodging a Request for ContinuedExamination (“RCE”) is projected to rise 83% for largeentities20. Interestingly, the fee for appeals, although setto increase (223% total costs for large entity), isexpected to be set lower than that of the revised RCEfee21. In any case, such fee projections may be revised inthe interim, however the intent behind the projectedincrease will remain constant as the USPTO is aiming toreduce backlogs and streamline examiner processingtimes.

No-Fault Inventorship/No Mal-Joinder Invalidity:The AIA now allows the assignee to file as the patentapplicant, not merely the inventor. This allows assignee,or someone who has obligated an inventor to assignownership rights, to file an application without obtainingan oath or declaration (or even permission or knowl-edge) of the inventor. Additionally, inventorship can nowbe corrected without swearing under oath that the errorin naming inventors occurred without “deceptiveintent.” To this end, changes to named inventor canremove misjoinder/non-joinder as a patent validity issuein litigation, because any such changes will now merelydetermine ownership only.

V. RULE CHANGES – IMPLEMENTATION TIMELINE

The aforementioned changes will become effective atdifferent dates22:

Implementation of the “Group 1 Rule Changes”: Thisincludes the aforementioned best mode changes, thehuman organism prohibition, the inter partes re-examin-ation threshold standard change, the court venuechanges, the fee changes and establishment of a micro-entity fee status, and the electronic filing incentive andprioritized examination changes, all of which will occurat dates on or shortly after September 16, 2011, but inno case later than November 15, 2011;

Implementation of “Group 2 Rule Changes”: Thisincludes the aforementioned inventor’s oath/declarationchange, the third party submission of prior art for patentapplication program, the supplemental examination pro-gram, the citation of prior art in a patent file changes, thepriority examination for important technologies pro-gram, inter partes review, post grant review, and thetransitional program for covered business method pat-ents, all of which will occur on September 16, 2012; and

Implementation of “Group 3 Rule Changes”: Thisincludes the aforementioned FITF system, the derivation

proceedings program, and the repeal of Statutory Inven-tion Registration system, all of which will occur on March16, 2013.

In implementing these changes, the USPTO has indi-cated that it will conduct, in the upcoming months,thirteen different “notice and comment” periods for rulemaking. It will post these periods and other noticesrelated to the AIA on a dedicated “AIA Micro-Site”which can be found at http://www.uspto.gov/americain-ventsact.

VI. PRACTICE TIPS

The substantive and procedural changes under the AIAmay be too extensive to fully summarize as a “one sizefits all” collection of practice tips, given that manyforeign patent attorneys, counsel and patent holdersoverseeing patent prosecution and litigation in theU.S. will be faced with numerous types of patent port-folios and competitive environments. However, some ofthe following practice tips for both prosecution andlitigation are nevertheless highlighted below:

A. Patent Prosecution– New Advantages/Disadvantages: Given that the “first

to invent” system is abolished for new patent filings,any issues related to conception, diligence, and reduc-tion to practice will not be relevant to future patent-ability. Similarly, abandonment, suppression, and con-cealment will also no longer be factors of concern.Many may consider the new system more advantage-ous. It is helpful to remember however, that despitethe changes, the new system does not provide anability to overcome prior art by swearing behind it,and may also contain some additional disadvantagesin certain areas.

– Monitoring Both In-House and Competitive PatentPortfolios: Given the expanded options for challen-ging the validity of U.S. patents, patent holdersshould closely monitor the patenting activities of theircompetitors to assess whether to challenge the valid-ity of any patent that issues, especially those regardingits mission-critical technologies. Such challengescould come under the inter partes proceedings, orpreferably, under the “post-grant review proceed-ings” program. Similarly, companies may wish tomonitor patent publications in order to decidewhether to submit prior art in applications underthe “preissuance submissions by third parties” pro-gram described above. As a preventive measure,companies should assess their own approaches tothe making of rapid patent filings and should con-template having very thorough patentability searchesdone before filing, so as to lessen the risks of havingpatents challenged by others. Thereafter, companiesmay consider using the “supplemental examination”program in cases where they become aware ofadditional relevant prior art in order to shield theirpatents from subsequent challenges by competitors.However, note that “supplemental examination”

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19 UPSTO, „Executive Summary: Patent Fee Proposal“, as submitted to thePatent Public Advisory Committee on 7 February 2012, p. 11, athttp://www.uspto.gov/aia_implementation/fee_setting_-_ppac_hea-ring_executive_summary_7feb12.pdf.

20 Ibid.21 Ibid.22 Gongola, Janet, USPTO Patent Reform Coordinator, comments introducing

the AIA implementation on 30 September 2011.

costs are expected to be quite severe23, so much sothat patentability searches done in advance of filingfor important technologies may, in some cases, bemore cost effective.

– Flexibility in How and When Patent Applications areFiled in the U.S.: The new definition of “prior art” andthe aspects of the first to file system may merit severalstrategic considerations as to when one should file.Hence, it is important to understand that an applicantcan choose the FITF system based on when they file. Infact, the applicant may even be able to choose thenew system for applications that are already filed,because the FITF rules apply to any application thatcontains (or contained at any time) a claim which hasan effective date that is one year or more after thedate of enactment of the AIA (or which contains areference to a priority application that contains orcontained at any time such a claim). As such, anapplicant can creatively manipulate the application ofthe FITF rules on an application by filing a continu-ation-in-part application that contains at least oneclaim that relies on new matter in the continuationin-part. When done in this manner, all claims of thatapplication (including any that were supported by thepre-AIA application) will be examined under the newrules, even if the newly-added claim were to be sub-sequently withdrawn. This could effectively protect anapplication from assertions of prior art under pre-AIAlaw (e.g., rejections relating to prior invention underthe legacy section 35 U.S.C. 102(g)), given that cer-tain types of prior art are no longer deemed “priorart” under the AIA system. Conversely, where anapplicant needs to rely on invention date proofs, thisadvantage may be lost in a continuation in-part filing.

– Consider Duplicate Filings: Following on from this itmay be advantageous under certain conditions forapplicants to consider duplicate applications, with onefiled before the complete transition to the FITF system,and another filed afterwards. Rather than delay filingin order to obtain the advantages of the FITF system,filing duplicate applications may be more desirable.For applications filed in the normal course before thetransition, a duplicate filing immediately after transi-tion to the FITF system might therefore be a viablestrategy in order to reap the advantages of the newlaw, obviously keeping in mind the limitations forthose who need to rely on invention proofs underthe existing FTI system. If pre-transition filing dates arenot needed for priority or prior art reasons, then anypost-transition filing will provide advantages thatcertain prior inventions and secret uses would notaffect patent validity, and near duplicate patents canissue given the improved 35 U.S.C. §102(b)(2)(c)exceptions. Although this approach may be alien toEuropean attorneys, it is an important considerationfor clients who wish to obtain patent protection in theU.S. only.

– Invention Publication Strategy: Under the pre-AIA law,publication before patent filing was not advantageousin the U.S. because any third party reading a pub-lication might then promptly file a patent on yourinvention in order to attempt to become the first“inventor” to file for the patent. However, as dis-cussed above, the AIA now better protects such aninventor by offering a grace period for inventors whopublish prior to filing, so that the third party cannotprevail over the inventor who promptly files after theirown publication. Nevertheless, publication beforepatent filing is not a preferred patenting tacticbecause even though the AIA seems to solve the“legacy third party” problem, because of the loss of18-month potential for pre-USPTO publicationsecrecy and the quickening of the end of the inven-tor’s “grace period” after the outside publication.

– Recognize New Fees and Examination Options: Appli-cants should encourage their U.S. counsel to move toelectronic filing if they have not already done so, inorder to avoid the new fee surcharges for paperfilings. For time-sensitive patent protection strategies,consider asking U.S. counsel to pursue the PrioritizedExamination program provided for under the AIA.Prioritized Examination is expensive, but offers advan-tages over existing expedited examination options.Specifically, when compared to the existing Acceler-ated Examination program, the new Prioritized Exam-ination is simpler and does not require a pre-examin-ation search or an examination support document,and unlike a Petition to Make Special (which is avail-able only in limited circumstances), the PrioritizedExamination will be available for most new applica-tions.

Note that many specific fees are set to increase, exceptfor the issuance fees, which will decrease. The feeincreases will even affect simple particulars, such as latesubmissions of declarations, maintenance fees, andother smaller aspects of prosecution. Such increasesseem especially large for entities that cannot avail them-selves of small (50%) and micro-entity (75%) fee reduc-tions. Many applicants (except for universities) will not beentitled to “micro entity” status because the require-ments for a micro-entity are extraordinarily strict, andinclude both gross income limits of three times themedian household income (about $150,000) and capson the number of applications made in the name of aninventor.

Such increases are particularly noticeable in the case ofappeals and RCE processes. In fact the RCE and appealsprocesses may become so much more expensive that itmay make sense to have U.S. counsel employ a tele-phonic interview with the Examiner early in prosecution,even upon receiving a first office action in a given case.Traditionally, cost concerns and the potential forexpanded prosecution estoppel have caused U.S. coun-sel to employ Examiner interviews sparingly, often onlyfor select cases. However, depending on the on-goingfee increases for RCE and appeals processes, telephonic

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23 UPSTO, „Executive Summary: Patent Fee Proposal“, as submitted to thePatent Public Advisory Committee on 7 February 2012, p. 11.

Examiner interviews early in prosecution may warrantconsideration in some cases.

Further note that certain program costs, such as total“supplemental examination” are actually expected to beslightly higher than the cost to the USPTO of conductingthe proceeding, and will cost between$16,000-$20,000+ for large entities24. In setting thisextraordinary fee, the USPTO expects that the higherthan cost fee will encourage applicants to submitapplications with all relevant information during initialexamination, thereby facilitating compact prosecution.To this end, it behooves applicants not only to take theirduty of disclosure seriously when submitting anInformation Disclosure Statement (“IDS”), but it mayalso mean that will want to obtain patentability searchesprior to filing for important applications, in order toreduce the chances that they will encounter relevantdisclosures later on that will warrant requesting supple-mental examination.

– Update Assignments/Declarations As Soon As Poss-ible: Declarations and/or assignments used for filing inthe U.S. should be updated soon to reflect the“required statements” under the AIA. Although notrequired until September 16, 2012, if done across theboard for all filings at one time, it can avoid sub-sequent complications. However, until the USPTO rulemaking is finalized, it is unclear what otherinformation or statements might be further required.

– PCT Simplification: Under the AIA, use of PCTapplica-tions will be simplified starting immediately becausethe PCT applicant will be the assignee.

– Consider Foreign Sales/Uses in U.S. Patent Applica-tions: Patent holders and foreign patent counselshould also be aware of the effect of foreign sales/uses when preparing to lodge US counterpart applica-tions through their U.S. counsel.

– Recognition of Competing U.S. Patent Law Systems:Both patent holders and foreign patent counselshould recognize that despite the imminent changesdiscussed above, pre-AIA law will still control manyproceedings before the USPTO and the courts formany years hereafter. To this end, interferences, FTI,previous prior art definitions and the like will continueto remain the law for certain cases for quite sometime.

B. Litigation/Pre-LitigationThe AIA provides some important tools that foreignpatent counsel and in-house intellectual property man-agers may wish their U.S. counsel use against competi-tors, both in and out of court:– Consider Using the Post-Grant Review Process Instead

of Litigation: Post-grant review provides a means forattacking a competitor’s new patent similar to post-grant opposition proceedings in other countries andat the EPO. Constant monitoring of competitor port-folios is warranted in order to meet the nine month

post-grant deadline. Anyone but the patent ownermay institute the post-grant review process, and itincludes the benefit of limited discovery. However, thepost-grant review process has a large drawback whichis not present in national litigation subsequent toopposition proceedings at the EPO, in that if thepetitioner loses a final determination before the PTABin this action, they cannot assert in a civil action or anITC action any invalidity defense on a ground that wasraised or which reasonably could have been raised inthe process. Also, defendants in current actions onbusiness method patents should consider the effect ofthe availability of post-grant review on the conduct ofthe litigation. Conversely, patent owners may wish toconsider the alternative use of inter partes proceed-ings for novelty and obviousness issues. Nevertheless,the inter partes process, like the post-grant reviewprocess is fairly expensive and also carries with itestoppel issues, although these are somewhat morelimited in scope than in the post-grant review process.

– Consider Use of Derivation Proceedings: Patent appli-cants and owners should monitor competitors’recently published and issued applications and pat-ents for similar or identical claims that may have beenderived from their inventors in order avail themselvesof relief by civil action in federal court for an allegedlyderived, earlier filed patent containing a claim thatwas effectively filed on or after March 16, 2013 orthat claims priority from such an application.

– Consider Foreign Sales/Uses in U.S. Patent Applica-tions: If a third party is aware of a foreign sale or usethat may serve as relevant prior art to a competitor’spatent application, they may not be able to utilize thethird party submission process based on that reasonalone, and may instead have to wait until after apatent is granted in order to submit a challenge in apost-grant review proceeding. If made in a timelyfashion, the post-grant review proceeding providesfor submission of affidavits or declarations includingsupporting evidence and opinions that may provide abetter vehicle for such submissions. Conversely, aspractitioners and patentees outside of the U.S. arewell aware be careful of the effect of your sales or usesanywhere, as it will now have a more direct impact onthe validity of any U.S. patents you may be asserting.

– Consider Use of Third Party Submissions: Vigilantmonitoring of competitor patent applications is criti-cal to maximizing the effective use of this program.Although the submission of prior art by a third partyrequires a written explanation of the pertinence of thesubmission, one important advantage is that theidentity of the third-party submitter can be madeconfidential upon written request. Interested partiesmay even consider providing such submissionsthrough another party in order to better preserveanonymity.

– Dismissal of False Marking Actions and Use of VirtualMarking: Defendants in “false-marking” litigationshould request that plaintiffs dismiss such actionsvoluntarily and/or move to dismiss themselves. Com-

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24 Ibid.

panies who choose to employ “virtual marking”should retain proper records of any changes to patentinformation on their website, and may wish to con-sider use of a separate party to document suchchanges.

– Deceptive Intent Will No Longer Provide an AutomaticDefense: Infringement actions can still be maintainedeven with an invalid claim based on deceptive intentbecause there is no statutory basis for invalidating theremaining claims where the subject patent containsan invalid claim and where “deceptive intent” hasbeen proven.

– Understand the Joinder and Venue Changes: The AIArelieves certain unrelated defendants from havinginfringement claims against them being automaticallyjoined in actions in distant court venues because nowonly related parties may be joined as defendants in acommon suit. Other actions may require new venuesdepending on the action at hand, such as venuechanges for actions under 35 U.S.C. §§ 32, 145, 146,154 (b)(4)(A) and 293.

– Consider Whether a Prior Commercial Use DefenseExists: Importantly the AIA expands the prior com-mercial use defense to more than just businessmethod patents and is therefore more akin to manynational defences and exclusions in Europe. Wherecommercial use existed more than one year prior tothe effective filing date or earliest publication of anasserted patent, the defendant now has a defense.Note that the scope of “commercial use” is quitebroad, and may even encompass activities such as

work in a non-profit research lab and pre-marketingregulatory review.

– Litigation May Increase in New Areas: Expect uncer-tainty in many of the definitions and rules presentherein. In the same vein, expect forthcoming litigationto define a whole new set of patent statute terminol-ogy. Conversely, while some litigation may decreasegiven the new post-grant processes under the AIA,such processes may represent a new form of “liti-gation” and indeed, some of these proceedings mayinvolve appeals to the federal courts.

VII. CONCLUSION

Despite the numerous changes described herein, therevisions in both prosecution practice and litigationmechanics brought about through the AIA are ultimatelydesigned to result in positive results to the U.S. patentingsystem. Such positive results include more transparentpatentability standards, objective criteria and simplertests for patentability, and more predictable assessmentsof patentability. Notably, some aspects of these changesmay, instead, be seen as providing a new and uniquekind of patent system that exhibits characteristics of boththe FTI and FTF systems, rather than a truly harmonizedsystem. Nevertheless U.S. patent law will now followmany of the international norms on a broad swath ofancillary patenting practices, but patent holders andin-house counsel will be well-served by thorough con-sultation with their U.S. patent counsel regarding thevarious particulars and exceptions contained therein.

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Statistical Advice for Passing the EQE Pre-Examor

How an untrained monkey can score 50% betterthan a fully trained candidate

O. Griebling (NL)

The year 2012 will mark a milestone in the history of theEuropean Qualifying Examination: it is the first year thata pre-examination will be organized, which will functionas an entrance examination for the “true” EQE. Since it isa first time, much is uncertain for both the candidatesand their supervisors. But from the little informationgiven, some practical conclusions can be drawn.

The pre-exam is generally indicated as a multiplechoice examination, but actually it is not a true multiplechoice examination: at best it is a triple choice examin-ation. From information available at the EPO’s website(see: http://www.eqe-online.org/pre-exam/), it appearsthat the examination will contain a total of 20 questions,and each question will contain 4 statements. Each state-ment is either TRUE or FALSE. So, per statement, thecandidate must choose from two options: he/she muststate whether the statement is true or whether thestatement is false. A third option would be to leaveopen the answer, indicating „don’t know“.

This seems fairly simple, but in practice it is not so easyto quickly see whether a statement is true or false. And“quickly” is a key issue here: the total time available is 4hours, so a candidate has on average 12 minutes perquestion to read and understand the question and the 4statements, which leaves less than 3 minutes per state-ment.

The “true” examination has an open format, wherethe candidate has to formulate an answer. In such case, itis hardly possible to score if one does not know theanswer, and it is very easy to lose points if the candidateknows the answer but does not formulate it correctly. Incontrast, the choice-type pre-examination is more user-friendly for the candidate who does not know theanswer, because it allows the candidate to guess.Whether or not guessing is attractive depends on themarking scheme.

It seems that the Examination Board is aware thatguessing is possible. In an interesting note (see:http://www.eqe-online.org/wiki/How_to_tackle_multi-ple_choice_questions_in_the_pre-exam), the followinginformation is given:

In order to minimise the effect of guesswork, themarking scheme is biased in favour of candidates whoget most or all of the 4 possible answers to a questioncorrect. That is, if you get all the possible answerswrong, or only one of the four correct, you will score 0marks. There is 1 mark if you have two of the fouranswers correct, 3 marks if you have three of the four

answers correct, and 5 marks if you have all fouranswers correct. A pass is awarded to candidatesscoring 50 marks or more.

Perhaps the Examination Board does not realize it, butactually they have invented a marking scheme that onthe one hand is unfair and on the other hand is stimulat-ing the candidates to guess.

The candidates are expected to handle 80 statements.A priori, there seems no reason for distinguishingbetween the different statements. Compare three can-didates, each having correctly answered 40 out of 80statements. A priori, one would say that such candidatesare equally “good”.

However, assume candidate A has his correct answersevenly distributed over the questions: two correctanswers per question. This candidate has scored 20points, and fails.

Assume candidate B has 3 correct answers in 13 of the20 questions, plus one correct answer in one of theremaining questions. This candidate has scored 39points, and fails.

Assume candidate C has 4 correct answers in 10 of the20 questions. This candidate has scored 50 points, andpasses.

This seems hardly fair.Traditionally, candidates are given the advice to try all

questions, therefore to spend no more than the calcu-lated average time and then move on to the next ques-tion. In the context of the pre-exam, this would meanthat the candidates would be advised to spend no morethan 3 minutes per statement. But in view of the abovestatistics, it may well be advisable to reconsider suchadvice: it is better to correctly answer 100% of 50% ofthe questions than to correctly answer 50% of 100% ofthe questions.

In a statistically well-balanced marking scheme, guess-ing will have no or little effect on the score. On average, acandidate who does not know and is not afraid to tellthis, should score the same amount of points as acandidate who does not know but is guessing. Thelogical consequence is that a WRONG answer shouldscore less than NO answer.

In contrast, with the marking scheme proposed,guessing will have an enormous effect on the score.

Consider again candidate A above. Assume that ineach question, the candidate has found two easy state-ments where he is absolutely certain of the answer. And

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assume that these answers are indeed correct. Withthese answers, the candidate has scored only 20 points.If he leaves open the remaining difficult statements, hewill fail.

Now the candidate knows, of course, that he still hasto answer 40 statements, 2 in each of the 20 questions.However, he has no idea what the answers are, and/or heis running out of time. What does he do?

Surprisingly, the answer is: do random guesswork.True “random” guesswork is in order if the answers

TRUE and FALSE are truly randomly distributed over thequestions. The above-mentioned note gives exampleshow guesswork might be less random to improve thechances on success. But for sake of illustration, considertrue random guesswork, such as perhaps would be doneby an untrained monkey (in analogy of Adam Monk).True randomness expects that, in each question, there is25% chance that both answers to the remaining state-ments are wrong, 25% chance that the first is correctand the second is wrong, 25% chance that the first iswrong and the second is correct, and 25% chance thatboth statements are correct. It can easily be seen that in aseries of 4 questions one would, on average, expect toscore 0 + 2 + 2 + 4 additional points, i. e. 8 points.

In the total of 20 questions, with two answers perquestions, it is possible to score anywhere between 0and 80 (but no odd scores). It can be shown that, withtrue randomness per answer, the probability of scoring30 points or more is as high as 96%: chances are that thecandidate will pass!

So what would happen of the exam rules wereamended as follows:1) a candidate is allowed to bring to the pre-exam an

untrained monkey;2) in each question, the candidate is allowed to select

the two EASIEST statements to answer by himself3) the remaining two MOST DIFFICULT statements per

question are given to the untrained monkey foranswering

4) the results of the candidate and the monkey arecombined

To our surprise, we would see that, even if the candidatescores 100% correct answers, the untrained monkeywould score 50% more points than the trained candi-date. One may wonder why the Examination Boardfancies such a marking scheme.

Statistics is a wonderful art. While being based on solidmathematical rules, it can be used to prove almostanything. But behind all this, there remains a practicaltruth for the candidates: if you do not know an answer,you’d better guess than leave the question unanswered.And you need only to know 50% of the answers.

Just one final remark. It has been said in the past thatthe exam should, to some extent, be a reflection of thedaily challenges of a patent attorney. By analogy, onemight expect that the pre-exam is, to some extent, areflection of the preparation program of a trainee. I dohope that the opposite is not true.

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Letters to the EditorThe Editors believe that for the time

being the theme of inventive activity is exhausted

Über Jurisprudenz im Patentrecht

G. Kern (DE)

Die seit über hundert Jahren bisher allgemein aner-kannte Philosophie der Jurisprudenz in Bezug auf dasPatentrecht ist von Dr. jur. Dr. Ing. Joseph Kohler (1849 –1919) in vielen bedeutenden und international geschätz-ten Schriften dargelegt worden und dort noch immer mitintellektuellem Gewinn nachlesbar. Das EuropäischePatentübereinkommen (EPUe) wurde ursprünglich mitbreitester internationaler Zustimmung streng nach derglobal nahezu einheitlich gelehrten Jurisprudenz verfasstund danach auch angewendet. Wenn jetzt Dr. A. W.Kumm in epi-information 2/12 die Meinung vorträgt, derbisher gültige Begriff von der erfinderischen Tätigkeit seiwissenschaftlich erledigt, stellt sich die Frage, ob dieserMeinung erfinderische Erkenntnis bisher verborgenerGegenstände menschlichen Denkens beispielsweise inBezug auf eine Abscheidung sozio-ökonomischenSchrotts vom Patentrecht oder doch vielmehr nur dasBedürfnis zugrunde liegt, den Erfinder als persönlichenSchöpfer intellektuellen Eigentums durch namenlosanonyme Organisationen oder Roboter zu ersetzen,die mit Programmen scheinbar objektivierbarer Begriffezeitgenössischen Managements gesteuert sind.

Der ursprünglichen Lehrmeinung liegt die Vorstellungzugrunde, dass das Patentrecht ein schwerwiegenderEingriff in das allgemeine Menschenrecht des Denkens,des intellektuellen Begreifens und Gestaltens, außerdemder Handels- und Gewerbefreiheit ist und als solcherbesonderer Begründung bedarf. In Bezug auf dieBeschränkung allgemeinen Menschenrechts kann dieBegründung nicht aus allgemein gültigen Regeln undmateriell objektivierbaren Umständen abgeleitet wer-den. Sie bedarf vielmehr zwingend individuell mensch-licher Leistung, die als solche außerordentlich nicht imbekannten Geltungsbereich allgemeinen Menschen-rechts erbracht wurde. Sie bedarf außerdem zwingenddeutlicher und vollständiger Offenbarung (Art. 83 EPÜ)sowie öffentlicher Bekanntmachung (Art. 93 EPÜ) sol-cher außerordentlichen Leistung derart, dass sie danachallgemein nachgeahmt werden kann. Demnach ist erfin-derische Tätigkeit diejenige, die zwar auf individuellmenschlicher Leistung von Erfindern beruht, aber jeden-falls ursprünglich nicht im ordentlich bekannten Gel-tungsbereich allgemeinen Menschenrechts stattgefun-den hat. Der Durchschnittsfachmann/die Fachfrau istaufgrund allgemein zugänglicher Wissenschaft dazubefähigt, die deutlich und vollständig geoffenbarteund öffentlich bekannt gemachte Erfindung zu verste-hen und zweckmäßig nachzuahmen.

Leuten, die öffentlich unzugängliche Wissenschaft imGeheimen nutzen, steht das ursprüngliche Patentrechtnicht zur Verfügung. Wenn T. Fox in epi-information2/12findet, „Der Fachmann (sei) die notwendige Fiktionim System“, so sind wohl mit der Fiktion die Fachleute imSinne patentrechtlicher Jurisprudenz gemeint, zu denendie Hüter öffentlich unzugänglicher Wissenschaft ebennicht gehören, obwohl sie für sich den Ruf von Eliten derGesellschaft in Anspruch nehmen. Aber der Fachmann/die Fachfrau im Sinne des noch immer geltenden Patent-rechts gibt sich tatsächlich durch die in der vorhandenenLiteratur allgemein zugängliche Wissenschaft einwand-frei zu erkennen und gehört so nicht in das Reich derFiktionen sondern zur materiell menschlichen Realität.

Das Patentrecht im Sinne der Beschränkung allgemei-ner Menschenrechte durch Verbot der Nachahmungbestimmter Technik wird zwar mit außerordentlicherLeistung der Art erfinderischer Tätigkeit und insbeson-dere mit der allgemein verständlichen Offenbarungsolcher Tätigkeit begründet. Sein Schutzbereich ist durchden Inhalt der Patentansprüche bestimmt (Art. 69 EPÜ)und der Inhalt der Patentansprüche Gegenstand desSchutzbegehrens (Regel 29 EPÜ). Demnach hat dasursprüngliche Patentrecht nicht die Erfindung als solchesondern das daraus vom Erfinder oder seinem Rechts-nachfolger abgeleitete Schutzbegehren zum Gegen-stand. Das durch die Patentansprüche bestimmteSchutzbegehren genügt allerdings in aller Regel nichtzum Nachweis erfinderischer Tätigkeit, die jedenfalls ineiner zusätzlich beigefügten Beschreibung verständlichgeoffenbart sein sollte. Im Gegenstand der Patent-ansprüche eines Patents sucht man also gewiss ver-gebens nach Wissenschaft erfinderischer Tätigkeit

Dr. A.W. Kumm schlägt in epi-information 2/12 vor,anstelle erfinderischer Tätigkeit technischen Fortschrittals hinreichend objektives Merkmal einer Erfindung undso als Begründung des Patentrechts gelten zu lassen.Technischen Fortschritt als Begründung des Patentrechtshat allerdings die Jurisprudenz von jeher abgelehnt, weildie Bedeutung erfinderischer Tätigkeit für technischenFortschritt von den ständig wechselnden Umständenallgemeiner technischer Entwicklung in der mensch-lichen Gesellschaft bestimmt wird und der durch eineErfindung erzielbare technische Fortschritt als veränder-liche Größe grundsätzlich nicht rechtsverbindlich fest-legbar ist.

Patente wurden bisher erteilt gewissermaßen als Lohnfür die Bereicherung der menschlichen Gesellschaft mit

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allgemeiner technischer Wissenschaft durch Offenba-rung anstelle der Geheimhaltung von aus erfinderischerTätigkeit geschöpfter Erfindung. Im deutschen Sprach-raum hat noch vor sechzig Jahren hauptsächlichProf.Dr.jur. Dr.Ing. e.h. Lindenmaier gelehrt, dass dastechnische Patent gewissermaßen zum Wettbewerbs-recht gehört und den Fachmann/die Fachfrau von unlau-terem Wettbewerb mit Erfindern abhält, indem es diegewerbliche Nachahmung unter staatlicher Aufsichtamtlich bekannt gemachter Erfindungen ohne dieZustimmung der Erfinder verbietet. Soweit das Wett-bewerbsrecht eine moralische Verpflichtung zur Geltungbringt, gilt diese also gleichermaßen auch im Patentrechtund ist nicht nur durch erfinderische Tätigkeit sondernauch durch gewerbliche Tätigkeit der Erfinder oder ihrerRechtsnachfolger begründet.

Im Hinblick auf den scheinbar unaufhaltsamen Fort-schritt technischer Wissenschaft und ihrer Anwendungim wirtschaftlichen Wettbewerb stellt sich die Frage, wasan solchem unaufhaltsamen Fortschritt denn noch alsaußerordentliche Leistung erfinderischer Tätigkeit mit

der Wirkung, allgemeine Menschenrechte einzuschrän-ken, und als notwendige Voraussetzung des Fortschrittsgelten kann. Diese Frage ist allerdings nicht neu. Sie hatvielmehr bereits vor über hundert Jahren beispielsweiseden hier anfangs genannten Joseph Kohler umgetriebenund seitdem die Jurisprudenz des Patentrechts nicht mitendgültigem Abschied durch philosophische Antwortenverlassen.

Im Hinblick auf die seit über einem Jahrhundert unver-ändert bestehenden Bedenken betreffend behaupteteoder tatsächliche Willkür der Bestimmung erfinderischerTätigkeit bleibt weiterhin mehr denn je zuvor die per-sönlich menschliche Individualität der Entstehung desPatentrechts als Begrenzung allgemeiner Menschen-rechte zu berücksichtigen. Solche Individualität lässt sichweder durch Roboter noch durch Robotern ähnlicheOrganisationen oder elitäre Geheimbünde ersetzen Viel-mehr wird man die Patentämter zu schließen und auchdie epi-information abzubrechen haben, wenn erst dieErfinder und deren erfinderische Tätigkeit aus dem tech-nischen Fortschritt endgültig hinwegrationalisiert sind.

Beitrag angeregt durch den Artikel von Herrn Dr. A. Kumm:„Die Crux mit der erfinderischen Tätigkeit und die schweizerische

Chance ihrer operablen Bewertung“ (epi Information 1/2012, S. 22/23)

S. V. Kulhavy (CH)

In den Fusszeilen zum Artikel von Herrn Dr. Kumm wirdauf seine Bücher hingewiesen, welche mit dem tech-nologischen Denken in den Industrieunternehmen imZusammenhang stehen. Der Text des vorliegenden Bei-trags soll dieses Thema vertiefen.

Die Fachhochschule in St. Gallen organisierte am25. April 2012 eine Innovationstagung. Während dieserInnovationstagung hat man unter anderem auch überdie Resultate einer Umfrage in den schweizerischenIndustrieunternehmen berichtet. Das Ziel dieser Umfragewar zu ermitteln, warum die Mitarbeiter in den Indu-strieunternehmen zu wenig innovativ sind. Etwa 60%der Befragten haben sich darüber beklagt, dass dieUnternehmen ihnen nicht sagen, wie man Innovationenmachen kann. Etwa 40% der Befragten haben daraufhingewiesen, dass sie innere Blockaden haben, welchesie daran hindern, bei den Innovationen mitzumachen.Lassen wir diese 40% der Befragten zunächst beiseite,weil man gegen solche Blockaden mit anderen Mittelnvorgehen müsste als mit den hier besprochenen Mitteln.

Man kann sich fragen, warum die Industrieunterneh-men nicht in der Lage sind, ihren Mitarbeitern zu

erläutern, wie Innovationen, d.h. auch Erfindungenentstehen. Die Industrieunternehmen haben andereSorgen, als sich damit zu befassen, wie Innovationenentstehen. Die Patentanwälte wären für solche Erläute-rungen eigentlich zuständig. Aber sie kümmern sich umsolche Erläuterungen nicht. Beispielsweise im Art. 56EPÜ wird auf den Fachmann Bezug genommen. DiesenFachmann verstehen die Gerichte, Einspruchsabteilun-gen und die Prüfer als Durchschnittsfachmann. Damitdiese Institutionen über Erfindungen entscheiden kön-nen, wird das Wissen und das Können des Fachmannsauf das Wissen und Können des für den jeweils beur-teilten Fall zuständigen Durchschnittsfachmanns redu-ziert. Wie weit diese Reduktion des Wissens und desKönnens geht, dies steht im freien Ermessen der Gerich-te, der Einspruchsabteilungen und der Prüfer. Folglichkann man sich als Partei im Voraus nicht einmal vor-stellen, wie diese Institutionen entscheiden könnten.

Die technischen Innovationen haben eine ganz spe-zielle Eigenschaft, mit der sie sich von allen anderenArten von Kreationen unterscheiden, nämlich, dass sieden Naturgesetzen, insbesondere dem Kausalgesetz,

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gehorchen müssen, damit sie funktionstüchtig sind.Damit dies möglich ist, muss der Mensch während derEntstehung neuer Lösungen technischer Problemelogisch, d.h. schlussfolgernd bzw. konsequent denken.Wenn man den Mitarbeitern in der Industrie erläuternwill, wie Innovationen entstehen, dann muss dies folglichso geschehen, dass diese Leute mit ihrer konsequentenDenkweise eine solche Erläuterung auch verstehen kön-nen.

Unter den genannten Bedingungen in den genanntenInstitutionen sagen sich die Patentanwälte jedoch,warum sollten wir uns um eine rational nachvollziehbareErfassung von Erfindungen kümmern, wenn die genann-ten Institutionen nach ihrem freien Ermessen, d.h. nichtvoraussehbar entscheiden? Als eine der Konsequenzendieser Überlegungsweise gilt, dass sich, mit Ausnahmedes Autors dieses Beitrags, niemand um die Umständekümmert, unter welchen Innovationen entstehen. Undjetzt weiss man es auch, warum es sonst niemandengibt, welcher den 60% der Mitarbeiter in den Indu-strieunternehmen erläutern kann, wie Innovationen ent-stehen. Aus diesen Darlegungen sollte auch ersichtlichsein, wie die hier kritisierte Fiktion des Durchschnitts-fachmanns, welche übrigens als längst überholt gilt, dietechnische Entwicklung in den Industrieunternehmen imbeträchtlichen Umfang blockiert!

Man darf wohl annehmen, dass entspreche Umfragenin anderen europäischen Ländern sehr ähnliche Zahlenliefern würden. Hieraus dürfte ersichtlich sein, wiegewaltig gross der volkwirtschaftliche Schaden ist, wennes nicht möglich ist, den Mitarbeitern in den Industrieun-ternehmen in einer rational nachvollziehbaren Weise zuerläutern, wie Erfindungen und sonstige Innovationenentstehen. Ausserdem müsste aus den Zahlen derUmfragen sowie aus den vorstehenden Erläuterungenauch ersichtlich sein, dass es in den Industrieunterneh-men einen enormen Bedarf nach einer schlussfolgern-den Erläuterung dessen gibt, wie Innovation entstehen.

Nach dieser Darlegung der Situation und der Zusam-menhänge, welche den Lesern dieses Textes wohl kaumbekannt waren, sollten die Leser, gleich wie der Autordieses Beitrags, ebenfalls zum Schluss kommen, dass dieFiktion des Durchschnittsfachmanns fallen gelassen wer-den soll. Wenn dies geschehen würde, dann müsstekeine Prüfungsweise von Erfindungen erst entwickeltwerden, welche es ermöglichen würde, Erfindungen ineiner logisch nachvollziehbaren Weise zu beurteilen.Dies deswegen, weil eine solche Prüfungsweise bereitsbekannt ist und weil diese Beurteilungsweise von Erfin-dungen im Einzelnen ebenfalls bereits beschrieben wur-de1. Im Rahmen dieser Prüfungsweise wird auch darge-legt, wie die erfinderische Tätigkeit in einerschlussfolgernden Weise beurteilt werden kann.

Eine sehr wichtige Folge des Verzichtes auf den Durch-schnittsfachmann wäre es, dass die Patentanwältebeginnen würden, sich mit der rational nachvollzieh-baren Theorie des Begriffes Erfindung zu befassen, weil

die Resultate der soeben erwähnten Beurteilungsweisevon Erfindungen voraussehbar sind. Dann könnten diePatentanwälte den Leuten in der Industrie aber aucherläutern, wie die Innovationen entstehen. Damit könnteder enorme volkswirtschaftliche Schaden beendet wer-den, welcher sich daraus ergibt, dass die Leute in denIndustrieunternehmen nicht wissen, wie Innovationenentstehen.

Die Situation heutzutage ist derart, dass die Innova-tionen den Leuten in den Industrieunternehmen nämlichnur intuitiv einfallen können. Wenn die Lösung einesgegebenen Problems einem intuitiv nicht einfällt, dannbleibt das Problem ungelöst oder sogar unlösbar.

Vor etwa hundert Jahren hat sich ein Gericht dahin-gehend geäussert, dass die mentale Tätigkeit, welche zuden Erfindungen führt, dermassen komplex ist, dass mannichts genaueres dazu sagen kann, ob eine Erfindungvorliegt oder nicht. Deswegen gelte der Begriff Erfin-dung als ein unbestimmter Rechtsbegriff. Nur der Richterim Rahmen seines freien Ermessens könne entscheiden,ob eine Erfindung vorliegt oder nicht. Dies ist eineDoktrin, welche auch heutzutage noch gilt. Ausserdemwird diese Doktrin mit allen verfügbaren Mitteln ent-schlossen verteidigt. Denn solange man sich auf dieseDoktrin berufen kann, muss man nichts neues lernenund man muss auch nichts ändern. Und wenn es ineinem Gerichtsfall darauf ankommt, dann probiert manes halt irgendwie, und man schaut, was daraus heraus-kommt. (Das Herzstück dieser Beurteilungsweise vonErfindungen bildet der Durchschnittsfachmann.) So ver-setzte sich das Patentwesen in einen „angenehmen“lethargischen und seit Jahren dauernden Schlaf. Wegendiesem lethargischen Schlummer nahm das Patent-wesen keine Notiz davon, dass sich die Situation betref-fend die zu den Erfindungen führenden mentalen Pro-zessen vor allem während den letzten etwa 50 Jahrengründlich geändert hat.

Vor allem die modernen medizinischen Abbildungs-verfahren, wie zum Beispiel die Computertomographieund weitere diesbezügliche Abbildungsverfahren,machen es möglich, der Tätigkeit des Gehirns beinahezuzuschauen. Wer sich diesbezüglich weiter bildenmöchte, der kann die Bücher beispielweise der folgen-den Autoren studieren: Antonio Damasio, Dietrich Dör-ner, John C. Eccles, Erich Kandel, Gerhard Roth, ManfredSpitzer und/oder anderer Autoren. Diese Literaturquel-len beziehen sich allein auf die physiologischen undpsychischen Prozesse, welche sich im Gehirn des Men-schen abspielen. Keine dieser Literaturquellen befasstsich damit, wie die über die Denkweise des Menschengewonnenen Erkenntnisse auf die Entstehung von Inno-vationen, d.h. auch auf die Entstehung von Erfindungenangewendet werden können. Das Studium solcherBücher hat es dem Autor des vorliegenden Beitragsdennoch ermöglicht, jene mentalen Schritte zu entdek-ken, die zu den Innovationen führen.

Der Autor dieses Beitrags plant jetzt, eine Erfinder-schule zu betreiben. Während dieser Ausbildung werdenzahlreiche Bilder gezeigt und der Inhalt dieser Bilder wirdvom Vortragenden erläutert. So kann wohl jeder Besu-

Information 3/2012 Letters to the Editor 91

1 S. Kulhavy: „Erfindungs- und Patentlehre“, Carl Heymanns Verlag, 2010,ISBN 978-3-452-27120-4

cher auch die schwierigsten Themen dieses Wissens-gebietes verstehen. Nachstehend befinden sich Beispielefür Themen, welche in der Erfinderschule behandeltwerden sollten:– Methoden zur Registrierung von Hirnaktivitäten;– Die Experimente von Deecke und Kornhuber sowie

von Libet;– Das Bewusste und das Unterbewusste beim Men-

schen;– Die Wahrnehmung durch Sinnesorgane; aktivierbare

Areale im Gehirn;– Das Mentalsystem des Menschen in Analogie zur

Architektur eines Computers;– Die Funktionen des menschlichen Gedächtnisses;– Das Blockschaltbild der Lösung technischer Proble-

me; „Allgemeiner Problemlöser“;– Gehirnphysiologische Grundlagen der Kreativität;

das Vorstellungsvermögen;– Mentale Vorgänge während der Entstehung von

Erfindungen;– Die Rolle der Intuition und von Schlaf bei der Lösung

technischer Probleme;– Die Sprache;

– Die Syllogistik;– Beseitigung von Denkblockaden bei der Lösung

technischer Probleme; Empfehlungen für die Arbeitder Innovatoren;

– Lenkung von Naturkräften als die äussere Grenze derTechnik;

– Gesetzliche Vorschriften darüber, was als Erfindunggelten kann;

– Als Erfindung gilt …; „Der Ladenpult“;– Ablauf der Prüfung von Erfindungen im Europäi-

schen Patentamt (Ablaufschema).

Es wäre sehr zu begrüssen, wenn die massgebendenInstitutionen auf die Beurteilung von Erfindungen aufder Grundlage des Durchschnittsfachmanns verzichten.Je schneller dieser Verzicht erfolgen würde, umso besser.Aus den hier dargebotenen Darlegungen sollte auchersichtlich sein, dass der Durchschnittsfachmann nichtbloss ein „Sandkasten“ der genannten Institutionen ist,sondern dass dieses „Spielen“ gesamthaft einen gewal-tigen volkwirtschaftlichen Schaden verursacht, und dassdieses daher nicht einen Schaden nur im jeweils beur-teilten Fall nach sich ziehen kann.

92 Letters to the Editor Information 3/2012

Information 3/2012 Letters to the Editor 93

Disziplinarorgane und AusschüsseDisciplinary bodies and Committees · Organes de discipline et Commissions

Disziplinarrat (epi) Disciplinary Committee (epi) Commission de discipline (epi)

AT – Wolfgang Poth°°BE – Thierry DebledBG – Vesel PendichevCH – Raymond ReutelerCZ – Michael FischerDE – Werner Fröhling°DK – Susanne HøibergEE – Sirje KahuES – Inigo Elosegui de la PenaFI – Christian WesterholmFR – Bernard RougemontGB – John Gray

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epi-Mitglieder

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epi Members

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94 Letters to the Editor Information 3/2012

Europäische Patentpraxis European Patent Practice Pratique du brevet européen

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*Chair /**Secretary °Vice-Chair / °°Vice-Secretary

Information 3/2012 Letters to the Editor 95

Biotechnologische Erfindungen Biotechnological Inventions Inventions en biotechnologie

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96 Letters to the Editor Information 3/2012

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