Philip Kerpen | Alfred Köpf
Die Beschwerde richtete sich gegen die Entscheidung der PrĂŒfungsabteilung, eine von SWISS RE eingereichte europĂ€ische Patentanmeldung wegen mangelnder erfinderischer TĂ€tigkeit zurĂŒckzuweisen. Die Erfindung bezog sich auf ein computerimplementiertes Verfahren zur Verwaltung der Finanzierung von Katastrophenhilfsmassnahmen und beanspruchte insbesondere eine Kapitalauszahlung in AbhĂ€ngigkeit von einem parametrischen Index, der sich auf Informationen ĂŒber Katastrophenereignisse bezieht. Die Kammer war der Ansicht, dass dieses Merkmal keine technischen Ăberlegungen erfordere und konnte keine Schwierigkeiten bei der Implementierung des Verfahrens auf einem allgemeinen vernetzten Computer erkennen. Daher musste die Patentanmeldung nach Artikel 56 EPĂ zurĂŒckgewiesen werden und auch die Beschwerde wurde zurĂŒckgewiesen. Die Kammer vertrat die Auffassung, dass es Sache des BeschwerdefĂŒhrers ist, zu begrĂŒnden, warum eine technische Wirkung vorliegt oder warum technische ErwĂ€gungen im Spiel sind und dass nicht die PrĂŒfungsabteilung beweisen muss, dass ein Merkmal nicht technisch ist. Letzteres kĂ€me einer Definition des Begriffs «technisch» gleich, was die Kammern stets abgelehnt haben.
Le recours Ă©tait dirigĂ© contre la dĂ©cision de la division dâexamen de rejeter une demande de brevet europĂ©en dĂ©posĂ©e par SWISS RE pour dĂ©faut dâactivitĂ© inventive. Lâinvention portait sur un procĂ©dĂ© mis en Ćuvre sur ordinateur pour gĂ©rer le financement de mesures dâaide en cas de catastrophe. Le demandeur revendiquait notamment une mĂ©thode de versement de capital en fonction dâun indice paramĂ©trique, qui serait obtenu Ă partir dâinformations relatives Ă des catastrophes. La chambre de recours a estimĂ© que cette caractĂ©ristique ne nĂ©cessitait pas de considĂ©rations techniques et nâa identifiĂ© aucune difficultĂ© pour la mise en Ćuvre du procĂ©dĂ© sur un quelconque ordinateur en rĂ©seau. Par consĂ©quent, la demande de brevet devait ĂȘtre rejetĂ©e en vertu de lâart. 56 CBE, et le recours a Ă©galement Ă©tĂ© rejetĂ©. La chambre a estimĂ© quâil appartenait au recourant de justifier lâexistence dâun effet technique ou lâimplication de considĂ©rations techniques, et quâil ne relevait pas de la responsabilitĂ© de la division dâexamen de prouver quâune caractĂ©ristique nâĂ©tait pas technique. Apporter une telle preuve reviendrait Ă dĂ©finir le terme «technique», ce que les chambres ont toujours refusĂ© de faire.
Philip Kerpen, MSc. ETH Phys., European Patent Attorney, Zurich.
Alfred Köpf, Dr. sc. nat. ETH, Swiss and European Patent Attorney, Zurich.
The english translation of the lead is included on Swisslex and legalis only.
Computer-implemented inventions often claim a combination of technical and non-technical features. Frequently, it is disputed whether those features of the claim which distinguish the claimed invention from the prior art are technical or provide a technical contribution, in particular when the claimed invention relates to a computer-implemented method of doing business. With such inventions, the Examining Division at the EPO typically raises an objection due to lack of inventive step, which can pose a challenge to be overcome.
According to the established case law of the Boards of Appeal of the EPO, the requirement of inventive step must be assessed taking account of all features that contribute to the technical character of the invention. While the technical problem to be solved according to the «problem-solution |approach» should not be formulated to contain indications of the solution or even partially anticipate it, merely because some feature appears in the claim does not automatically exclude it from appearing in the formulation of the problem. Accordingly, an applicant is advised to argue that the non-technical features contribute to the technical character of the invention, for example, by interacting with the technical features to solve a technical problem.
In another line of case law, the presence of an inventive step can be affirmed if the invention is based on technical considerations. The applicant is advised to argue why the non-technical features are not within the domain of the notional business person, but rather would be put to a person skilled in the art, and therefore that the non-technical features involve technical considerations and must be part of the solution to be assessed regarding inventive step.
While the Boards of Appeal have consistently refused to provide a definition of which kinds of features are to be deemed «technical», guidance on which types of features are considered non-technical is provided, for example, in the decision G 1/19, which held that «the term âčnon-technical featuresâ refers to features which, on their own, would be considered âčnon-inventionsâ under Article 52(2) EPC.»
The applicant, SWISS RE, appealed a decision of the Examining Division to refuse its European patent application on the grounds of lack of inventive step. The decision held that claims 1 and 7 were considered to be a straightforward implementation of a business method on a generic computer system.
The invention of claim 1 concerned a computer-implemented method for managing funding of catastrophe relief efforts caused by natural or man-made disasters, such as earthquakes. Instead of the direct funding of relief efforts by a charitable organization (using donor funds), as occurs conventionally, the method provides for a special-purpose vehicle, which offers a financial product in return for a premium from the charitable organization (or directly from the donors). Investors invest in the product and receive in return a payment of the premium. Catastrophic event information is received from an information provider, and if a catastrophic event occurs within the contract duration of the financial product, capital is paid to the charitable organization depending on a parametric index of the received catastrophic event information.
The applicant argued that the invention concerned an entirely new business model involving the expertise of an assurance expert and a capital risk expert without knowledge about parametric triggering criteria, which are measurable parameters and therefore technical. The applicant argued that technical knowledge was therefore required to develop the new business method.
During appeal, the appellant argued that the invention was an entirely new business method which did not exist in the prior art. Technical considerations were needed, it was argued, to derive the concept of using an electronic parametric triggered payout. It was only through the collaboration of a group of persons that the invention was able to be realized, with a technically skilled person included in the group. The appellant further argued that, in order to implement a «trigger»-based management of the funding of catastrophe relief efforts, an understanding of the data structures and computer process steps was required, in particular, how the system of the «special purpose entity» had to interact with other systems. This went beyond the normal technical know-how of the skilled person and beyond a «stand-alone» network computer.
The Board agreed with the Examining Division that a valid starting point is a networked computer system, comprising a control module and several functional modules. Such a «networked» system can be interconnected with other networked computers via a telecommunications network.
The invention was considered to differ from the prior art by all the features of the relief payout scheme, and the question was whether the Division was right to consider all these features as being non-technical.
In particular, concerning the feature of the parametric trigger, the Board agreed with the Examining Division that «the business person in the form of an insurance expert would naturally have to consider the conditions under which the payout would be made. These conditions are part of the business method and would depend on the type of financial model being used. Whereas a conventional insurance might link the payout to loss, the method of the invention links the payout to the nature of the catastrophe, which makes sense if the cost is being covered by a financial product.»
The Board considered that the «parametric trigger» was simply a broad term covering parameters defining the catastrophe, and that in determining this parametric in|formation, the triggering criteria and the trigger level do not require any technical considerations.
The Board could not see any difficulties for the person skilled in the art of data processing to implement the business concept on generic networked computer systems and that therefore, the present application had to be refused under Article 56 EPC, . The appellantâs request for remittal for further search and examination could not be granted, as the Board was able to take the decision without remitting the case to the Examining Division.
The Board stated that the appellantâs wish for the Board to define criteria that the Examining Division should use to prove that a feature is not technical is «tantamount to defining the term technical, which the Boards have consistently declined to do», and referred to the decisions T 2314/16 â Distributing rewards/RAKUTEN and T 1463/11 â Universal merchant platform/CardinalCommerce, for guidance on the issue of technicality or to help classify whether borderline features are on the technical or non-technical side. The Board further included a piece of advice for the Examining Division, namely to search for and start from a document that already discloses some of the alleged non-technical features, thus avoiding a discussion on these features.
The Board refused the patent application for lack of inventive step pursuant to Article 56 EPC. It held that the feature of the «parametric trigger» did not require any technical considerations and that the features of the business method could be implemented on a known networked computer without difficulty. Further, it affirmed that the Boards have consistently declined to define the term «technical», which is in line with the earlier decision G 1/19 in which it was held that defining «technical» was undesirable as «any definition of a technical invention may have to be extended in the course of time in order to accommodate new technical or scientific developments or to reflect societal changes.» This further develops the case law that, once a feature has been established to be non-technical, the applicant must argue why this non-technical feature provides a technical contribution. Furthermore, it is to be expected that Examining Divisions will more often cite prior art which discloses at least some of the non-technical features, thereby streamlining the discussion of inventive step.
Borderline cases, often relating to computer-implemented business methods, will continue to spur the further development and refinement of the case law providing greater predictability of outcome for applicants.