Patent decision

BL number

O/373/17

Concerning rights in

GB1202590.4

Hearing Officer

Mr P Mason

Decision date

8 August 2017

Person(s) or Company(s) involved

Lexisnexis

Provisions discussed

PA 1977 Sections 1(1)(d), 1(2)(c)

Keywords

Excluded fields (refused)

Related Decisions

None

Summary

The invention is a computer-implemented method for searching for and ranking documents according to their relevancy; where relevancy is determined by a mathematical process applied to each document found, to quantitatively assess the distribution therein of words which match the search criteria.

The Hearing Officer applied the four step test set out in Aerotel/Macrossan and considered the AT&T signposts. He concluded that there was no relevant technical contribution to save the invention from being more than a program for a computer as such, and that the invention therefore related solely to subject matter excluded from being patented. Accordingly he refused the application.

Full decision O/373/17 87Kb