Patent decision

BL number

O/638/19

Concerning rights in

GB1322615.4

Hearing Officer

Mr P Mason

Decision date

23 October 2019

Person(s) or Company(s) involved

Clarity Markets Holdings LLC

Provisions discussed

Patents Act 1977 Section 1(2)(c) and (d)

Keywords

Excluded fields (refused)

Related Decisions

None

Summary

The application relates to an online auction trading platform, that is realised in a networked computer system, for trading biddable financial instruments. In the invention, the platform projects, for each of a plurality of impending auctions, a final clearing rate that would result from each transaction. The clearing rate is displayed along with any submitted bids to enable more transparent and expedient auctions. The Hearing Officer applied the four-step approach set out in the Court of Appeal judgment in Aerotel. He decided that the contribution made by the invention is not technical in nature. He found that the contribution falls solely within excluded subject matter as no more than the presentation of information, a program for a computer and a method for doing business as such. The application was refused.

Full decision O/638/19 282Kb