Patent decision
- BL number
- O/282/10
- Concerning rights in
- EP1080178, EP0942781 and GB2333250
- Hearing Officer
- Mr J Elbro
- Decision date
- 9 August 2010
- Person(s) or Company(s) involved
- N Nazareth and Secretary of State for Defence
- Provisions discussed
- Patents Act 1977 Section 72
- Keywords
- Inventive step, Revocation, Sufficiency, Summary judgement
- Related Decisions
- None
Summary
The claimant sought revocation of the three patents on the basis that they lacked inventive step and that they were insufficient for the skilled worker to put the inventions in to practice. The defendant requested summary judgment in their favour under Rule 83(3), arguing that the claim had no real prospect of success. The Hearing Officer considered that the arguments regarding inventive step were misdirected as they did not relate to the contributions made by the inventions as claimed in the patents. He also found that the arguments regarding insufficiency, even if proved, would not show that the inventions claimed did not work at all but were directed to whether the inventions would work as well as they should or could be reproduced on commercial scale. The Hearing Officer found that the case had no real prospect of success and awarded summary judgment in favour of the defendant. He awarded costs on the usual scale to the defendant.
Full decision O/282/10 136Kb