Patent decision

BL number

O/550/16

Concerning rights in

GB 1305712.0

Hearing Officer

Miss J Pullen

Decision date

22 November 2016

Person(s) or Company(s) involved

Logined B.V.

Provisions discussed

Section 1(2)(a) and 1(2)(c)

Keywords

Estoppel, Excluded fields (refused)

Related Decisions

None

Summary

The application relates to geostatics, which is a discipline concerned with spatially distributed random variables, usually applied to 2d or 3d modelling problems in the earth sciences. Multipoint geostatics simulation generates numerical values for pixels such that they match a preset spatial correlation, or known structural properties, while optionally matching predetermined measured data. If there are numerous unknown pixels in the search mask area, the calculation of each unknown pixel becomes very complicated and hence computationally expensive.

The hearing officer found that the contribution to lie in using the improved mathematical method steps contained in the claims to achieve the increased computational efficiency when performing geostatistics modelling, rather than in the field of image generation and/or manipulation. The contribution was not considered to be technical in nature.

The application was refused under section 1(2) as a mathematical method and a computer program as such.

The applicant also raised the issues of estoppel, legitimate and substantive procedural expectation and whether there had been an irregularity under rule 107.

Full decision O/550/16 94Kb