Patent decision

BL number

O/570/16

Concerning rights in

GB 1202856.9

Hearing Officer

Mrs C L Davies

Decision date

5 December 2016

Person(s) or Company(s) involved

Jon Otegui Van Leeuw

Provisions discussed

Sections 1(1)(a), 1(1)(b), 14(3), 14(5) & 76

Keywords

Added subject matter, Clarity, Inventive step, Novelty

Related Decisions

None

Summary

The application relates to a composite laminate or sandwich material that operates as both a capacitor and an electrical energy storage device (a capacitor) that has a particular use in aerospace vehicles.

The Hearing Officer accepted the late filed amendments but found the current claim to be unclear as it set out a number of preferable options within the claim and contained references to materials designated by Trade Marks. Added subject matter was also present.

The Hearing Officer construed the claim to arrive at a nominal claim taking into account the disclosures of the specification and removing the preferable options. They found the claim to lack novelty in the light of the state of the art and to also lack an inventive step in the eyes of the skilled man which in this case was a team comprising an aerospace and a capacitor engineer.

The Hearing Officer having considered the specification, referred the application back to the Examiner for further processing and set a deadline for setting the case in order for grant as the extended compliance date (17th December 2016) or otherwise it would be refused.

Full decision O/570/16 112Kb