Patent decision

BL number
O/251/06
Concerning rights in
GB0317232.7 GB0220666.2
Hearing Officer
Mr A Bartlett
Decision date
6 September 2006
Person(s) or Company(s) involved
EBS Dealing Resources International Limited
Provisions discussed
PA 1977 sections 1(2)(c)
Keywords
Excluded fields (refused)
Related Decisions
None

Summary

The applications concern systems whereby traders can buy and sell commodities such as shares, currency and the like to other traders via a network of computer terminals. Each terminal has a user interface allowing the trader to take part in a series of ongoing transactions displayed in a deal stack by inputting text. That text is parsed to extract significant information and it is the particular way that this parsing is carried out that is at the heart of the inventions - the parsing being dependent upon the status that a particular deal has reached. In GB0317232.7 once the deal related information is detected by the status dependent parser a message including the deal status and deal related information is generated. An auxiliary request also included the additional limitation that once the parsed message has been generated, no record of the deal related information is retained in the parser. In GB0220666.2 when a change in status of a deal is detected, the deal stack is notified and generates a deal string reflecting the new status. An auxiliary request also included the additional limitation that the trader terminals also facilitate the input of non-conversational deal related information into the deal stack e.g. via menus.

The hearing officer regarded parsing- the analysis of data to extract specific information- as an intellectual process. The parser used was programmed to respond according to a different set of rules rather than operating differently at a functional level. The advance in doing that was regarded as being excluded as a method for performing a mental act and as a computer implemented invention, a program for a computer. The auxiliary requests were also regarded as relating to excluded subject matter as such.

Full decision O/251/06 PDF document62Kb