Patent decision

BL number
O/360/00
Concerning rights in
GB9926835.1
Hearing Officer
Mrs L Blunt
Decision date
16 August 2000
Person(s) or Company(s) involved
Michael Willis Peet
Provisions discussed
PA 1977 sections 1(1), 1(2)
Keywords
Excluded fields (refused)
Related Decisions
None

Summary

The patent application was entitled Real/fantasy competition and related to a type of competition which was particularly relevant to competitive sports. The patent examiner had told the applicant that he had been unable to find anything of a patentable nature in the application on which he could base a search, in view of section 1(2) of the Act, and after further correspondence the applicant requested a hearing. The hearing officer, having identified the contribution that the invention made to the known art of sporting competitions, held that the contribution was not technical in nature. The fact that a programmed computer could be used to implement the invention did not introduce a technical element into the invention, since the programmed computer was operating in a conventional manner. The application was therefore refused.

Full decision O/360/00 PDF document33Kb