Latest Insights

1. Amendments to avoid contradictions between claims and description This forms part of a wider report on the 2022 updates to EPO Guidelines for Examination. There are some small but important changes to the guidelines on required changes to the description of a European patent application (Guidelines Part F, Chapter IV, section 4.3). Many EPO… Read more »

Trademarking in the Metaverse and Non-Fungible Tokens – virtually pointless? Should you be extending your trade mark protection to the Metaverse?  What role do Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) play within the Metaverse and your trade mark protection strategy?   What is the Metaverse? It is probably easiest to understand as a massively scaled up version of… Read more »

Recent progress towards Unitary Patent and Unified Patent Court Europe’s long-awaited Unified Patent Court and the European Union’s Unitary Patent could (and even should) both be available before the end of 2022. Even if there is a short delay, the UPC is almost certain to be open for business in late 2022 or early 2023…. Read more »

IPO’s consultation on Standard Essential Patents (SEPs) and Innovation The UK government is seeking views from industry and others both domestically and globally as to whether the ecosystem surrounding Standard Essential Patents (SEPs) is functioning efficiently and effectively and striking the right balance for all entities involved. The purpose of the consultation is to help… Read more »

A practical update on patenting computer-implemented inventions – with a preview for 2022 The American Intellectual Property Lawyers Association (AIPLA) invited AA Thornton Partner Mike Jennings and Conley Rose President Michael Piper to speak about patenting computer implemented inventions including artificial intelligence and computer simulation inventions at the AIPLA Annual Meeting in Washington DC on… Read more »

Protecting Digital Medtech Innovation This article was first published in BioScience Today.   For many years the medical technology (medtech) sector has been at the forefront of innovation and the Covid-19 pandemic has not slowed it down, with new technology quickly being developed to test for, prevent and treat the virus. Protecting medtech innovations can… Read more »

EPO rejects appeals against refusal of applications naming an AI system as inventor Further to our earlier publication (https://www.aathornton.com/court-of-appeal-dabus-case/) reporting a UK Court of Appeal decision concerning the naming of an AI system DABUS as an inventor for a patent application, the European Patent Office (EPO) has now issued a decision on the corresponding European… Read more »

Pharmaceutical team member Suzanne Power provides a round-up of UK Trade Mark case law in pharma goods and medical devices This article was published in the December issue of PTMG’s Law, Lore & Practice With the UK IPO having seen record numbers of trade mark applications over the past year, a steady stream of objections,… Read more »

Patent Box: Inventing a way to reduce Corporation Tax Most companies would like to invent a way to reduce their corporation tax liability.  The UK Patent Box scheme provides a way to do just that by offering a reduced corporation tax rate of 10% for profits arising from patented inventions.  This tax saving through innovation… Read more »

Court of Appeal confirms requirement for human inventor in ‘DABUS’ case   On 21 September 2021 the Court of Appeal handed down its decision in THALER v COMPTROLLER GENERAL concerning allowability of UK patents having an AI based machine known as DABUS (short for Device for the Autonomous Bootstrapping of Unified Sentience) listed as an inventor. A… Read more »