News in the In Rebilski case

The US Supreme Court has decided to have a look at the most recent decision concerning business method patenting

As we have written about previously, there have been a big debate and court cases at several courts in the US with regard to whether method claims are patentable. The latest decision which we mentioned back in November 2008 came from the United States Court of Appeal for the Federal Circuit and took the so-called Machine-or-Transformation-test as its starting point. According to this test, a method is patentable if it is either attached to a particular machine or apparatus or it transforms a particular article into a different state or thing. In both cases, the machine or transfomation must be a central part of the purpose of the method.

In the meantime, the Supreme Court has decided to have a look at the case. Normally, a decision from the Federal Circuit cannot be appealed because it is already the court of second instance. However, one can file a petition to get the Supreme Court to bring up the case if one believes that it is a matter of principle, and it has also happened in this case. We do not know yet how this case will end, but at any rate it emphasises that the US system changes very quickly. We thus believe that it is important to keep an eye on the development and we will  continue to inform about this here on Patentgruppen's homepage.