Patent Inventiveness In China: Why “Common Knowledge” Must Be Proven, Not Assumed

A Case Study of the "Electronic Blackboard" Case, (2025) SPC Zhi Xing Zhong No. 286

I. Introduction

In assessing inventive step for invention patents, determining whether a technical solution would have been “readily conceivable” to a person skilled in the art has long been one of the most disputed and uncertain aspects of the analysis. In practice, Examiners far too often have a flawed tendency to deem a technical means a "conventional choice" in the art simply because the prior art discloses a similar function or means. This leads to Examiners directly concluding that the claim lacks inventive step as a whole. This approach suffers from two major defects:

• It lacks a holistic evaluation of the distinguishing technical features.