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ARTICLE · 09 MARCH 2018

Infringement By Overseas Servers Revisited

J A Kemp
J A Kemp
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J A Kemp

J A Kemp

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Since the UK Court of Appeal judgment in Menashe v William Hill, it has not been safe to assume that infringement of a patent claim including a processor or a processing step can be avoided...

United KingdomIntellectual Property
John Leeming
John Leeming
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Since the UK Court of Appeal judgment in Menashe v William Hill, it has not been safe to assume that infringement of a patent claim including a processor or a processing step can be avoided by performing the processing on a server outside the UK. A third judgement on this topic has recently been issued – making the score two for infringement and one for non-infringement – so it is instructive to consider what factors affect a finding of infringement. We review the relevant points of the three cases and draw some practical conclusions.

Menashe v William Hill

In Menashe v William Hill the claimed invention was an on-line gaming system that included a host computer and a terminal computer. The defendants operated a host computer in Antigua and supplied software to customers in the UK which allowed the customers to place bets via the host computer in Antigua. The claimant asserted that the supply of the software to UK customers was an indirect (or contributory)

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