Public comments on USPTO's post-Bilski, patentable
subject matter guidelines are due September 28, 2009.
In response to the revised standards for patent eligibility set
forth by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in
In re Bilski (see
IP Update, Vol. 11, No. 11; certiorari
granted), the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued
revised guidelines for examination of patent claims under Section
101 at the end of August 2009. The guidelines are available here.
Before the release of these guidelines, the USPTO Board of
Patent Appeals and Interferences (BPAI) appeared to take a narrow
view of patent eligibility under the Bilski
"machine-or-transformation" test. In contrast, the new
guidelines appear to adopt a more moderate position, at least for
computer-related or computer-implemented subject matter.
