A lengthy federal appeals court decision issued Thursday may cut back on the issuance of patents for business methods, such as some online shopping systems and other less-tangible concepts, McAfee & Taft attorney Chad McLawhorn told The Journal Record shortly after the ruling.
McLawhorn said the federal circuit’s ruling in Bilski sees as inadequate the 1998 State Street opinion that broadened what could be considered eligible for a patent.
The article reported that Bilski is seen as a substantial curtailment on the patentability of business methods by some legal bloggers.
McLawhorn explained that Bilski dealt with what “process” means in terms of patentability, and how to determine whether a given claim involves a new and useful process.
The U.S. Supreme Court has held that a process is patentable if it is tied to a particular machine or transforms a particular article into a different state of being, the article stated.
“That’s really what the federal circuit goes back to,” said McLawhorn. “In Bilski, the federal circuit says the ‘useful, concrete and tangible result’ test of State Street is inadequate. They clearly say that’s not the correct test.”
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