The Patentability of Professional Skills and Business Methods in Canada

Journal of Intellectual Property Law & Practice (Oxford), Vol. 5, No. 2, 2010

7 Pages Posted: 20 Apr 2010

Date Written: April 19, 2010

Abstract

Any invention under the Patent Act must therefore notionally fit or improve upon one of these five categories. However, judicial activism has led to the denial of many new, inventive, and useful patents on the ground that certain categories of ‘invention’ do not fall within any of them. Professional skills, business methods, and methods of medical treatment have all been excluded on this basis.

However, broad categorical exclusions of patentable subject matter by the courts defeat the underlying purposes of the patent system by foreclosing entire avenues of progress ab initio. If subject matter can be made to fit within definition of invention, the courts should aim to ‘breathe life’ into the bare, and sometimes dated, words of the patent statute. Patent statutes are drafted with a view to the unforeseen; any judicial interpretation of the word ‘invention’ must give deference to this vision.

Keywords: patents, patentability, subject matter, amazon.com, amazon, professional skill, business methods, invention

Suggested Citation

Crowne, Emir, The Patentability of Professional Skills and Business Methods in Canada (April 19, 2010). Journal of Intellectual Property Law & Practice (Oxford), Vol. 5, No. 2, 2010, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1592573

Emir Crowne (Contact Author)

New City Chambers

13 Fitzgerald Lane
Port-Of-Spain
Trinidad and Tobago

HOME PAGE: http://newcitychambers.com/

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
118
Abstract Views
662
Rank
425,167
PlumX Metrics