Category: G06F

Translating natural languages/SYSTRAN – T 1177/97 – 9 July 2002

This decision concerns the technical nature of information. This can have a technical character if:

– it is used in or intended for use in a technical system,

– if it reflects the properties of the technical system.

Object of the Invention:

  • automatic search in dictionaries with a character-by-character process that cuts off the characters from the end of the word until a valid combination of stem and ending is found to achieve the longest match
  • Claim 1 differs from the closest prior art (general purpose computer) in that it comprises a low frequency dictionary look-up process on the basis of the socalled “longest match principle“, meaning a look-up process which produces the dictionary entry with the longest stem matching the source text word

Board I (inventive step)

  • a piece of information in a technical system, or its usability for this purpose, may confer a technical character on the information itself in that it reflects the properties of the technical system, for instance by being specifically formatted and/or processed
  • such information when used in or processed by the technical system may be part of a technical solution to a technical problem and form the basis for a technical contribution of the invention to the prior art

Board II (inventive step)

  • the use of a low frequency dictionary and an algorithm of sequentially dropping letters as part of the matching process may be regarded as the result of a specific adaptation of the translation process for computer implementation –> in principle as technical components of the claimed invention
  • the application of the “longest match principle” is in substance based on linguistic considerations
  • applying the principles laid down by the Board in its COMVIK-decision, the decision for one or the other matching principle (“longest match principle”, “shortest-matching method”) does not seem to solve any technical problem and hence does not fall within the responsibility of a technically skilled person
  • it is rather a non-technical constraint determined by the linguistic expert and given to the skilled person as part of the framework of his task, namely implementing the known low frequency dictionary look-up process by applying the “longest match principle”

Semi-automatic answering/3M INNOVATIVE PROPERTIES – T 0755/18 – 11 December 2020

This decision is about the output of a machine learning algorithm. The output of the algorithm is more accurate here compared to the prior art. However, this is not a reason that the output automatically serves a technical effect. The output therefore does not automatically lead to non-technical features making a technical contribution via the output.

Object of the Invention:

  • the present application is concerned with the generation of billing codes to be used in medical billing, wherein billings are provided to an insurer for reimbursement
  • computer-based support systems have been developed to guide human coders through the process of generating billing codes
  • claim 1 specifies a computer-implemented method for improving the accuracy of automatically generated billing codes

Board I (inventive step):

  • a billing code is non-technical administrative data
  • generating a billing code is a cognitive task

Appellant (inventive step):

  • use of machine learning techniques to improve the accuracy of the machine output
  • invention is technical because it improved the system so that it would generate more accurate billing codes in the future

Board II (inventive step):

  • if neither the output of a learning-machine computer program nor the machine output’s accuracy contributes to a technical effect, an improvement of the machine achieved automatically through supervised learning for producing a more accurate output is not in itself a technical effect
  • in this case, the learning machine’s output is a billing code, which is non-technical administrative data
  • the accuracy of the billing code refers to “administrative accuracy” regarding, for example, whether the billing code is consistent with information represented by a spoken audio stream or a draft transcript
  • the learning machine to generate more accurate billing codes or, equivalently, improving the accuracy of the billing codes generated by the system, is as such not a technical effect

Conclusion

Furthermore, the below figure shows according to G 1/19, point 85 and 86 how and when “technical effects” or “technical interactions” based on inter alia non-technical features may occur in the context of a computer-implemented process (the arrows in the figure above represent interactions and not abstract data). In this decision T 755/18 it was discussed whether the non-technical features contribute to the technical character of the invention via the output side and also via the technical implementation (although the latter is not discussed here in this commentary).

Equivalent Aortic Pressure/ARC SEIBERSDORF – T 0161/18 – 12 May 2020

This decision concerns an invention involving machine learning. The Board of Appeal ruled on the need to disclose training data in a patent application.

Object of the Invention:

  • use of an artificial neural network to transform the blood pressure curve measured at the periphery into the equivalent aortic pressure
  • Claim 1 differs from the closest prior art (general purpose computer) in that the transformation of the blood pressure curve measured at the periphery into the equivalent aortic pressure is carried out with the aid of an artificial neural network whose weighting values are determined by learning’

Board I (sufficiency of disclosure (Article 83 EPC)):

  • the application does not disclose which input data are suitable for training the artificial neural network according to the invention, or at least one data set suitable for solving the present technical problem
  • the training of the artificial neural network can therefore not be reworked by the person skilled in the art and the person skilled in the art can therefore not carry out the invention
  • no sufficient disclosure, since the training according to the invention cannot be carried out due to a lack of corresponding disclosure

Appellant (inventive step):

  • the use of an artificial neural network has the technical effect that the cardiac output can be determined reliably and precisely, while keeping the computing effort within reasonable limits, which enables integration into a mobile and correspondingly handy device

Board II (inventive step):

  • neither the claim nor the description contain details regarding the training of the neural network
  • the claimed neural network is therefore not adapted for the specific claimed application
  • the claimed effect is not achieved in the claimed method over the entire claimed range
  • the effect cannot therefore be considered as an improvement over the prior art when assessing the inventive step
  • the object is to provide an alternative to the method disclosed in D1
  • the use of a neural networks not only corresponds to a general trend in technology, it was also already known for the transformation of the blood pressure curve measured at the periphery into the equivalent aortic pressure
  • the subject-matter of claim 1 was therefore suggested to the skilled person by combining the teaching of D1 with his general technical knowledge or with the teaching of D8 –> no inventive step

Conclusion

  • in this decision, the distinguishing feature is based on machine learning (ML)
  • ML is data-driven and, therefore, the success of an ML invention will largely depend on the data on which it is trained
  • if there is too little suitable training data, it may not work
  • the application does not disclose any input data or data set
  • for AI patent applications, at least some effort should be made to explain:
    • what training data is used, and
    • why enough of it is available to train the ML system appropriately

Stock index/NASDAQ – T 1161/04 – 6 December 2006

In this case, the responsible board decides in particular whether input data is functional data / a physical entity or simply cognitive data.

Object of the Invention:

  • Claim 1 relates to an apparatus for rebalancing a stock index
  • stock indexes are used to track the performance of a group of stocks
  • capitalization-weighted indexes are regarded as having the disadvantage that a few large stocks may dominate the overall performance of the index
  • the invention is aimed at overcoming this drawback by scaling down large individual stocks and distributing the corresponding excess capitalization over the smaller stocks
  • the output data of the apparatus correspond to the redistributed capitalization weights of the stock index.

Board I (inventive step):

  • the hardware defined in claim 1 is well known as such
  • the invention concerns the way data relating to stocks in a stock index are processed
  • the computer implementation of this process must be assumed to be straightforward

Appellant I (inventive step):

  • decisions T 115/85 and T 362/90 established the principle that automatic visual display of conditions prevailing or desirable in an apparatus or system was basically a technical problem

Board II (inventive step):

  • the invention in the case T 115/85 was a method for displaying one of a set of predetermined messages
  • each such message indicated a specific event which might occur in the input/output device of a text processing system
  • this system comprised a processor, a keyboard, a display and a memory and would also require means for detecting events
  • deciding board: “giving visual indications automatically about conditions prevailing in an apparatus or system is basically a technical problem”
  • the Board cannot agree with the appellants that the present invention relates to an “apparatus or system” in the way these terms are used in decision T 115/85
  • the data entering the system of claim 1 are “information relating to stocks”
  • this is information of a descriptive kind having exclusively “cognitive content” in the sense of decision T 1194/97
  • applying the test proposed in this decision for cognitive information as opposed to “functional data“, it can be seen that if stock information were lost the claimed apparatus would still function, ie still perform the algorithm and produce output data (although these data would be meaningless)
  • presentations of information having merely “cognitive content” are as such excluded from patentability under Article 52(2) EPC and cannot contribute to an inventive step
  • it appears necessary to point out that the nature of such information is irrelevant
  • a description of a gear box may intuitively appear more “technical” than a play by Shakespeare, but in fact both are examples of data having only cognitive content
  • the Board does not accept the appellants’ argument that the present invention provides visual indications automatically about conditions prevailing in a system in the sense of decision T 115/85 for the triple reason:
    • that the conditions are outside the claimed system,
    • that they are not detected by the claimed system but input to it in the form of descriptive data, and
    • that the system in which the conditions prevail is of a commercial rather than technical nature

Appellant II (inventive step):

  • the “information relating to stocks” in claim 1 represents physical entities and therefore has technical character.

Board III (inventive step):

  • in T 208/84 a distinction is made between abstract concepts on the one hand and technical processes involving and modifying a “physical entity”, such as an electrical signal, on the other hand
  • the present invention is not completely abstract since it involves electrical signals
  • but the mere fact that an invention involves signals representing data does not necessarily imply that it solves a technical problem going beyond that of physically representing these data
  • for example, information having only cognitive content is also conventionally represented by (electrical) signals
  • decision T 208/84 therefore requires that the data should represent not just numbers but a “physical entity“
  • the physical entity in that case was an image, and the invention aimed at restoring it if distorted
  • in the case T 1194/97 the physical entity was a synchronization signal
  • the data were thus in both cases “functional” because the degree of restoration of an image or the synchronisation state of a receiver are objectively measurable entities
  • in both cases a technical effect was achieved by the functional nature of the data irrespective of their cognitive contents
  • in the present case however the data represent nothing but numbers, arguably describing “physical entities“, which necessarily require interpretation by a human being without any further interaction with, or modification of, the technical system
  • the data input to the claimed apparatus have no technical function
  • the processing performed on them comprises classification, scaling and redistribution
  • these steps concern exclusively the cognitive content of the data (their numerical value)
  • this is pure information processing which is as such excluded as a mental act by virtue of Article 52(2) EPC
  • the technical task is reduced to the implementation of the process on a conventional computer, something which was obvious for the skilled person –> no inventive step