This post was first published on 16th April, 2012.
Germany is considered to be the birthplace of the automobile since late 1870's when Karl Benz and Nikolaus Otto independently developed four-stroke internal combustion engines. Germany has the largest share of passenger car production in Europe with over 29% market share, followed by France (18%), Spain (13%) and the United Kingdom (9%). Nearly six million vehicles are produced in Germany each year, and approximately 5.5 million are produced overseas by German brands.…
This post was first published on 5th December, 2014.
The Supreme Court's non-obviousness precedent commenced with Graham v. John Deere Co., and its companion cases, Calmar v. Cook Chemical and United States v. Adams, collectively referred to in patent circles as the Trilogy. This trilogy represents the Supreme Court’s first interpretation of the statutory non-obvious requirement. The principal issue in the trilogy was establishing the level of ingenuity necessary to satisfy the Section 103 non-obvious requirement that had been added to the Patent Act in 1952.…
This post was first published on 6th December, 2014.
TSM test is the Teaching, Suggestion and Motivation test. It simply means, when analysing the obviousness of an invention while comparing it with prior art, these are the three questions that have to be asked:
Is the prior art quoted instrumental in teaching the reader the method of producing the invention?
Does the prior art or any of its contents suggest any method of producing the invention in question?
Does the…
This post was first published on 19th August, 2014.
Every blind person aspires to live a life of independence, a life of freedom and free will, a life free from intrusion, physical and psychological. Some patented inventions have attempted to enhance this very independence, and I will, in my upcoming posts, endeavor to take an unbiased look at some of them.
In 1991, Hsieh Chi-Sheng filed a patent for an electronic talking stick for the blind. Before we get into details, one must understand…
This post was first published on 15th September, 2014.
In my earlier posts (Post1, Post2, Post3, Post4), we discussed the mobility of a visually disabled person that is directly proportional to his awareness of the environment. The more he knows about his surroundings, the easier it gets for him to move around. An issue in achieving this, is the extent of the person's sensory involvement. Most blind people use auditory signals to understand the state of the environment and a navigation device is…
This post was first published on 15th September, 2011.
The patent reform bill is now awaiting approval from the President to become the law of the land. The bill proposes many changes to the existing US Patent Act. Below listed are few important provisions included in the bill:
First-Inventor-To-File: US patent system will now operate on first-inventor-to-file instead of its earlier operation system which was first-to-invent. The first-inventor-to file system provides certainty with respect to the invention date thereby…
This post was first published on 25th August, 2014.
Owing to the ever increasing gas prices, fuel efficiency offered by vehicles has become a strong deciding factor among buyers. Diesel bikes are a great benefit for people obsessed with fuel efficiency but unfortunately diesel bikes are currently not offered by any OEMs for the masses. Royal Enfield’s Taurus was the only diesel motorcycle that was in mass production until some time ago. The vibration produced by diesel engines in a motorcycle, jolts the…
This post was first published on 8th November, 2012.
The Jamun patent saga, earlier reported to be the subject of government revocation has spurred discussions and debates across India on various counts, ranging from mode of revocation to CSIR's blind eye to Indian applications. My attempt in this post is not to add another opinion to the existing ones but to bring forth that a composition of Jamun can be susceptible to patent protection. All of us in India…
This post was first published on 13th October, 2014.
Most of us have learned about the Industrial Revolution that took place in the 18th and 19th centuries, that ultimately resulted in the transition to the new manufacturing processes found even today. While I was reading about the industrial revolution, the question that flashed in my mind was, "Is there any invention that fueled the revolution?".
Well, surprisingly (or not), the answer is a Yes! It's nothing but the Steam Engine. Let…
This post was first published on 5th September, 2014.
Today we will be discussing a case where the patent grant was rejected by the Canadian Patent Office as higher life forms are patent ineligible subject matter under the Act.
Canada (Commissioner of Patents) (Appellants) vs. President & Fellows of Harvard College (Respondents)
Case: The case was about a patent application filed by the Harvard College for a transgenic mouse. In the transgenic mouse, the genome was genetically altered with the insertion of an oncogene.…