In both the US and the UK, patent offices have refused to allow applications filed by Dr Stephen Thaler to proceed, on the basis that the named inventor – an ‘AI’ machine dubbed DABUS – is not a human being. In the first article in this series I looked at the US approach to the role of the inventor in patent law and practice, and at the recent decision of Judge Leonie M Brinkema in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia (‘EDVA’) upholding the USPTO’s decision. In the second, I discussed the split decision of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales, which upheld (by a 2-1 majority) the decisions of the UK Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) and the High Court.
In Australia, the Patent Office also refused to allow a corresponding application by Dr Thaler to proceed. In contrast to the US and the UK, however, that decision was overturned by Justice Beach in the Federal Court. The Commissioner of Patents has now appealed that ruling to a Full Bench of the Court (case no. VID496/2021). In this article, I will be looking at the potential implications of the recent US and UK decision for the conduct and outcome of the appeal in Australia.
It should be said at the outset that the US law is very different to that of Australia, and it is therefore unlikely that anything in Judge Brinkema’s legal reasoning will be influential upon the Full Court. It has also become apparent through the UK High Court and Court of Appeal decisions that while the UK law shares some similarities with the corresponding provisions of the Australian Patents Act 1990, there are also some significant differences. Even so, there are aspects of the reasoning of Lord Justice Arnold in the Court of Appeal that the Australian appeals court may consider persuasive, and that could therefore influence the outcome here.
There are two key questions likely to be addressed in the appeal, both of which also arose in the UK, although only the first received substantive attention in the US. These are:
- Can DABUS, as an ‘AI’ machine and not a human being, validly be named as an inventor on a patent application?
- Can Dr Thaler, not being (at his own insistence) the inventor, establish a proper legal basis for entitlement to the grant of patents on inventions said to be generated by DABUS?
I shall look at each of these questions in turn.