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Australia

Revision as of 06:02, 15 August 2009 by Ciaran (talk | contribs) (case law)
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In Australia, there are two types of patent. There's patents, and "innovation patents". The latter are minimally examined (which lead to someone getting a patent on the wheel[1]), but these are not the normal, main category of patents.

Legislation

(See Australian Patents Act 1990)

[1]

Patent office practice

The Australian patent office is: IPAustralia

According to IPAustralia, the criteria for eligibility include: "Your invention must ... be a 'manner of manufacture'. It includes any device, substance, method or process, but it excludes artistic creations, mathematical methods, plans, schemes or other purely mental processes;"

See also: Representative of IPAustralia describing the situation with software patents

Case law

See Grant v Commissioner of Patents [2006] FCAFC 120m July 17th 2006 where the Federal Court of Appeal refused a patent for a method of protecting assets from bankruptcy involving the setting up of a trust, a gift to the trust, and a loan back with the trustee taking a charge on the loan. As mentioned in the UK 2002 ruling on Aerotel v. Telco.

External links

Possibly related links for review

References