Australia
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.
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Contents
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
In 1991, the patent commissioner rejected a software patent application on the grounds that it was mathematics. On December 13 1991, Federal Court judge Burchett disagreed and said this patent was indeed valid.[2]
"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 2006 ruling on Aerotel v. Telco.
External links
- Comments on Australian law from New Zealand researcher Joel Wiramu Pauling
- AIPLA: A US organisation of patent lawyers gives comments on patents in Australia
- History of software patenting in Australia - only the abstract is available but it's interesting
- http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/pa1990109/
- http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/papa2000400/
- http://www.ipaustralia.gov.au/
- http://weatherall.blogspot.com/
- http://www.lawfont.com/category/ip/patent/
- http://www.efa.org.au/Publish/ipfta-paper.html#patent
- http://www.efa.org.au/ip/