Software patents

Patents for software developments are now well established and have been granted in selected jurisdictions for a number of years. The status of software patents in the US, Australia, Japan and Europe is described. Patents for software developments have now expanded to an extent that they are regularly obtained for all manner of software inventions, including telecommunications protocols, encryption algorithms and even features of video games. Although computer programs have been in existence since the 1950s, software patents have only been available in the US since 1981 and have only come to the fore in a number of jurisdictions in the last four years (1993-7). This has come as somewhat of a surprise to sections of the IT industry which have never had to deal with the issue of software patents. The 30 year lag also means that Patent Offices have not amassed a collection of patent literature which would normally trace the development of a technology. This gap in the material has resulted in the granting of patent claims which are not truly novel and inventive and which understandably has drawn criticism from the industry. The US Patent Office in particular is working to address the quality of its examination procedures and the new guidelines give explicit instructions in this regard.