What is an Invention?

1 April 2017

The word “invention” is not defined in our Patents Act 1977 or in the European Patent Convention that the Act implements, but it would appear from s.60 (1) of that Act that an invention can be either a product or a process. 

However, some matter is specifically excluded from the definition of invention for the purpose of the Act by s.1 (2). It includes mathematical methods, methods of doing business, the presentation of information and programs for computers as such.

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Jane Lambert

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