Patent decision

BL number

O/268/07

Concerning rights in

GB 0514055.3

Hearing Officer

Mr R C Kennell

Decision date

13 September 2007

Person(s) or Company(s) involved

Immersion Corporation

Provisions discussed

PA 1977 section 1(2)

Keywords

Excluded fields (refused)

Related Decisions

None

Summary

The claims before the hearing officer related to a handheld communications device with provision for the user to store a correlation of information about the sources of received signals with distinct haptic effects to be output. Following Aerotel/Macrossan [2006] EWCA Civ 1371, the hearing officer accepted that (as in Raytheon [2007] EWHC 1230) the contribution of the invention was a combination of aspects - (i) the use of a haptic effect in a communications device to indicate a feature of the communicated data and (ii) the customisation by the user of the haptic effect. He held that (i) related solely to the presentation of information and (ii) related solely to a computer program, and did not accept the applicant’s argument from the successful Aerotel appeal that (ii) provided a new physical hardware or combination of hardware. Even if (i) was not to be regarded as part of the contribution, the contribution would still relate solely to a computer program. The contribution therefore failed the third step of the Aerotel/Macrossan test and it was not necessary to consider whether it was technical in nature. The application was refused.