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When do innovations deserve patents?
08.24.2010
Published by The Portland Press Herald
Authored by Patrick Scanlon, Preti Flaherty
On June 28, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a highly anticipated opinion regarding the type of innovation that is eligible for patent protection.
In the case Bilski v. Kappos, the court held that a method for hedging, or minimizing, risk in commodities trading was not patent-eligible – meaning that the method could not be patented even if it were novel and unobvious.
While this particular method of conducting business was found to be ineligible for patent protection, the court did not rule that all business methods are unpatentable.
U.S. patent law defines patent-eligible subject matter as "any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof."
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