Patent Law Practice Center

Patentability of Business Method Subject Matter Divides Federal Circuit

A new level of significance is reached when the Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals decides to address an issue even though it is not in fact at issue in the case before them. On March 2, 2012, the Federal Circuit issued its decision in MySpace, Inc. v. GraphOn Corp. (No. 2011-1149), in which they affirmed the lower court’s decision, finding the case was properly decided under §§ 102 and 103 of the Patent Act and not under § 101.

The significance is that even though the Federal Circuit was deciding on the issue of patent invalidity under §102’s anticipation standard and under § 103’s obviousness standard, the issue of whether or not the underlying subject matter was patentable was still brought up and discussed by the Federal Circuit judges.  (more…)