G2/21 - Plausibility and Now?

• Plausibility: What it was and what it was not
• G2/21: guidance on when a technical effect demonstrated by post-filed data can be taken into account
• Structured toolbox for mastering technical effect
• Drafting tips for patent applications with reduced exposure to G2/21 challenges
• Workshop: insight into what G2/21 could mean for practice

Who should attend

A doctrine of "plausibility" has been adopted by some patent offices, including the European Patent Office (EPO), under which post-filed data that supports the existence of a "technical effect" is only evaluated where the application as originally filed renders the effect plausible.

This online course will turn on the issue of when a technical effect demonstrated by post filed data can be taken into account. An issue underlying the doctrine of "plausibility" is the extent to which the technical effect should be supported by the application as filed for any post filed evidence to be considered. There is a relationship between the role of a "technical effect" in protecting inventions and the level of disclosure of the technical effect that must be given in the application as filed.

The course will explore how this relationship has shaped outcomes in various cases and led to the referral to the EPO's Enlarged Board of Appeal before we turn to the Enlarged Board's guidance in G2/21. It seems to be common ground that G2/21 has not (yet) made the EPO practitioner's life easier. The abstractness of the criteria set forth by the Enlarged Board of Appeal requires due consideration.

In the workshop we will explore G2/21 by re-engineering a number of past cases and their outcomes against the guidance given in G2/21.

• Both sides covered: the innovator-friendly approach and what opponents will try to make out of G2/21
• Structured toolbox for mastering technical effects
• Patent application drafting tips: reducing G2/21 challenges exposure