Software-Related Patents:
France
copyright 1997 Donald M. Cameron , Aird & Berlis
Contents
Statutes
Article L.611-10 of the French Patent Act conforms to the Article 52 of the EPC . Process claims for software which are not limited to a computer program specifically would likely be patentable.
Regulations
The regulations from the French Patent Office direct that algorithms could be considered to be mathematical models and flow charts could be considered as presentation of information.
Case Law
In the Mobil Oil case (Cass. Com. May 28, 1975) it was held that a program for computer as such was not patentable.
In the Schlumberger case, a decision of the Court of Appeal of Paris on June 15, 1981, it was held that a process for detecting oil by mathematical calculation made by a computer was patentable. The court held that a process patent should not be denied merely because one or more steps are carried out by computer.
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