IPO updates guidance on AI patent examination

The IPO has published updated guidance on examining artificial intelligence (‘AI’) patent applications.

The guidance and the accompanying scenarios aim to provide clarity on how these types of inventions are assessed.

The latest update reflects the judgment handed down by the Court of Appeal in July 2024 in Emotional Perception AI v Comptroller General of Patents [2024] EWCA Civ 825.

The court ruled that artificial neural networks (ANN) should be treated like any other computer-implemented invention.

The guidance supplements the IPO’s Manual of Patent Practice (MoPP) and reflects recent legal developments.

Key points include:

• How technical contribution is assessed for AI inventions
• Treatment of ‘applied AI’ and ‘core AI’ innovations
• Guidance on training data sets and hardware implementations
• Clarity on sufficiency requirements
• Illustrative scenarios