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UK appeals court rules AI cannot be listed as a patent inventor

Add the United Kingdom to the list of countries that says an artificial intelligence can’t be legally credited as an inventor. Per the BBC, the UK Court of Appeal recently ruled against Dr. Stephen Thaler in a case involving the country’s Intellectual Property Office. In 2018, Thaler filed two patent applications in which he didn’t list himself as the creator of the inventions mentioned in the documents. Instead, he put down his AI DABUS and said the patent should go to him “by ownership of the creativity machine.”

The Intellectual Property Office told Thaler he had to list a real person on the application. When he didn’t do that, the agency decided he had withdrawn from the process. Thaler took the case to the UK’s High Court. The body ruled against him, leading to the eventual appeal. “Only a person can have rights. A machine cannot,” Lady Justice Elisabeth Laing of the Appeal Court wrote in her judgment. “A patent is a statutory right and it can only be granted to a person.”

Thaler has filed similar legal challenges in other countries, and the results so far have been mixed. In August, a judge in Australia ruled inventions created by an AI can qualify for a patent. However, only earlier this month, US District Judge Leonie M Brinkema upheld a decision by the US Patent and Trademark Office that said “only natural persons may be named as an inventor in a patent application.” Judge Brinkema said there may eventually be a time when AI becomes sophisticated enough to satisfy the accepted definitions of inventorship, but noted, “that time has not yet arrived, and, if it does, it will be up to Congress to decide how, if at all, it wants to expand the scope of patent law.”

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China accounts for 40% of 6G patent applications with most of them being filed by Huawei, survey reveals

China is already working on the next generation of communication networks known as 6G that is expected to roll out commercially by the end of this decade.

Research conducted by Nikkei Asia and Tokyo-based research company Cyber Creative Institute shows that China topped the list with 40.3% of 6G patent filings, closely followed by the U.S. with 35.2%. Japan ranked third with 9.9%, followed by Europe with 8.9% and South Korea with 4.2%.

Around 20,000 patent applications for nine core 6G technologies were surveyed for this. This includes communications, quantum technology, base stations, and artificial intelligence. Countries with a greater number of patent filings are more likely to be ahead of the curve in terms of advanced technology and tend to have a greater influence over industry standards.

China’s 6G development had been expected to be slow due to sanctions imposed by the US government in 2019 on Huawei Technologies but, the Asian country has maintained its competitiveness by mobilizing state-run companies and universities.

6G patent applications by China are mostly related to mobile infrastructure technology. This makes sense considering aerial coverage such as satellites, combined with ground base stations for broader radio bands, will be needed in the 6G era.

A considerable amount of the patents (12%) have been filed by none other than Huawei which controlled 30% of the world’s base stations in 2020. Other prominent patent holders include state-run companies such as State Grid Corporation of China and China Aerospace Science and Technology.

6G is expected to be over 10 times faster than 5G and will be enabling fully autonomous driving, HD virtual reality, and worldwide internet, even in the most remote regions.

On the other end, the US has high technical prowess in software and terminals, thanks to it possessing many smartphone and internet companies. Qualcomm and Intel have acquired many patents for chips used in smartphones and other IT equipment.

Finally, Japan that ranks third in the number of patents, has Nippon Telegraph & Telephone. Nippon has filed many patents involving optical communications and mobile infrastructure networks in urban areas. This includes technologies for mitigating data congestion and delays.

The International Telecommunication Union and industry groups will likely begin discussing 6G standardization around 2024. China is expected to have a strong voice in the policy-making process thanks to the large number of patents owned by it.

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Judge Says an AI Can’t Be an Inventor on a Patent Because It’s Not a Person

It all boils down to how the law defines an 'individual.'

Don’t worry, humans—artificial intelligence systems aren’t taking over the world yet. They can’t even appear as inventors on U.S. patents.

U.S. federal judge Leonie Brikema ruled this week that an AI can’t be listed as an inventor on a U.S. patent under current law. The case was brought forward by Stephen Thaler, who is part of the Artificial Inventor Project, an international initiative that argues that an AI should be allowed to be listed as an inventor in a patent (the owner of the AI would legally own the patent).

Thaler sued the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office after it denied his patent applications because he had listed the AI named DABUS as the inventor of a new type of flashing light and a beverage container. In various responses spanning several months, the Patent Office explained to Thaler that a machine does not qualify as an inventor because it is not a person. In fact, the machine is a tool used by people to create inventions, the agency maintained.

Brikema determined that the Patent Office correctly enforced the nation’s patent laws and pointed out that it basically all boils down to the everyday use of language. In the latest revision of the nation’s patent law in 2011, Congress explicitly defined an inventor as an “individual.” The Patent Act also references an inventor using words such as “himself” and herself.”

“By using personal pronouns such as ‘himself or herself’ and the verb ‘believes’ in adjacent terms modifying ‘individual,’ Congress was clearly referencing a natural person,” Brikema said in her ruling, which you can read in full at the Verge. “Because ‘there is a presumption that a given term is used to mean the same thing throughout a statute,’ the term ‘individual’ is presumed to have a persistent meaning throughout the Patent Act.”

The judge also rejected Thaler’s claim that the Patent Office had to provide evidence that Congress did not want to exclude AI systems from being inventors.

Furthermore, Brikema stated that the nature of an inventor has already been examined in federal courts, which have ruled that neither companies nor states can claim to be inventors on a patent.

For his part, Thaler also tried to argue that the court should respect Congress’ intent to create a system that would “encourage innovation.”

“Allowing patents for AI-Generated Inventions will result in more innovation. It will incentivize the development of AI capable of producing patentable output by making that output more valuable…” Thaler said. “By contrast, denying patent protection for AI-Generated Inventions threatens to undermine the patent system by failing to encourage the production of socially valuable inventions.”

Nonetheless, Thaler didn’t have luck with that argument, either. Brikema said that these were policy considerations and thus must be dealt with by Congress, not the courts.

And it’s not like the Patent Office is refusing to consider what role, if any, AI should have in patents. It has requested comments artificial intelligence in patent policy and reported that the majority of responses reflected the belief that current AI “could neither invent nor author without human intervention.”

Ryan Abbott, a law professor who oversees the Artificial Inventor Project, told Bloomberg the group would appeal. Although Brikema squashed all of the project’s arguments, she didn’t say an AI could never be listed as an inventor.

“As technology evolves, there may come a time when artificial intelligence reaches a level of sophistication such that might satisfy accepted meanings of inventorship. But that time has not yet arrived, and, if it does, it will be up to Congress to decide how, if it at all, it wants to expand the scope of patent law,” Brikema said.
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Malaysian students invent device that makes ocean water drinkable for ‘sea nomads’

An invention that could provide clean drinking water to "sea nomads" — communities living near the ocean — has earned three Malaysian students a spot to compete at the James Dyson Awards, an annual competition that recognizes young design engineers with inventive solutions to real-world problems.

Malaysia’s best: Asia Pacific University of Technology & Innovation (APU) sophomores Bennie Beh Hue May, Loo Xin Yang and Yap Chun Yoon won the top prize of 10,000 Malaysian Ringgit ($2,400) in Malaysia’s search for its official entry to the international design competition, MalayMail reported.

  • The product design students bested 120 other participants with their sustainable seawater desalination pod called the “WaterPod.”
  • Eighty-four international finalists are now vying for a chance to win the top prize of $40,000, with an additional $6,600 for the winners’ university.
  • According to the James Dyson Awards website, Dyson engineers will narrow the competitors down and announce a shortlist of the top 20 contestants on Oct. 13.

How WaterPod works: The invention utilizes a self-cleaning solar desalination system, which facilitates seawater absorption through a wick. It has a special semi-spherical cover exposed to sunlight that collects vapor, which eventually condenses into a potable liquid.

  • The desalinated water then flows into a storage chamber that can hold between 8 to 10.5 gallons (30.28 to 39.75 liters), which users can then collect using a pump.
  • In their online pitch, the students describe the WaterPod as an alternative to bigger desalination plants, since it “is designed to be simple and only uses basic science” to do the same process.
  • The students came up with the device’s floatation concept after studying the needs of local communities living near the sea, like the Bajau tribe in Sabah.
  • Eekang Ooi, a lecturer affiliated with a nonprofit that helps sea nomads, inspired the students to pursue the project.

Why this matters: Sea nomads, who live on the coasts and islands in Southeast Asia, reportedly collect rainwater or barter tap water wherever and whenever they can due to lack of access to clean water.