Reminder: No exclusions in Canada for “Business Method Patents”

According to “AMAZON.COM, INC. vs THE ATTORNEY GENERAL OF CANADA, and THE COMMISSIONER OF PATENTS“:

“[61] There is no basis for the Commissioner’s assumption that there is a “tradition” of excluding

business methods from patentability in Canada. The only Canadian jurisprudence cited was made as

obiter and in dissent by Arbour J. in Schmeiser.”

“[69] The Commissioner’s decision introduced one more novel and unnecessary requirement for

patentability into the Canadian patent regime: the technical or technological requirement. She also

suggests that “new and useful knowledge” must be “scientific or technological” in order to

constitute a patentable art. Thus, according to this reasoning, one must now assess whether an

invention : and specifically what has been added to human knowledge : is technological in nature.”

“[70] In fairness, in this instance the Commissioner does glean some of her rationale from the

language in the Patent Rules and Canadian jurisprudence, but this does not translate into an

endorsement or imposition of a “technical test”. There is no reference to such a test in the Canadian

jurisprudence (or none was advanced in this Court). It was not within the Commissioner’s

jurisdiction to introduce one. Once again, the Commissioner’s heavy reliance on the “technical

contribution approach” as discussed in the UK did not correspond with the reality of our Patent Act

or recognize the range of opinions as to its application and appropriateness…”

With regards to the specific Amazon patent application, Amazon’s invention qualified under s. 2 because (1) the system claims require a machine as an essential element of the invention and (2) the method claims are “put the into action through the use of cookies, computers, the internet and the customer’s own action” and results in a “physical effect” on those elements.