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In US patent law, non-obviousness is one of the requirements that an invention must meet to qualify for patentability, codified as a part of Patent Act of 1952 as 35 U.S.C. §103. An invention is not obvious if a " person having ordinary skill in the art " (PHOSITA) would not know how to solve the problem at which the invention is directed by ...
For example, "substantial novelty" has been proposed as an alternative approach. [14] Also, many countries have, in addition to patents, utility models, which have a lower (or none) requirement for non-obviousness in return for a shorter monopoly term duration. The availability of utility model protection minimizes for inventors, developers and ...
For a patent to be valid in Canada, the invention claimed therein needs to be new and inventive.In patent law, these requirements are known as novelty and non-obviousness.A patent cannot in theory be granted for an invention without meeting these basic requirements or at least, if a patent which does not meet these requirements is granted, it cannot later be maintained.
Novelty is requirement for a patent claim to be patentable. [1] In contrast, if an invention was known to the public before filing a patent application, or before its date of priority, if the priority of an earlier patent application is claimed, the invention is not considered new and therefore not patentable.
Prior art (also known as state of the art [1] or background art [2]) is a concept in patent law used to determine the patentability of an invention, in particular whether an invention meets the novelty and the inventive step or non-obviousness criteria for patentability.
Thus the patentability criteria largely involves novelty, inventive step and industrial application or usability of the invention. In addition, section 3 of the Patent Act, 1970, also provides a list of non-patentable inventions for e.g. inventions that are frivolous or contrary to well established to natural laws. [8]
The non-obviousness criterion can be easily met if a claim is based on a discovery of new natural phenomenon/principle/law. In the patentable subject matter analysis, however, this "discovery" is assumed to be prior art, and an "additional inventive concept" must be present in the claim.
The SCOTUS under William O. Douglas developed case law on non-obviousness (see flash of genius) and subject matter eligibility to limit proliferation of weak patents. 1952. Fifth Patent Act codified US patent law into Title 35 of the U.S. Code including previous case law on non-obviousness. 1980.