By: WISCONSIN LAW JOURNAL STAFF//June 19, 2014//
U.S. Supreme Court
Civil
Intellectual property — patents
Claims drawn to an abstract idea are not patent eligible.
Because petitioner’s system and media claims add nothing of substance to the underlying abstract idea, they too are patent ineligible under §101. Petitioner conceded below that its media claims rise or fall with its method claims. And the system claims are no different in substance from the method claims. The method claims recite the abstract idea implemented on a generic computer; the system claims recite a handful of generic computer components configured to implement the same idea. This Court has long “warn[ed] . . . against” interpreting §101 “in ways that make patent eligibility ‘depend simply on the draftsman’s art.’ ”Mayo, supra, at ___. Holding that the system claims are patent eligible would have exactly that result.
717 F. 3d 1269, affirmed.
13-298 Alice Corporation Pty. Ltd. V. CLS Bank Int’l.
Thomas, J., Sotomayor, J., concurring.