A decision in French, but well worth reading (and well-readable, too). It concerns the question whether the Boards of Appeal, based on Articles 12(2) and 13(1) of the Rules of Procedure of the Boards of Appeal (RPBA), have the discretion not to admit arguments submitted late in the proceedings - when the facts (in this case, a prior art document) underlying these arguments have been filed in time. It particularly deals with the legal meaning of the terms "facts" and "arguments", and how "facts, evidence or requests" (Art. 12(4) RPBA) and "amendments (to a party's case)" (Art. 13 RPBA) relate to Art. 114(2) EPC, stipulating that the European Patent Office may disregard "facts or evidence" (but not arguments?) not filed in time.
The present appeal lies from the decision of the Opposition Division to revoke European Patent EP1968779 on the grounds of lack of novelty and inventive step in view of, among others, prior art document D51. Briefly, the patent is concerned with a method for bonding a strip of a flexible sheet to a rigid support involving a step of pressing and heating a polymerizable adhesive applied between the support and the strip.
In its grounds of appeal, the proprietor provided several arguments as to why the subject matter of claim 1 distinguishes itself from the disclosure of D51. In a subsequent written submission - filed after transfer of the patent from the original proprietor to the original opponent - the new proprietor argued that, in addition to the distinguishing features discussed previously, D51 differs from claim 1 by disclosing a thermoplastic rather than a polymerizable adhesive (the latter point having merely been noted in the grounds, but not elaborated on).
In its preliminary opinion preceding Oral Proceedings, the Board expressed its intention not to accept the late argument that the nature of the adhesive used was an additional distinguishing feature.
During Oral Proceedings, the proprietor submitted that the assessment of a late argument must be applied according to a more flexible test than facts, evidence or requests, according to the RPBA interpreted in the light of its travaux préparatoires, in which the explicit inclusion of the term "arguments" had been debated. The proprietor further held that the belated argument is a pure argument concerning the underlying technical reality, namely the nature of the adhesive used. In this case, it is not the facts of the case that have changed, but the position of the parties on the interpretation of a document. In regard of Art. 114 EPC, the expression "in due time" must be interpreted in respect of the right of the parties to a fair trial and the duty of the Board to judge whether a fact corresponds to the technical reality.
In its reasons, the Board concluded that indeed a "fact" can be understood as a factual (or allegedly such) element or a circumstance on which a party bases its claims, whereas an "argument" would mean a proposition that a party bases on one or more facts and that supports the plea ["moyen" in the decision] which the party debates.
The Board further noted that in the "Proposal to amend the Rules of Procedure of the Boards of Appeal (RPBA)" of 2002, leading to the current version of the RPBA, "arguments" had initially been included in the definition of "amendments to a party's case". According to the Board, the deletion of the words "arguments" from the final (current) version seems to express the intention of the Praesidium, after consultation with the Patent Law Committee, to exclude arguments from the discretionary power conferred to the Boards of Appeal.
The Board cited T 1794/12 of 16 January 2018, which relied on point 3.1 of the article by B. Günzel, "The treatment of late submissions in proceedings before the boards of appeal of the European Patent Office" ( OJ EPO, Special Edition 2/2007, page 30):
For one thing, submissions can only be rejected on the grounds of being late if the decision-making body would not have been required to examine them and take them into consideration of its own motion. It is incumbent on every decision-maker and thus also on the boards of appeal to weigh up all the relevant legal and technical arguments in making their decision. Such arguments must therefore, at least when they involve the facts of the case and not new grounds for opposition, be taken into account at all stages of the proceedings, including the appeal stage, and cannot be rejected on the grounds of being late.
As regards previous Board decisions, the present Board is not persuaded by the reasoning behind
T 1069/08 and
T 1621/09 - followed by many Boards - which rely exclusively on the application of Article 13(1) RPBA from the formulation of Article 12(2) RPBA to recognize the discretion of Boards in (not) admitting late submissions. According to this Board, the interpretation of those decisions ignores the fact that Article 114(2) EPC does not justify such discretion, as previous case law has repeatedly stated. According to the Board, the EPC, and in particular its Article 114 - at least in its English version - raises a difference in the treatment of facts and arguments. In particular, Article 114(2) EPC provides for a discretionary power with regard to the facts invoked belatedly, and not for late arguments based on facts already in the proceedings. Even when drafting the RPBA, the legislator seems to have intended to maintain this distinction, as is apparent from the preparatory work on Article 13 RPBA. According to this board, the RPBA, also in view of Art. 23 thereof, although it can specify and interpret the provisions of the EPC, it cannot confer on the Boards of appeal powers which the EPC does not give them.
Thus, departing from T 1621/09, the Board found that the Boards of Appeal do not have a discretion as to the (non)admissibility of late arguments based on facts already in the proceedings.
Consequently, the proprietor's assertion concerning the nature of the adhesive used, first presented in its letter of 15 October 2015, constitutes a new argument in support of the plea which it defends, namely: that the subject matter of claim 1 is novel compared to document D51. Taking into account of this argument necessarily leads to the consideration of the applicant's argumentation concerning the inventive step of the subject-matter of claim 1. The Board comes to the conclusion that it has no discretion as to the (non)admission of these arguments. It follows that the additional difference must be taken into consideration.
With this new distinctive feature, a new line of argument has been submitted for consideration of inventive step. In view of the fact that this distinctive new characteristic may have an influence on the choice of the closest prior art, a referral of the case in the first instance is considered justified by the Board.