Tuesday, April 26, 2016 T 651/12 - To display information in an ergonomically improved manner is a technical purpose

The Examining Division considered the subject-matter of claim 1 according to the main request to lack an inventive step and refused an application. The Examining Division reasoned that the claim was made up of technical and non-technical features, the technical features merely defining a commonplace map display apparatus and the non-technical features defining a method defining an abstract calculation on the basis of modelled map data. The applicant appealed, arguing that the claim features were technical as was the problem solved.
According to the Board's opinion, a map display apparatus and method explicitly comprising, after the calculation of the three-dimensional bird's eye view map, displaying this map on the screen, would provide a more realistic view of the road to the user and support the user in better orienting himself. This would be considered to be a technical solution to a technical problem: the outcome of the calculation is used for a technical purpose, namely to display information in an ergonomically improved manner (r.3.2). Also the calculation as such has in the board's judgement clear technical aspects (r 3.3).