Wednesday, March 06, 2019 T 489/14 - New referral on computer-implemented simulations

In the present case, the Board was faced with discussing inventive step of a computer-implemented simulation of pedestrian crowd movement in an environment. The Board tended to consider the invention to lack inventive step over a known general-purpose computer. However, the appellant argued that modelling pedestrian crowd movement in an environment constituted an adequately defined technical purpose for a computer-implemented method. The Board discussed case law relating to  the requirement of a direct link with physical reality, to simulations and to designs, and then decided to refer three questions to the Enlarged Board:

1. In the assessment of inventive step, can the computer-implemented simulation of a technical system or process solve a technical problem by producing a technical effect which goes beyond the simulation's implementation on a computer, if the computer-implemented simulation is claimed as such?

2. If the answer to the first question is yes, what are the relevant criteria for assessing whether a computer-implemented simulation claimed as such solves a technical problem? In particular, is it a sufficient condition that the simulation is based, at least in part, on technical principles underlying the simulated system or process?

3. What are the answers to the first and second questions if the computer-implemented simulation is claimed as part of a design process, in particular for verifying a design?