Transmission power control method
The Federal Supreme Court has decided that in order for the invention to be carried out, the patent specification must indicate by which means and in which way the claimed technical teaching can be realised. This requirement is not met if the patent specification merely states an abstract object in keywords without even giving an indication of how this object can be achieved.
In the previous invalidity proceeding, the Federal Patent Court declared the patent in dispute partially invalid with effect for the Federal Republic of Germany. The patent proprietor appealed against this to the Federal Supreme Court. The appeal was not successful.
In its decision of 29 March 2022, the Federal Supreme Court decided that the patent in dispute did not disclose the invention sufficiently for it to be carried out, as
the patent specification does not disclose the invention so clearly and completely that a person skilled in the art can carry it out. The patent in dispute relates to a method for controlling transmission power in a mobile communication system. According to the patent specification, in a CDMA (Dode Division Multiple Acess) method, several mobile devices share the same frequency band for communication with a base station. However, the patent in dispute does not contain any explanation as to how the claimed downlink traffic channel should be designed in order to transmit a common transmission control signal from the base station to several mobile devices and at the same time realise a point-to-point connection between the base station and a mobile station for the transmission of user data. The patent in dispute discloses only that a common downlink traffic channel is to be established for all mobile stations. How such a common downlink channel can be created is disclosed neither by an example of an embodiment nor by any other specific reference.
In order to satisfy the requirement that the invention can be carried out, the patent specification must indicate the means by which the technical teaching of the patent specification can be realised with recourse to general technical knowledge. It is not sufficient if the patent specification merely states an abstract object without disclosing how this object can be achieved. In the present case, the general technical knowledge does not provide any concrete indications as to how the invention could be carried out, since in this case a downlink channel is typically assigned to only one mobile station, i.e. there is no common downlink channel. Consequently, the person skilled in the art is faced with the problem of working out a concept for implementing the abstract object from scratch, without being able to access relevant technical information in the patent specification or to supplement missing information with his general technical knowledge. For this reason, the Federal Supreme Court decided that the patent in dispute did not satisfy the requirement of sufficient disclosure.
This decision once again demonstrates the importance of a professional and high-quality drafting of a patent application in order to avoid difficulties regarding the disclosure from the outset.