An AI Can File A Patent Application

The emergence of artificial intelligence-related technology as a means of innovation has led to uncertainties for companies across industries, primarily because patent law has historically held that intellectual property rights be assigned only to humans. 

Now, in a landmark decision, an Australian court has set a groundbreaking precedent, deciding AI systems can be legally recognised as an inventor in patent applications, challenging a fundamental assumption in the law: that only human beings can be inventors. 

The AI machine called DABUS is an "artificial neural system" and its designs have set off a string of debates and court battles across the globe.

Australia's Federal Court has now made the new law that "the inventor can be non-human" in the same month that South Africa became the first country to defy the status quo and award a patent recognising DABUS as an inventor.

AI inventor and creator of DABUS, Stephen Thaler has been running a sustained global campaign to have DABUS recognised as an inventor for more than two years. He argues that DABUS can autonomously perform the "inventive step" required to be eligible for a patent. Thaler says he is elated by the South African and Australian decisions, but for him it’s never been a legal battle. "The recently established fact that DABUS has created patent-worthy inventions is further evidence that the system 'walks and talks' just like a conscious human brain." Thaler said.

Ryan Abbott, a British attorney leading the DABUS matter and the author of The Reasonable Robot: Artificial Intelligence and the Law, says he supports AI inventorship after realising the law's "double standards" in assessing behaviour by an AI compared to behaviour by a human being. "For example, if a pharmaceutical company uses an AI system to come up with a new drug … they can't get a patent, but if a person does exactly the same thing they can," Dr Abbott says.

Short for "device for the autonomous bootstrapping of unified sentience", DABUS is essentially a computer system that's been programmed to invent on its own. DABUS operates as a "swarm" of disconnected neutral nets that continuously generate "thought processes" and "memories" which over time independently generate new and inventive outputs.

In 2019, two patent applications naming DABUS as the inventor were filed in more than a dozen countries and the European Union. The applications list DABUS as the inventor, but Dr Thaler is still the owner of the patent, meaning they're not trying to advocate for property rights for AI. The DABUS applications caused months of deliberation in intellectual property offices and courtrooms around the world.

The case went to the highest court in the UK, where the appeal was dismissed, with the same result in US and EU courts.

Justice Jonathan Beach of the Australian Federal Court has become the first to hand down a judgement in favour of Dr Thaler, ruling "an inventor … can be an artificial intelligence system or device... This is a landmark decision and an important development for making sure Australia maximises the social benefits of AI and promotes innovation."

Federal Court.Au:      ABC:       JonesDay:       DWT:       Chemistry World:   American Bar Assoc:     Engadget: 

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