Oh, patents! Perugia superstar, FR utility patents

Copyright © Françoise Herrmann

Below, you will find a hyperlinked list of the patents that Perugia filed with patenting authorities at the French Ministries of Commerce and Industry, or Commerce and Energy, depending on the Administration in place, and now all stored at the INPI – Institut de la Propriété Industrielle in France -- just in case you had doubts about this shoe genius and how prolific an inventor in the domain of shoewear and shoe manufacture!

Just as a reminder, each of these 50 French inventions was filed and examined, and then judged patentable according to the three criteria of patentability: novelty, inventive step (no pun here) and usefulness (meaning with industrial application in Europe). Thus, each invention was not only a new improvement, product or process, it was also one that was non-obvious to those skilled in the art. Indeed, what is perhaps most extraordinary is that all of these previously non-obvious inventions were designed and commissioned for the comfort, beauty and glamour of women's feet, exclusively!

Perugia's Fish Shoe
in honor of Georges Bracques
 exhibited in NYC in 1955

For a single individual, it is otherwise really quite uncommon to have invented so many new shoe manufacturing processes, materials and designs, in such a relatively short period of time, with a horrific interruption during World War II, which engulfed most of Europe from 1944 to 1948. 

As for Patents on the soles of your shoes… What a catch!

[Please, click on the patent number for access to original French patent document at the INPI, then be patient for the document to load.]

France Utility patents

FR1169315 -  Perfectionnements apportés aux chaussures féminines dites pieds nus - Dec. 12, 1958 – Perugia.

FR1163665 – Nouvelle matière première notamment pour la confection de bouts durs, contreforts et renforts de chaussures – Sept. 30, 1958 – Perugia.

FR1142810 – Perfectionnement apporté aux chaussures, notamment celles comportant un quartier court ou un quartier ouvert – Sept. 23, 1957 – Perugia.

FR1142809 – Chaussure à talon interchangeable - Sept. 23, 1957 – Perugia.

FR1118264 – Perfectionnement apporté aux chaussures, notamment aux chaussures sans quartier – June 4, 1956 – Perugia.

FR1112645 - Procédé de montage de chaussures, et chaussures obtenues par ce procédé – March 16, 1956 - Perugia.

FR1064458 – Chaussure de dame à quartier amovible – May 13, 1954 – Perugia.

FR1036098 – Nouveau procédé de montage de la tige dans les chaussures comportant une « première »   de montage – Sept 3, 1953 – Perugia.

FR1030496 – Talon  « habillé »  et procédé de fabrication de son habillage – June 15, 1953 – Perugia.

FR1024750 – Nouveau mode de montage de chaussures – April 7, 1953 – Perugia.

FR981071 – Nouvelle chaussure feminine découverte – May 22, 1951 – Perugia.

FR974391 - Chaussure à quartier fermé – Feb. 21, 1951 – Perugia.

FR892618 – Montage de chaussure à semelle de bois avec première en matière rigide ou semi rigide perfectionnée – May 15 1944 – Perugia.

FR892437 – Procédé d’armage des semelles bois, liège et analogues – April 6 1944 – Perugia.

FR884864 – Perfectionnement apporté aux chaussures à semelles de bois articulées – Aug. 30, 1943 – Perugia.

FR882037 – Chaussure à semelle en matière rigide perfectionnée – May 14, 1943 – Perugia.

FR882036 – Nouveau quartier pour chaussures – May 14, 1943 – Pergugia.

FR873454 – Semelle de chaussure en fibres végétales – July 9, 1942 – Perugia.

FR872823 – Nouveau montage de chaussures – June 19, 1942 – Perugia.

FR871763 – Procédé de fabrication de chaussures à semelle de bois et produit industriel en résultant – May 9, 1942 – Perugia.

FR857534 – Procédé de farication de chaussures et produits en résutlant – Sept. 17, 1940 – Perugia.

FR832534 – Peausserie composée, extensible élastiquement suivant une seule direction et applicable à la fabrication de chaussures – Sept, 28, 1938 – Perugia.

FR813134 – Montage de chaussure et produit industriel en résultant – May 26, 1937 – Perugia

FR769952 -  Procédé de fabrication de chaussure – Sept. 5, 1934 – Perugia.

FR769914 – Gaine formant quartier d’empeigne et enveloppe de talon pour chaussure – Sept 4, 1934 – Perugia.

FR739916 – Dispositif de serrage pour souliers – Jan 19, 1933 – Perugia.

FR719851 – Procédé de protection temporaire des peaux, cuirs, étoffes, etc.. pendant la confection d’articles fabriqués avec ces matières - Feb. 12, 1932 – Perugia.

FR719850 – Perfectionnements aux sabots à semelle rigide articulée – Feb. 10, 1932 – Perugia.

FR703295 – Procédé de fabracation de parois imitant un tressé de plusieurs lanières – April 28, 1931 – Perugia.

FR695509 – Perfectionnements aux sandales à semelles rigides – Dec. 17, 1930 – Perugia.

FR680710 – Perfectionnements à la fabrication des chaussures – May 5, 1930 – Perugia.

FR653470 – Perfectionnement apporté dans l’établissement de semelles de socques ou autres – March 21, 1929 – Perugia.

FR652607 – Procédé de fabrication de parois au moyen de lanières de cuir et produits industriels en résultant – March 11, 1929 – Perugia.

FR630415 – Monture de sac – Dec. 2, 1929 – Perugia.

FR630414 -  Monture de sac – Dec. 2, 1929 – Perugia.

FR630413 -  Monture de sac – Dec. 2, 1929 – Perugia.

FR625731 – Chaussure à talon ou semelle à musique – Aug. 8, 1927 – Perugia.

FR608988 – Perfectionnements apportés aux talons de chaussures – Aug. 6, 1926 – Perugia.

FR595482 – Talon pour chaussure et son mode de fabrication – Oct. 3, 1925 – Perugia.

FR530356 – Peinture à l’émail sur cuir noir verni pour chaussures – Dec. 21, 1921 - Perugia.

FR1218920 – Perfectionnements apportés aux chaussures – May 13, 1960 – Perugia. 

FR1236520 - Perfectionnements apportés aux chaussures – July 22, 1960 – Perugia.

FR69780 (E) - Perfectionnements apportés aux chaussures, notamment aux chaussures sans quartier – Dec.30, 1958 – Perugia.

FR63894 (E) – Nouveau procédé de montage de la tige, dans les chaussures comportant une « première » de montage – Oct. 13 1955 – Perugia.

FR36507 (E) – Perfectionnement apporté dans l’établissemenet de semelles de socques ou autres – June 28, 1930 – Perugia.

FR35272 (E) -  Procédé de fabrication de parois au moyen de lanières de cuir et produits industriels en résultant – Dec. 31, 1929 – Perugia.

FR1522438 – Perfectionnement aux souliers – April 26, 1968 – Perugia.

FR1522437 – Perfectionnement aux formes de souliers – April 26, 1968 – Perugia.

Oh, patents! Patentability of the QR code

Copyright © Françoise Herrmann

Woohoo….Now that you have noticed the position code, at three apices, forming a right angle of the square QR codes that rock our daily lives…Consider the contending patent EP 0672994, and the manner in which the QR code invention is presented. The title of  contending patent EP 0672994 -  Method and apparatus for reading an optically two-dimensional code  discloses a method and apparatus for reading QR codes rather than the QR Code itself. And you may legitimately wonder: Why? Since, after all, the big invention concerns storage of 350 times more data than the prior art barcodes, and most importantly how to swiftly retrieve this information stored in a two dimensional manner. The optical reader is after all secondary to what it is that the code is doing, its readability, and to what it gives access. 

The answer to this question poses the issue of the patentability of software or machine readable code and the 50 year battle to obtain protection. Indeed, software lies at the intersection of two types of intellectual property laws, and at this intersection, protection in effect remains controversial. This is because software code is primarily written code, and in this mode of presentation falls within the provisions of Copyright Law. Consequently, following review by the National Commission on New Technologial Uses of Copyrighted Works (CONTU) created “to evaluate the adequacy of copyright law regarding computer based information systems and photocopying technology” (Stobbs, p. 27), Copyright Law was amended in 1976 to include software as “written instructions”.   

However, Copyright protection appears inadequate for protecting what software code does and its connection to artifacts. Copyright law protects the expression of ideas and not the ideas themselves. For example, a computer manual may be copyrighted but not the computer which falls under the jurisdiction of Patent Law. In contrast machine readable code, as instructions, is inseparable from what it does, and there are many different ways to achieve the same result (to instruct), all of which cannot be copyrighted to protect the invention, or what the code does.

If Copyright Law thus fails to adequately protect what software code does, then Patent law should be able to cover all of the software inventions in our lives, whether it is the code for word processing, xl sheets, air traffic systems, hotel reservation systems or expert querying systems that are able to match bacterial infections with the most effective antibiotic candidate, etc.. However, the provisions of Patent law exclude all forms of writing as a patentable.. be they poems, novels or computer program instructions, which under all other circumstances, enter the jurisdiction of Copyright Law.  Thus, software code, is also technically unpatentable according to the provisions of Patent Law, unless… there is a compromise in the interpretation of patent law.

Recognizing the need for software protection, especially once software became unbundled from large mainframe computers in the late 1960s, the compromise that was historically achieved in a court ruling began with the landmark 1981 Diamond v. Dierhr decision stating that the presence of software in an otherwise patentable invention could not make the invention unpatentable. In a roundabout way, this opened up the floodgates for code protection as long as it was part of some tangible device or support media.  And this is, in a nutshell, the reason why the QR Code was patented as method and apparatus for reading two-dimensional code vs. straight QR Code, which, in fact, is un-patentable and only copyrightable.

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Woohoo.. download QRReader for Iphones and/or QR Reader for Android.
Woohoo… Scan the code to the right. It will take you to www.qrstuff.com , where you can generate your own QR code!
Woohoo… Scan my blue QR code above and you will access my web pages!
Woohoo… have fun…!

Reference

Stobbs, G. A (2012). Software patents – Third Edition. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.  

Prior art: Including indigenous /traditional knowledge (IK/TK)

Copyright © Françoise Herrmann

Neem tree

Two out three determining criteria of patentability -- novelty and inventive step -- rely on an examination of what is termed prior art. Indeed, an inventor will have to search all prior art sources to make sure that the invention s/he is claiming does not exist elsewhere, in some published form. Similarly, examiners in charge of determining the patentability of an invention recited in a patent application will conduct prior art searches to make sure that the invention is indeed patentable. And finally, any litigation arising in the process of determining patentability, and in regards an infringement procedure, will also rely on prior art because the existence of this art will either deny novelty or demonstrate that the claims are infringing on some already existing form of the invention.  

So far, so good…This is all about prior art in a print tradition; knowledge in a language known to the Western world or for which there are printed records.

But what happens when knowledge has no written record? What happens when knowledge is shared by a community as an ancestral practice, handed down from one generation to the next in initiation and an oral tradition? How do you include this knowledge, and these practices, in the dataset that will serve to determine the patentability of an invention? How do you include this sort of prior art, termed traditional or indigenous knowledge [TK or IK], in the determination of novelty or inventive step of an invention?

Until fairly recently, the answers to these questions were simply ignored, or to put it less sweetly, this sort of prior art was largely illicitly appropriated and plundered, as Vandana Shiva has  pointed out, and extensively described in her work on biopiracy (Shiva, 1997, 2002).

In fact, it took a reversal of the decisions to grant two patents to set precedence: one reversal in 1997 of a decision the USPTO had previously taken to grant US 5401504; and another reversal in 2000 of a decision the EPO had previously taken to award EP436257.Thus, in recognizing the existence of traditional or indigenous knowledge as evidence of prior art, both revocations consequently laid the groundwork for a more equitable and fair evaluation of patentability. The first patent, EP436257, had been awarded for the use of Neem Tree oil (Azadirachta indica), as a pesticide, and it was revoked when traditional Indian knowledge was provided as evidence of prior art, existing for thousands of years in India. The second patent, US5401504, had been awarded for the healing properties of turmeric (Curcuma longa) a spice and plant used for healing since the dawn of time in India, and it was revoked when such prior knowledge was brought before the EPO as evidence of prior art. 

Add to the USPTO and EPO decisions to reverse patents they had previously awarded, passage of the TRIPS (Trade-related aspects of Intellectual Property Rights) agreement a few years earlier, in 1994, and you will begin to find answers to the questions posed previously in regard patentability, and the miss-appropriation of indigenous resources, including knowledge, practices, technologies and commodities.

You will find answers appearing as organized dissent in the 600-year, extraordinarily consensual, history of the patenting system; answers arising as the full-scale resistance of third world countries to certain provisions of the TRIPS agreement which incorporates patenting rights in the context of world trade and thus seeks to extend patenting rights on a global level. Answers in the form of new international conventions such as the 1992 UN Convention of biological diversity, set forth to guarantee and protect biological diversity, to promote sustainable practices and fair and equitable sharing of benefits, And, as part of this new, more genuine and more inclusive international dialogue, the clever compilation and recording of indigenous knowledge and practices in the form of databases and registries, under the auspices of such global international institutions as the UNESCO, the World Bank and WIPO (World Intellectual Property Office - the UN patent office).

Interestingly enough, the Indian TKDL – Traditional Knowledge Digital Library, initiated in 2001, within the previously mentioned context of dissent, under the auspices of the Indian government and several large public health institutions of India, has not only sought to record ancient knowledge, including 1200 Ayurvedic medicinal formulations, it has also digitized and translated this traditional knowledge into French, English, Japanese, German and Spanish. And, most importantly, the TKDL has devised a Traditional Knowledge Resource Classification (TKRC) system based on the 25,000 subgroups of the International Patent Classification System (IPC) to index all of the traditional knowledge recorded. Thus, the TDKL makes it easy to search IndianTK/IK, and indeed has signed agreements with the USPTO and other patenting Offices, allowing prior art searches to crawl into the TDKL.  

Conversely, the existence and development of the TKDL has also commissioned task forces for the re-examination of previously granted patents. Using TK as evidence of prior art, the task forces endeavor to further determine the validity of previously awarded patents, considering the sort of precedence afforded when the USPTO and EPO reversed their decisions to award turmeric and Neem tree patents.

Finally, to the extent that the new TK classification system incorporates the existing International Classification (IPC) system, the new TK system has also contributed to the expansion of the IPC system with the incorporation of 207 new and additional sub-categories for medicinal plants.

Thus, in the mighty scheme of the patenting system, the TKDL indeed appears as an exemplary manner of inclusion -- on more counts than one! ”.

So... consider this “making it right” -- much like former President Clinton speaks of “building better”!

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 Below, you will find listed a few links to available databases of Indigenous knowledge (IK), Traditional Knowledge (TK)  and Best practices of Indigenous/Traditional knowledge, under the auspices of The World Bank, UNESCO, WIPO, and in India at the TKDL – Traditional Knowledge Digital Library, under the auspices oftheIndian Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR], the Department of Ayurveda, Yoga, Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy (AYUSH), the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare and the Government of India.

 The World Bank - Database of Indigenous Knowledge  - Sub-Saharan Africa  http://www.worldbank.org/afr/ik/datab.htm

UNESCO – Register of Best practices on Indigenous/Traditional Knowledge  http://www.unesco.org/most/bpikreg.htm

WIPO – World Intellectual Property Organization – Traditional Knowledge  http://www.wipo.int/tk/en/tk/

India – TKDL – Traditional Knowledge Digital Library    http://www.tkdl.res.in/tkdl/langdefault/common/

 References 

Shiva, V. (1997) Biopiracy: The plunder of nature and knowledge.   Cambridge, MA: South End Press.

Shiva, V. (2002)Protect or plunder: Understanding intellectual property rights (global issues).London, UK: Zed Books.

Monfils, L.(2008)  Flower of the curcuma longa. Photograph at Wikimedia Commons:http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Curcuma_longa.jpg

Neem Tree – Courtesy of Google images

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 Turmeric (Curcuma longa)

Key concept : Evergreening

Copyright © Françoise Herrmann

Evergreening is seen as a way of extending the protection period of drug patents. The drug formula is changed or improved, and it is hoped that the patent’s protection period is extended for another 20 years. The question that the examiners ask, and the courts invoke, is then the following: does the new and improved formula demonstrate an inventive step?

Demonstrating an inventive step is the second condition of patentability, after the novelty condition. Indeed, patents must first be novel, and an improvement may count as novelty, but the novelty or improvement must also be “non-obvious” to those skilled in the art. This means that the formula of a patent may be “new and improved”, but in order to qualify as a patent, it must also demonstrate an inventive step.

So yeah, there’s evergreening… and evergreening is never a patent…..:-)

New & Improved but does it demonstrate an inventive step?