DABUS gains territory in South Africa and Australia: Revisiting the AI-inventorship question

• Citation: (2021) IPLJ 87
• Date: 10 December 2021
• Published date: 10 December 2021
• Author: Oriakhogba, D.O.
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.47348/SAIPL/v9/a5
• Pages: 87-108

87

https://doi.org/10.47348/SAIPLJ/v9/a5

DABUS GAINS TERRITORY

IN SOUTH AFRICA AND

AUSTRALIA: REVISITI NG THE

AI-INVENTORSHIP QUESTION

DESMOND OSAR ETIN ORIAK HOGBA*

Senior Lecture r, Department of Mercantile and Pr ivate Law, University of Venda

ABST RAC T

This paper d raws from and bu ilds upon DO Or iakhogba ‘What I f DABUS Came to

Africa? Visitin g AI Inventorship and Ow nership of Patent from th e Nigerian Perspective’

(2021) 42(2) Busines s Law Review 89. It reviews th e recent gran ting of a patent by the

Companies and I ntellectual Pr operty Comm ission (CIPC) to Dr Stephen T haler in respect

of the DABUS-generated i nvention in South A frica and th e judgment of the Aust ralian

Federal Cour t (FCA) upholding AI-invento rship. The review, which is b ased on desk

research, is co nducted against a backdr op of statutory provision s and case law from both

countries , the provisions of the Patent Cooperat ion Treaty (PCT) and relevant liter ature

dealing with t he inventorship question . The paper determi nes whether, without reform of

       

does not under mine the foundat ional concept of human i nventorship, and the c entral focus

on human creat ion and agency for int ellectual pr operty pr otection in Sout h Africa and

Australia. I n connection with this, t he paper asks and examine s the question of whether

the CIPC patent g rant and the FCA judgment ca n stand judicial scrut iny under the extant

patent regime s in South Africa and Aus tralia.

    

  

The South Africa n Companies and Intellectual Proper ty Commission (CIPC)

accepted Dr Thale r’s Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT)1 application on

24 June 2021 for a patent in respect of inventions2 generated by DABUS,3 an

     4 In July 2021, the CIPC released a notice

of issuance for the patent.5 As expect ed, the patent gra nted to Thaler by the

        

* LLB, LLM (Unibe n) BL (NLS) PhD (UCT).

1 Patent Coope ration Treaty (PCT ), 19 June 1970, 28 U.S.T. 7645, 1160 U.N.T.S. 231, reprinted in 9

I.L.M. 978 (1970). South Africa an d Australia are membe r states of the PCT and beca me bound

by it in 1999 and 1980, respec tively. See https://ww w.wipo.int/pct/en/pc t_contra cting_ states.

html (accessed o n 11 August 2021)

2 Thaler SL Food cont ainer and dev ices and method s for attract ing enha nced attent ion.

ZA2 021/ 0 3242 . 2 021.

3 DABUS is an acronym for De vice for the Autonomous Boot strapping of Unifie d Sentience.

4 IPWatchdog ‘DABUS Gets Its First Pa tent in South Af rica Under Form alities Exam ination’

(29 July 2021), available at https://ww w.ipwatchdog.com/2021/07/29/dabus-get s-first-p atent-

south-afr ica-formalities- examination/id =136116/ (accessed on 11 August 2021).

5 CIPC The South Afr ican Patent Journal (28 July 2021) Part II , 54(7) The South African Pa tent

Journal 255.

(2021) IPLJ 87

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https://doi.org/10.47348/SAIPLJ/v9/a5

AI invention (DABUS patent).6 Hailing the grant as an ‘histor ic decision’ and

‘progressive and pro-science’,7 and calling for a broad reading of the provisions

of the SA Patents Act (SAPA)8 on inventorship, Thaldar and Naidoo arg ued

that it:

was the right legal d ecision, [which] aligned wit h [SA] public policy on AI more broad ly.

The [SA] government has publ ished various polic y documents relat ing to science, tech nology,

and innovation i n light of the Fourth Indust rial Revolution (4IR). [...]. The fact that [SA] has

            

– patent law in thi s case – can be dyn amic and develop in s tep with cutt ing-edge scien ce.

AI innovation h as the potential to imp rove the human condition.9

However, if subjected to critical assessment again st the backdrop of the

clear provisions of the SAPA and SAPR,10 would the patent granted by the

CIPC stand a validity t est under judicial scr utiny? Moreover, without an

amendment of the extant patent legi slation, has the grant not water ed-down

the foundational concept of huma n-inventorship that under pins the SAPA

and SAPR and tur ned the principle of subjective rights and pe rsonhood,11

especially in IP-related mat ters in SA,12 on its head?



of 30 July 2021, per Beach J,13 

the Australian Patent Act (APA) and Regulations (APR).14 The judgment

was based on an application for judicial review of an earl ier ruling by the

           

Commissioner of Patent (DCP),15 which held that the language of the APA

and the APR made thereto a re not consistent ‘with an application for a patent

identifying an [AI] ma chine as an inventor’.16 Barker DCP’s ruling was based

on a similar application for patent as th at granted by the CIPC.17 A lr ea dy,

Beach J’s judgment is attracting m ixed reactions18 for its broad extension

of the principles of legal personality a nd inventorship to DABUS, the AI

‘inventor’, contrary to the High Cour t of Australia’s (HCA) traditional st ance

6 IPwatchdog (n4).

7 DW Thaldar & M Naidoo ‘AI invento rship: The right decision?’ (4 Augu st 2021) OSF Preprints 7,

available at htt ps://osf.io/7uctg/ (accessed on 11 August 2021).

8 Patent Act No 57 of 1978 (SAPA).

9 Thaldar & Naido o (n7) 7.

10 Patent Regulatio ns 1978 (SAPR).

11 Generally, see L M du Plessis An Introducti on to Law 3 ed (2009).

12 CB Ncube & DO Oriak hogba ‘Monkey selfie and au thorship in copyr ight law: The Nigerian a nd

South Afric an perspectives’ (2018) 21 PER/PELJ, available at htt ps://www.ajol info/index.php/

pelj/article/vie w/183358/172722 (accessed on 11 Augus t 2021).

13 Thaler v Com missioner of Patents [2021] FCA 879.

14 Patent Act No. 83 of 1990 (APA); Patent Regulations 1991 (APR).

15 Stephen L T haler [20 21] AP O.

16 Stephen L T haler (n15) para 34.

17 Patent Applicatio n No. 2019363177, 17 September 2019; Food Container and Dev ices and

Methods for Att racting Enha nced Attention.

18 J Taylor ‘I’m sorr y Dave I’m afraid I invente d that: Austra lian court finds AI s ystems can be

recognise d under patent law’ (30 July 2021) The Guardian, availa ble at https://www.thegu ardian.

com/technology/ 2021/ jul/ 30/ im-sorry-dave-im-afraid-i-invented-that-australian-court-finds-ai-

systems-can-be-recognised-under-patent-law (accessed on 11 August 2021).

88 South African Intellectual Property Law Journal (2021) 9

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