Systemic Innovation

10When Innovation Innovates: How Artificial Intelligence Challenges the Patent System

10.1. Introduction

On December 20, 2019, the European Patent Office (EPO) refused two patent applications on the argument that their inventor, named DABUS, was not a human being but a machine¹. DABUS is referred to by its patent applicant, the company Imagination Engines Inc., as a “true artificial inventor”² and a patent was also filed in 2015 at the USPTO who ultimately decided not to grant the patent with a similar argument to the one used by the EPO³. The case of DABUS is illustrative of how Artificial Intelligence (AI) challenges the current patent system. AI holds promise as the next breakthrough technology⁴, as the basis of the so-called 4th industrial revolution, with AI expected to revolutionize processes across a wide range of fields. AI today is deployed in numerous contexts. From Apple’s Siri engaging in interactive dialogue with iPhone users to Amazon’s Alexa placing orders or autonomous cars, companies have embraced the use of AI to implement innovative new business models and to address the needs of consumers. If these examples are somewhat anecdotal, it should be recognized that AI is disrupting (and likely to disrupt) many sectors, both from an economic and a legal point of view (Bessen 2018). As underlined by Cockburn et al. (2017, p. 1), “AI may have a large impact on the economy by serving as a new general-purpose method of invention that can reshape the nature of the innovation ...