Raytheon Company v. Controller General of Patents and Designs

This is an appeal against the refusal to grant a patent for an invention concerning scheduling in high-performance computing systems. The Controller of Patents and Designs rejected the application primarily due to a lack of inventive step and non-patentability under Section 3(k) of the Patents Act, claiming it was merely a computer program. The court found that the Controller incorrectly applied outdated guidelines for Computer Related Inventions (CRI) from 2016 instead of the updated 2017 guidelines. The court emphasized that a requirement for novel hardware is not legally supported and that the patent application should be re-examined based on the correct legal principles, focusing on "technical contribution" and "technical effect". Result: Appeal accepted; refusal order set aside and patent application to be re-examined without the requirement of novel hardware.