Supreme Court unanimously rules that software patents can't cover abstract ideas

25 Jun 2014 • engadget.com

From now on companies will have to be a little more specific when filing software patents. The United States Supreme Court today ruled in favor of CLS Bank, a company that was accused by Alice Corporation of violating several of its patents relating to computer-based trading systems. Twice lower courts have found that Alice's patents were invalid and now the highest court in the land has settled the dispute once and for all. In one of the two group opinions supporting the unanimous decision, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that "merely requiring generic computer implementation fails to transform that abstract idea into a patent-eligible invention."

Finally, some progress on the patent front.