The Comvik Maze

The Comvik Maze

By Bastian BestSociety & CultureTechnology
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The Comvik Maze episodes

  • The Case of the Missing Connections
    In the dim corridors of the European Patent Office, where innovation often collides with bureaucracy, Mitsubishi Electric’s quest for patent protection takes a Kafkaesque turn. Their invention—a neural network designed for efficiency through sparse connectivity—promised to alleviate the computational burdens of modern AI. Yet, the EPO’s Examining Division deemed it a mere mathematical abstraction, unworthy of patentability. What followed was a legal battle of logic and precedent, as Mitsubishi sought to prove that their algorithm was not just theory, but technical ingenuity. Would the Board of Appeal recognize the hidden technical merits, or would the invention be swallowed by the void of non-technical subject matter?
    Based on T 0702/20 (Sparsely connected neural network/MITSUBISHI) 07-11-2022
    8 min

About The Comvik Maze

From the publisher's feed

An experimental podcast that retells EPO software patent appeal cases in the unsettling, surreal style of a Kafka novel. Each episode unpacks a key decision, dissecting the legal reasoning, its impact on patent strategy, and what it means for practitioners and innovators.