Insights

Chicago – December 12, 2024: Crowell partner Marc V. Richards and counsel Adam D. Sussman recently authored the lead chapter in the 2025 edition of the Illinois Institute of Continuing Legal Education’s Intellectual Property Law Handbook. The chapter, titled “Patenting Inventions,” covers the basics of what a patent is and what it can protect, and provides a detailed roadmap for evaluating inventions and the process to obtain a U.S. patent.

Washington – August 15, 2024: The 2025 edition of The Best Lawyers in America® has recognized 42 Crowell & Moring lawyers as "Best Lawyers" and 29 lawyers as “Ones to Watch.”

Washington – August 17, 2023: The 2024 edition of The Best Lawyers in America® has recognized 47 firm lawyers as "Best Lawyers" and 41 lawyers as “Ones to Watch.”

Last year, in the case of Thaler v. Vidal, the Federal Circuit affirmed that only natural persons (i.e., human beings) can be named inventors on U.S. patents, thereby excluding artificial intelligence from being listed as an inventor per se.  43 F.4th 1207 (Fed. Cir. 2022).  Most Courts around the world ruled similarly.  But this does not mean that artificial intelligence (“AI”) inventions, including inventions developed with AI as a tool and inventions directed to AI subject matters, are not patentable.  To the contrary, according to the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office’s (“USPTO’s”) October 2020 Public Views on Artificial Intelligence and Intellectual Property Policy Report (“2020 Report”), academics and practitioners generally agree that artificial intelligence can represent a subset of computer-implemented technology that can be a subject matter of an invention or used to assist with other inventions.  2020 Report, at iii.  Current stakeholders generally agree that the U.S. laws are calibrated to address artificial intelligence inventions.  2020 Report, at iii.