As we eagerly await the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) ruling in theBilski case -- which could greatly cut back on the ability of the US Patent Office togrant software and business model patents, it looks Europe may be moving in the oppositedirection. We had earlier reported on a ruling in the UK which said that the UK PatentOffice had gone too far in tossing out a Symbian patent application because it wassoftware. Now, a UK appeals court has agreed with the earlier ruling, effectivelysaying that Symbian can, in fact, patent software in the UK, despite earlier policies thatdid not allow software patents.

The reasoning behind the ruling is a little odd, as it seems mostly based on aligning UKpatent rules with the rest of Europe's. However, that doesn't mean that the rulingactually makes sense or does anything towards promoting innovation (and, plenty of recentstudies show quite clearly that software patents appear to do exactly the opposite). Thisis definitely bad news for the software industry in the UK, which will now find moretollbooths to deal with, and more patent thickets to pick through. Money is going to bewasted going after legal fights, rather than on research, development and actually servingcustomers.

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