Fundamentals of Patent Drafting

This subject has the following teaching availabilities in 2013:

Successful completion of Patent Law or an equivalent subject.

Applicants without legal qualifications should note that subjects are offered in the discipline of law at an advanced graduate level. While every effort will be made to meet the needs of students trained in other fields, concessions will not be made in the general level of instruction or assessment. Most subjects assume the knowledge usually acquired in a degree in law (LLB, JD or equivalent). Applicants should note that admission to some subjects in the Melbourne Law Masters will be dependent upon the individual applicant’s educational background and professional experience.

The Melbourne Law Masters welcomes applications from students with disabilities. The inherent academic requirements for study in the Melbourne Law Masters are:

• The ability to attend a minimum of 75% of classes and actively engage in the analysis and critique of complex materials and debate;
• The ability to read, analyse and comprehend complex written legal materials and complex interdisciplinary materials;
• The ability to clearly and independently communicate in writing a knowledge and application of legal principles and interdisciplinary materials and to critically evaluate these;
• The ability to clearly and independently communicate orally a knowledge and application of legal principles and interdisciplinary materials and critically evaluate these;
• The ability to work independently and as a part of a group;
• The ability to present orally and in writing legal analysis to a professional standard.

Students who feel their disability will inhibit them from meeting these inherent academic requirements are encouraged to contact the Disability Liaison Unit: www.services.unimelb.edu.au/disability/

This subject teaches students the fundamental principles and basic skills of drafting patent specifications. It does so through a combination of instruction sessions, workshop sessions and review sessions, for a range of topics. The students’ mastery of each topic is evaluated through a number of practical assessment tasks, undertaken individually, both in and outside the classroom. Passing the subject will satisfy the knowledge requirements specified by the Professional Standards Board for Patent and Trade Marks Attorneys for ‘Topic Group G: Drafting patent specifications‘. The lecturers for this subject are senior practising patent attorneys with substantial experience teaching drafting skills.

Principal topics will include:

• History and nature of specifications and claims
• Interviewing the inventor
• Identifying the invention
• Approaches to claim drafting
• Drafting basic claims
• Drafting process claims
• Drafting with reference to prior art
• Preparing a description.

A student who has successfully completed this subject should demonstrate the ability to obtain relevant information about an invention and from that, given the prior art, draft a specification to accompany a provisional application, a standard complete application, an international application and an innovation patent application.

In-class drafting exercises (25%)

4-hour supervised assessment (75%) (22 March, am)

Core subject materials will be provided free of charge to all students. Some subjects require further texts to be purchased. Visit the Melbourne Law Masters website for more information about this subject.

This subject is not available as a breadth subject.