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In T 79/91 the board stated that lack of clarity of the claims as a whole could arise from lack of conciseness. The invention in this case had been set out in at least ten independent claims of different scope. The board was of the opinion that this presentation made it difficult, if not impossible, to determine the matter for which protection was sought, and placed an undue burden on others seeking to establish the extent of the monopoly. Citing this case, the board found in T 596/97 that, prima facie, a total of seven independent claims could be undesirable for reasons of conciseness and clarity. However, on the facts of the specific case before it, the board found the independent claims to be acceptable.
In T 246/91 the application comprised 191 claims, reduced in appeal proceedings to 157. The board ruled that the number of claims had to be reasonable, bearing in mind the nature of the invention claimed. Although no hard and fast definition could be accorded to the term reasonable, this did not mean that the requirement was wholly devoid of meaning and legal effect. In deciding the matter, regard had to be had to the interest of the relevant public, since patents ought not to be allowed to erect a legal maze or smoke screen in front of potential users of the inventions to which they laid claim. Patent claims taken singly as well as in totality had to be clear and concise in order to enable such potential users to ascertain, without undue burden, let alone recourse to litigation, whether their planned commercial use was likely to infringe the patent. Having to construe the remaining 157 claims and form a valid and commercially useful opinion on whether or not any one of them could prevent or hinder the commercial activities imposed, necessarily, a severe and totally undue burden on the public. It followed that the application in question contravened the clear provisions not only of R. 29 EPC 1973 (R. 43 EPC) but also of Art. 84 EPC 1973.
However, where a single main claim having to present a multiplicity of alternatives corresponding to the plurality of processes claimed would have lacked clarity, multiple claims could be concise within the meaning of Art. 84 EPC 1973 (T 350/93).
Overlapping method and use claims were allowed by the board in T 433/99, as the emphasis and thus scope of the claims was slightly different. Moreover, such a method allowed for differences in claim interpretation in the different contracting states of the EPC, particularly during infringement and revocation proceedings in national courts, where opportunities for amendment were limited.
A Markush formula is the concisest means of defining a class of chemical compounds in a claim (T 1020/98). The examining division had held that "formulating claims in a style that makes routine tasks in substantive examination unnecessarily difficult" was a contravention of Art. 84 EPC 1973. However, there is no legal basis in the Convention for a request to restrict the content of an independent claim so that substantive examination can be carried out with greater ease and less effort.
Regarding lack of conciseness because of a superfluous claim, see e.g. T 988/02.