Zusammenfassung von EPC2000 Art 056 für die Entscheidung T1618/19 vom 28.02.2023

In T 1618/19 the claimed subject-matter related to a concrete apparatus, namely a blending control system in a refinery, and a corresponding method. The claimed blending control apparatus/method comprised a computer modelling apparatus/method. The modelling was performed for an active refinery process in an actual refinery. The feeding of the model with the input parameters (flow and product parameters of the "rundown components supplied from the splitter" and refinery product commitments) as well as the direct conversion of the simulation results ("blend recipes", "blend events", "blend timing", "split ratio") into output signals for the control of the blender and splitter in the refinery process could be considered technical inputs / outputs according to G 1/19, OJ 2021, A77, point 85 of the Reasons, and were therefore technical or have a technical effect. The feeding of process parameters of a running process, i.e. the refinery process, into the simulation and the conversion of calculated process parameters into control signals were thus indications of a "direct link with physical reality" (G 1/19) and of a "further technical effect" that goes beyond the mere technical implementation of the algorithm in a computer (G 1/19). Consequently, it was irrelevant whether the final step of implementing the optimisation results by means of control signals, i.e. to the splitter and blender, was explicitly claimed (as would be recommended in principle according to G 1/19), if the skilled person understands from the wording of the claim, that the simulation results were directly converted into control signals of the splitter and blender, as was the case here. Consequently, the board held that the entire subject-matter of claims 1 and 6 was technical.