9.2.17 Logistics

In T 696/06 the application concerned a data processing system intended to facilitate confronting an offer and a demand in the field of transporting travellers or goods. Essentially the system executed business processes and transactions, like mediating offers and demands, which were typical for a transportation broker or freight exchange service and which the board held not to be technical.

In T 912/05 the application related to a mail delivery system that could deliver by physical and/or electronic means. The board held that methods of mail delivery can qualify as inventions if they involve "technical means", with mail delivery by e-mail qualifying as such.

In T 1806/20 the application concerned a parcel delivery system that sought to prevent damage to water-sensitive parcels by avoiding delivery to rainy destinations. The board found that the requirement to ensure that parcels do not get damaged by water formed part of the non-technical logistics scheme.

In T 1594/20, the board held that an arithmetic optimisation for efficiently dividing up a picking order did not necessarily bring about a simulation of the underlying physical operation (the transport of goods in this case) but also included purely deterministic mathematical optimisations.

Asserted energy savings were purely speculative and could not readily lead to a technical effect being acknowledged. For this, any such effect would have to be achieved using technical means. In the claimed subject-matter, however, energy savings (if any) would be the result of a purely organisational or algorithmic optimisation based essentially on a mental act. No technical effect can be derived from this to acknowledge inventive step.

T 1960/20 related to an invention tracking how quickly a warehouse employee enters and exits the proximity of a warehouse robot waiting for them. The board considered that understanding and analysing spatial and temporal conditions under which the steps of the established business workflows are carried out is per se a non-technical exercise.