Tag: Art. 69 EPC

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G 1/24 – claim interpretation

On 18 June 2025, the Enlarged Board of Appeal (EBA) rendered its decision on claim interpretation in EPO proceedings in matter G 1/24 . The EBA held that (headnote of the decision): “The description and any drawings are always referred to when interpreting the claims, and not just in the case of unclarity or ambiguity.” Thus, claim interpretation in proceedings before the EPO is based on the same principles as in infringement proceedings. Prior to G 1/24, some Boards of Appeal took the position that the description and drawings are to be consulted for claim interpretation only in case the claims were unclear or ambiguous.

Many useful and valuable resources on G 1/24 are already available online, such as:

While the headnote of G 1/24 stipulates that the description is to be taken into consideration for claim interpretation in proceedings before the EPO, this does not mean that clarity issues in the claims can be resolved by simply referring to the description. Point 20 of G 1/24 highlights “… the importance of the examining division carrying out a high quality examination of whether a claim fulfils the clarity requirements of Article 84 EPC. The correct response to any unclarity in a claim is amendment.”

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Claim construction at the UPC

In decision UPC_CFI_292/2023, the Local Division (LD) Munich of 20/12/2023, the UPC rejected a request for a preliminary injunction. According to the first headnote of the decision, claim amendments made during prosecution can aid the claim construction . In the decided case, the LD Munich was of the opinion that a claim amendment introduced during prosecution defined an original claim feature in greater specificity and, thus, had to be construed more narrowly than suggested by claimant.

In an article published on LinkedIn, a fellow German patent attorney remarked that he considers the first headnote of this decision to represent a significant change as compared to the national German claim construction practice. I don’t think that the decision of the LD Munich is a significant departure from German national practice. While German courts have traditionally not relied on file history estoppel, several decisions handed down by the German Federal Supreme Court (BGH) in recent years – such as BGH decision of 14/06/2016 – X ZR 29/15 – Pemetrexed and BGH decision of 10/05/2011 – X ZR 16/09 – Okklusionsvorrichtung (“occlusion device”) – held that claim amendments made during prosecution can be a useful tool for claim construction. The decision by the LD Munich appears to be in line with this German national case law (which in itself represents a shift towards the national practice of other EPC contracting states that apply the principles of file history estoppel).