This was the comment issued by the Intellectual Property Office (IPO) in reaction to a recent statement by an open source group that the government agency is about to issue software patents in the country — something which current IP laws forbid.
An IPO press statement has branded as "false" news reports which alleged that the IP watchdog is moving towards institutionalizing software patent laws in the Philippines.
The IPO, speaking through Deputy Director General Irineo M. Galicia, said the agency has "no plans, not even in the nearest future," to issue patents on software programs.
Galicia issued the statement in behalf of IPO Director General Adrian Cristobal Jr. who was on an official trip in Geneva, Switzerland for the WIPO General Assembly.
The comment came after the Opensource Technology Association of the Philippines, also called OpenMinds, tipped off the public during the LinuxWorld conference held last September about an "impending" plan of the IPO to issue a patent as long as the software is embedded in a hardware product.
In a petition letter it distributed during the forum, OpenMinds, led by its president Manny Amador, stated that the IPO is headed in the wrong direction in recommending the establishment of software patent laws in the Philippines.
"Programmers...are only impeded by software patents which threaten them or their employers with litigation. The ultimate impact of software patents is to slow innovation, rather than to promote it and therefore contradicts the stated purpose of the patent laws," the petition said.
In the Philippines, computer programs are protected under copyright laws but they cannot be patented.
Patent is more broader than copyright since it involves a right over a process unlike copyright which only gives the right to a creator of a property, say software product, to sell or license that particular product.
Section 22 of Republic Act 8293, or the Intellectual Property Code of the Philippines, cites computer programs as a non-patentable invention.
Galicia also said that this provision on software is also in line with the country’s existing treaty obligations, particularly the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, known as the TRIPS Agreement, under the Berne Convention of 1971, which treat computer programs within the domain of literary works or creations.
"Be that as it may, the Philippines is keeping a close watch on the developments in this area," Galicia stated.
Incidentally, the IPO recently sponsored a two-day symposium entitled, "Protection of Computer Software and Business Methods in the Philippines," wherein the IPO clarified and underscored its position on software patenting in accordance with the country’s IP Code.
During the event, Bureau of Patents Director Epifanio Evasco carried out talks on the protection of computer software from the perspective of the Philippine patent system, while Augusto Bundang of Sapalo & Velez Law Offices tackled the topic on the perspective of the local copyright law.
