A patentable invention must have technical features which together with the application are new and innovative.

The new field of biotechnology has been particularly charged with patent litigation as well as controversy over just what constitutes a patentable invention.

The median effort to create the patentable invention was 1 person-year, with 10% of the patent owners requiring 2 or more person-years.

The act of developing an alternative apparatus or method (which may in itself also be a patentable invention), that does not infringe upon an issued patent.

Although computers have long been considered patentable inventions, the mathematical algorithm has not.

As early as 1939, the Supreme Court held that "scientific truth, or the mathematical expression of it, is not a patentable invention."

The court found in favour of the government, ruling that the application did not disclose a patentable invention.

Instead, patentable inventions must be solutions that combine an idea with its technical execution, for example car safety systems.

The issue before the Court was whether such a discovery is a patentable invention.

A patentable invention must be "not obvious to one skilled in the art."