T 0901/16 - Breadth of claim 1

Key points

• In this examination appeal, the Board observes as follows:
• " The breadth of claim 1 however does not render it unclear in the present case. Article 84 EPC is essentially concerned with setting clearly defined limits on the scope of protection conferred as well as indicating the essential technical features of the solution." 
• "In the present case, the wording of the features of claim 1 is technically and linguistically not ambiguous, and the broad claim is also supported by the numerous embodiments set out in the description.
• " claim 1 defines how the input signals, the prototype signal, the non-linear function and the linear estimate interact to generate the output signal. These are the essential features which result in an improved performance as regards the presence of sonic artefacts and/or processing latency []" 
• " it is not necessary, having regard to the requirement of clarity, that every possible embodiment embraced by the claim provide an improved performance, since this is not claimed." 
• The case is remitted to the Examining Division. 

EPO T 0901/16 -  link

The breadth of claim 1 however does not render it unclear in the present case. Article 84 EPC is essentially concerned with setting clearly defined limits on the scope of protection conferred as well as indicating the essential technical features of the solution.

In the present case, the wording of the features of claim 1 is technically and linguistically not ambiguous, and the broad claim is also supported by the numerous embodiments set out in the description. In this latter respect, although embodiments relating to upmixing predominate in the description, there are indications of other applications (cf. page 3, lines 14-21; page 10, line 16 - page 11, line 5). The input signals also need not be a multichannel source (e.g. a stereo signal), but for example may be signals from a microphone array (cf. page 7, line 1).

Further, the problem of "performing upmixing in a manner that accurately renders spatially separated audio channels from a multichannel source" is not the most general problem to which the claimed subject-matter is said to provide a solution, which is "synthesizing output signals that both permit flexible and temporal and/or frequency local processing while limiting or mitigating artifacts in such output signals" (cf. page 3, lines 5-7). Finally, claim 1 defines how the input signals, the prototype signal, the non-linear function and the linear estimate interact to generate the output signal. These are the essential features which result in an improved performance as regards the presence of sonic artefacts and/or processing latency (cf. page 11, lines 3-5), whereby it is not necessary, having regard to the requirement of clarity, that every possible embodiment embraced by the claim provide an improved performance, since this is not claimed.