Published Paper Details:

The purpose of patents is to protect the innovator against wrongful exploitation by others of his or her innovation. But when it comes to software, patents unfortunately have the opposite effect. Innovation is stifled and the only ones to gain from the system in the long run are patent profiteers, that is, companies with no innovation who acquire software patents with the sole purpose of extracting royalty payments from the true innovators. On the losing side are large and small software companies with products under closed source and open source licenses. This paper aims to throw light on the issues related with software patent under TRIPS agreement. The US, Canada, European Countries and India shows that there are variations in approaches towards patentability of software. This paper explains the idea that how diverse approaches are creating differences in opinions about patenting of software, thereby leading to software patent war. The question of software patents and its patentability in the case of Alice Corporation v CLS Bank International remained unanswered in so many questions. The Court emphasised on the fact that the existence of free software itself is a strong argument against the granting of software patents. Mere recitation of a generic computer cannot transform a patent-ineligible abstract idea into a patent-eligible invention. This paper is based on the on the present position of software patent national as well as international. Although few areas like free and open source software is a research topic, the particular effects of patenting on its innovation have not yet been investigated systematically. This paper offer an attempt to understand the status of patent law and practice relating to computer related inventions.