What is patentable?

The patent law is one of the most well-known disciplines within the intellectual property area. The patent law protects inventions that may be used commercially, and the object of protection is always and only the technical issue. Applications and procedures are thus patentable. Protection of the inventions' design etc. is comprised by other intellectual property rights. The typical areas of patent law are mechanism, electronics, it programs, medicines, microbiology and chemistry.

In order to be protected by a patent an invention has to fulfill some basic requirements. It has to be new compared to what is already generally known and it has to involve an inventive step. The latter condition implies that the invention has to be substantially distinguishable from the technique already known. Furthermore, the invention has to be reproducible, i.e. not a discovery or an activity of thought but a practical reality.