Seungkwan Jwa
Ministry of Intellectual Property, Organic Chemistry Examination Division, Republic of Korea
Correspondence to Seungkwan Jwa, E-mail: skjwa@korea.kr
Volume 20, Number 4, Pages 31-57, December 2025.
Journal of Intellectual Property 2025;20(4):31-57. https://doi.org/10.34122/jip.2025.20.4.31
Received on September 29, 2025, Revised on November 03, 2025, Accepted on December 03, 2025, Published on December 30, 2025.
Copyright © 2025 Korea Institute of Intellectual Property.
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The court ruling adopted the Supreme Court’s principle that in inventions for pharmaceutical uses, the specific use should be considered an element of a claim. The court extended this principle to other fields, treating both the specific substance and its intended use as elements of a claim. However, the author argues that this generalization lacks legal foundation. The Supreme Court recognized its value as elements of a claim in pharmaceutical patents, specifically because methods for diagnosing and treating diseases cannot be patented. Applying this reasoning broadly to non-pharmaceutical use inventions is problematic considering the established legal principles for use-limited compound inventions, use-limited extract inventions, and product-by-process (PBP) claims. The author suggests that in non-pharmaceutical use inventions, the use itself should not be considered elements of a claim, which aligns with the position of major IP5 countries, except Japan. Additionally, for inventions with technical features related to use, the document recommends three approaches: (1) protecting inventions with technically distinctive uses through method patents; (2) allowing category corrections from use-limited product inventions to use-related method inventions; and (3) amending the Patent Act to include provisions on non-exclusive-use articles, incorporating a subjective requirement that the infringer is aware that their actions contribute to or assist a patent’s exploitation.
Use of invention, claim interpretation, indirect infringement, non-exclusive items, cosmetics
No potential conflict of interest relevant to this article was reported.
The author received manuscript fees for this article from Korea Institute of Intellectual Property.