Should Patents Have Background and Summary Sections?

Greg Aharonian's recent PATNEWS newsletter mentions that he is reviewing the book Drafting Patents for Litigation and Licensing, edited by Bradley Wright of Banner & Witcoff. A chapter in that book led Greg to raise the question about whether inventors and patent owners are helped in any way by including background and summary sections in patents. Greg mentions that numerous risks that can arise when prior art is improperly discussed or when statements in the background or summary sections are imported by judges as unwanted limitations in claims. With all the risks, and with no legal requirement to include such sections, why do it?

It's a fair question and perhaps patents will be more successful if unnecessary sections are left out, but there's another perspective to consider.

Greg is not alone, and in fact is thinking along lines of Irving Kayton et al. at PRG who have been advocating barebones approaches to skirt the numerous pitfalls from judges and courts. (I really enjoyed the "Drafting and Crafting Winning Patents" course I took from them several years ago where they introduced their minimalist concepts.) Skipping the background and summary makes a lot of sense with those concerns in mind. However, the chance of a judge abusing your issued patent is minuscule, and in fact is ZERO if it doesn't get past the Examiner. In light of KSR, I would argue (and do so argue in the book Conquering Innovation Fatigue from John Wiley & Sons, 2009) that it is valuable to build some storytelling into the patent to help the examiner avoid the temptation of applying hindsight to the invention and, when possible, to help the Examiner see that the invention involved more than just conventional problem solving to deal with known problems in standard ways.

Sometimes the key to a brilliant invention is discovering what the real problem was. Once understood, the solution may seem "obvious" and straightforward, and if the patent just presents the solution, the nonobvious nature of it may be lost upon the examiner. Examiners are people who will be most helpful in advancing patents when they get the story and have their imagination captured, and that is what can be done in the background and summary. Tell a story to advance your nonobviousness position, but do be cautious about discussing prior art and avoid listing benefits or "objects" of the invention which can certainly haunt you in future litigation. But when there isn't much of a story that needs to be told, skipping the background altogether might be wise.

Another consideration is the benefits of helping others besides judges appreciate and understand the invention. This might include members of a jury as well as potential licensees or business partners. Again, the storytelling role of the background can add value to the patent.

Storytelling: it's what marketing is, and patents need to be drafted with marketing insights and plans in mind for both long-term and immediate success.