PA Axel H. Horns and Software Patents

Axel Horns spends about half of his time on Net activism, public lectures and journal publications and the rest on obtaining patents, mainly in the field of software, at the EPO and DE-PTO for his customers at KSNH. He must have been born around 1960 and studied patent law in the 80s to become a registered patent representative before the DE-PTO and later before the EPO.

KSNH: Axel H. Horns: Info by patent lawyer company about their member, a specialist in physics, electronics and software. Contains a photo.
Security in Information Technology and Patent Protection for Software Products -- Expert Opinion by Lutterbeck et al written at the order of the German Ministery of Economics and Technology: Prof. Lutterbeck of Berlin Technical University, his assistant Robert Gehring and Axel Horns, patent lawyer in Munich, figuring under the name of "Internet Governance Research Group", received an order from the German Ministery of Economics and Technology in late summer of 2000 to work out this "short expert opinion" which was published in December 2000. A large part of the 166 pages is dedicated to reiterating the well-known legal opinion of Horns. Horns states that Art 52 EPC was a misconception from the beginning, and that patent law will be seriously impaired unless any innovation that is implemented through a computer is patentable. However he warns that software patents can have a very negative impact on open source software and proposes that patent law at least in Germany should be amended in such a way that the publication and transmission of source code does not violate the law, even if the excecution of object code on a computer does.
Lenz Blog: Horns Blog on Patent Vote: Dr. Lenz, professor of german and european law in Tokyo, is worried about the attempts of Horns and other patent lawyers to declare themselves "experts" in this matter and deny the competence of the European Parliament, points out that this runs counter to recent principle decisions of the German Constitutional Court. Moreover Lenz confesses himself guilty of what Horns calls a "misinformation campaign" about the exclusion of software from patentability by the European Patent Convention and expresses doubt about the correctness of Horns's assertions.
see also Reactions to the EU Parliament's Vote of 2003/09/24
Hartmut Pilch responds to PA Axel Horns: Horns accuses European Parliament of FFII-inspired dilettantism and predicts that Bolkestein, Council and US friends will kill the directive. Pilch refutes the arguments. Discussion in German.
see also Reactions to the EU Parliament's Vote of 2003/09/24
FFII Softwarepatente Diskussion Mailingliste: Re: Matthew Broersma : Software patent limits 'go too far' (fwd): Answer by Hartmut Pilch to Axel Horns in mailing list discussion on the Broersma article
see also Reactions to the EU Parliament's Vote of 2003/09/24
PA Axel H. Horns' blog on IPR: the day after: Patent attorney Horns says that EP decision is "rubbish", based on FFII "misinformation campaign", will be "thrown into the dustbin" by European Commission or Council and, if not, attacked on the basis of TRIPs by friends from US.
see also Reactions to the EU Parliament's Vote of 2003/09/24
Horns 03-09-25: Severe Defeat for the Users of the Patent System: A patent attorney trying to mobilise his profession for backlash in the Council.
see also Reactions to the EU Parliament's Vote of 2003/09/24
PA Horns on Software Patents: A nice and [des]informative presentation of many current law issues. Unfortunately PA Horns, although on the whole quite methodologically strict and correct, is in love with the idea of unlimited patentability, and continues to prominently propagate fallacies about the European Patent Convention and its history. In general he likes to use formalistic, sometimes quite idiosyncratic interpretation of law in order to refute non-lawyer criticism of the patent system. Using this lawyer language he often succedes in deterring the critics. When the fallacy is pointed out, he withdraws from the debate without however changing his propaganda on the Web.
Horns 2000: Some Observations on the Controversy on "Software Patents": A German software patent attorney calls on his colleagues to lobby for the survival of their profession which he sees under attack by a coalition of neoliberals and leftists riding on a wave of growing popularity of open source software among politicians in Europe. In particular the people from FFII and Eurolinux have successfully spread myths about the meaning of Art 52 EPC and proposed restrictions on patentability which would be disastrous for the patent system, because they would relegate it to a marginal role in information society, Horns warns. If patent lawyers continue to be complacent about this development and to rely solely on their traditional means of paper based communication, they risk losing control of the legislative process. Horns warns against underestimating the political potential of the free software movement. It strikes a resonating chord with politicians and patent attorneys should therefore try to make peace with this movement and instead establish the patent system in other parts of the software industry. In particular they should try to build an economic rationale for the patent system in the area of embedded software. Much of the argumentation of Horns is built on treating law texts in a formalistic way (e.g. putting "software patents" and "as such" in double quotes, arguing that Art 52 is about claim language rather than about inventions, quoting an overwhelming mass of more or less irrelevant law sources while suppressing relevant ones), as well as on historical myths about the EPC and on false assertions about FFII/Eurolinux.
PA Horns 2002: RA Klein kann offenbar Patentansprüche nicht lesen: Horns trying to debunk patent criticism from a speaker of the German farmers' association as founded on a misunderstanding of legal concepts. Very similar in style and structure to Horns' software patent discourse. With a detailed refutation from Hartmut Pilch.
Horns 2002-07-22: Energieverbrauch im Anspruchswortlaut begründet Technizität, Computer-Implemented Invention (CII) ist nicht Programm als solches: Auf den Vorwurf hin, er führe juristische Laien in die Irre, indem er höchst zweifelhafte persönliche Rechtsauffassungen mit Recht und Gesetz gleichsetze und als eine Art Grundwissen ausgebe, räumt Horns ein, dass er sich in der im immer Einklang mit der Rechtsprechung befinde:
Beim EPÜ teile ich in der Tat die Auffassung der Beschwerdekammern nicht, dass der Energieumsatz einer CPU bei einer CII noch nicht für "Technizität" ausreichen soll. Das EPA begründet das damit, dass bekannte Geschäftsmethoden nicht durch "Portierung" auf einen Rechner patentfähig werden dürfen. Im Ergebnis ist das richtig, aber ich vertrete doch sehr stark die Meinung, dass dies eine Frage der "Erfindungshöhe" und nicht der "Technizität" sein sollte.
Hiermit sagt Horns, dass neuartige Geschäftsmethoden patentierbar sein müssen, sofern bei ihrer Durchführung Energie verbraucht wird.
Uecker 2002-07-25: Musikinstrument-Implementierte Erfindungen (MII) sind nicht ästhetische Formschöpfungen als solche (2): Eine parodierende Antwort auf den Hornsschen Begriff der Technischen Erfindung. Nach Hornsscher Logik könnte man auch musikalische Ideen patentieren. Es sind nämlich ganz eindeutig musikinstrument-implementierte Erfindungen. Technischer Effekt ist die Schallerzeugung.
Donnerhacke 2002-07-25: unakzeptable formalistische Argumentation von Horns: Axel Horns hatte das Europäische Patentamt gegen den Vorwurf der Rechtsbeugung in Schutz genommen. Nach tagelanger Beobachtung der darauf folgenden Diskussion kritisiert der Kryptograph und Fitug-Mitinitiator die formalistische Argumentationstaktik von Horns: "Bei der Diskussion um Abstrakta dem Gegenüber abzuverlangen, auf dem eigenen Gebiet so konkret zu werden, daß man anhand von Spezialdetails weitermachen kann, zeigt, daß der abstrakte Grundvorwurf zutrifft." Er beanstandet damit insbesondere, dass Horns Ücker aufgefordert hatte, die fraglichen "musikinstrument-implementierten Erfindungen" in Form von Patentansprüchen darzustellen, damit man darüber reden könne.
Horns 2003/09: software patent critics are crypto communists: Since summer 2002 PA Horns is preoccupied with a new theory: patentability of software is a consequence of capitalism in the information age, and those who oppose such patentability are really against capitalism but, in the case of FFII at least, concealing this fact by facade debates. Here Horns answers an anti-capitalist rant by a discussant and feels confirmed in his suspicion.


Software Patents > Players > Axel HORNS
Robert Hart	Jürgen BETTEN	Axel HORNS	Axel PFEIFFER	Harald SPRINGORUM	PA FREISCHEM