1 August 2012Copyright

CJEU: no copyright for computer program functionality

Europe’s highest court ruled in May that copyright protection does not extend to the functionality of a computer program or its programming language.

Ruling in a case between SAS Institute and World Programming (WPL), the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) said anyone licensing a computer program could observe, study or test its functioning to determine the ideas and principles underlying that program.

Hamish Sandison, partner at Field Fisher Waterhouse LLP, welcomed the decision and said extending copyright protection to a program’s functionality would stifle innovation and competition.

Software-producer SAS developed SAS System, a program for processing and analysing data. WPL, a company based in the UK, produced an alternative software program capable of executing application programs written in SAS language. While this software did not completely copy SAS’s program, it emulated much of the program’s functionality.

SAS sued WPL in the UK’s High Court before, last year, Mr Justice Arnold referred two questions on the interpretation of the 1991 and 2001 Directives to the CJEU. The CJEU’s Advocate General Bot then recommended the court rule that the functionality of a computer program and its programming language should not be protected by copyright.

On May 2, 2012, the CJEU agreed. It said that allowing computer programs to be copyrighted would allow companies to monopolise ideas—and would hinder technological progress and industrial development.

But the court said a company could prevent a rival from developing software if it procured the programming language’s source code. Only observing, studying or testing that program is allowed, the court said. This “struck the right balance”, said Sandison.

The court added another caveat by saying it could be an infringement if one company reproduced elements of the computer program’s manual—“if that reproduction constitutes the expression of the intellectual creation of the author of the manual”. The choice, sequence and combination of commands, syntax, keywords and mathematical concepts could be copyright protected if they met the court’s “originality” test, Sandison said.

SAS’s claim will now return to the UK High Court, which will have to decide whether any elements of the SAS manuals copied by WPL were copyright protected.

Already registered?

Login to your account

To request a FREE 2-week trial subscription, please signup.
NOTE - this can take up to 48hrs to be approved.

Two Weeks Free Trial

For multi-user price options, or to check if your company has an existing subscription that we can add you to for FREE, please email Adrian Tapping at atapping@newtonmedia.co.uk


More on this story

Copyright
25 January 2013   A judge at The High Court of England & Wales has cleared World Programming (WPL) of infringing the copyright in SAS Institute’s computer programs.
Copyright
3 December 2013   The England & Wales Court of Appeal has dismissed a copyright case brought by software producer SAS Institute against World Programming.