Abstract This article explores the impact of the Japanese Intellectual Property High Court (IPHC) 2025 Thaler decision, critically reflecting on how the court approached the issue of DABUS and artificial intelligence (AI) inventors, building to a more international and comparative reflection on the legal points raised. The Japanese judgment demonstrates that, in many ways, the Thaler cases have globally reached their endpoint. Throughout the judgment, the court interprets AI as an inventor through the prism of rights. However, even the most inventive, creative or autonomous AI system cannot be recognized within the patent system as an inventor because it cannot hold rights, thereby suppressing the more abstract consideration of what it means for an AI to be truly ‘creative’ in a patent context. The decision emphasizes the interconnected nature of patent law. Allowing an expansive interpretation of the naming requirement in patent law would have consequences in the legal system more generally. Ultimately, the judgment necessarily defers the question of modifying these interconnections to a more appropriate legislative context, highlighting the international task of AI reform in patent law.
David Tilt (Wed,) studied this question.