UK - Schlumberger v. Electromagnetic Services

Schlumberger v. Electromagnetic Services, Court of Appeal, London, UK, 28 July 2010, [2010] EWCA Civ 819

The Court of Appeal has allowed Electromagnetic Services’ (EMGS) appeal of the decision of the Patents Court to revoke two of EMGS’ patents relating to the use of CSEM (Controlled Source Electromagnetic) surveying to detect oil and gas deposits under the sea.

It was common ground between the parties that the two patents in issue, EP (UK) 1 256 019 and EP (UK) 1 309 887, stood or fell together and so the appeal was concerned with EP (UK) 1 256 019 only. At the first instance trial, Mr Justice Mann had held the patent to be obvious on the basis of three pieces of prior art (Chave, MacGregor and Srnka) but rejected Schlumberger’s lack of novelty attacks based on Srnka and Yuan.