The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has ruled that an artificial intelligence system cannot be named an inventor of a patentable invention. The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has confirmed that AI systems cannot patent inventions as the law grants intellectual property rights only to human beings.

The Court has ruled that the term 'individual' in the Patent Act refers only to humans.

The case was brought by AI systems developer Stephen Thaler, who sought patents on behalf of his AI system called DABUS. The decision is consistent with court rulings in the European Union, the United Kingdom, and Australia, which have all rejected Thaler's claim. However, an intriguing development came from South Africa in 2021, where DABUS was given patent rights, as the first-ever country to do so.