IP Australia - Notable Australian Patents

Notable Australian Patents

• On 4 August 1868, Thomas Sutcliffe Mort and Eugene Nicolle filed Victorian Patent 1139 for "Refrigeration".

• On 25 March 1885 Hugh Victor McKay filed Victorian Patent 4006 for a "Sunshine Stripper Harvester".

• On 13 February 1904 the first Federal Australian Patent Application was filed by Andrew Brown McKenzie for "Improvements in air leak preventative for Westinghouse and like brakes.".

• On 21 December 1914 George Julius filed Australian Patent 15133/14 for an "Automatic Totalizator".

• On 22 November 1926 Hume filed Australian Patent 4843/26 for the "Spun Concrete Pipe".

• On 10 September 1947 George Shepherd filed Australian Patent 136548 for Furniture Castors.

• On 2 May 1955 Mervyn Victor Richardson filed Australian Patent 212130 for the Victa lawn mower.

• On 22 March 1956 Lance Hill filed Australian Patent 215772 for a fold-away handle design for the Hills rotary clothes hoist.

• On 6 July 1970 Ralph Sarich filed Australian Patent 467415 for "An Improved Rotary Motor", which later became known as the "Sarich orbital engine".

• On 3 November 1977 The University of Melbourne filed Australian Patent 519851 for "A Prothesis to Simulate Neural Endings", invented by I. C. Forster. This became known as the "Cochlear Bionic Ear".

• On 7 May 1982 Arthur Ernest Bishop filed Australian Patent 552975 for "Rack and pinion Steering Gear". This became known as the "Bishop Steering Gear".

• On 6 July 1982 Norport Pty. Ltd filed Australian Patent Application 85668/82 for "Yacht Keel With Fins Near Tip", invented by Ben Lexcen. This became known as the "Winged keel" and was used on Alan Bond's Australia II yacht during its successful challenge to the America's Cup in 1983.

• On 13 October 1986 Norman Thomas Jennings filed Australian Patent Application 35064/71 for "Pelletted Poultry Manure Fertilizer" that later became more commonly known as "Dynamic Lifter".

• On 19 July 1991, CSL Limited and The University of Queensland filed Australian Patent 651727 for "Papilloma Virus Vaccine", invented by Ian Frazer and Jian Zhou. This vaccine for cervical cancer is known as "Gardasil" or "Cervarix".

• On 27 November 1992, the CSIRO filed Australian Patent 666411 for "A Wireless LAN", invented by John David O'Sullivan, Graham Ross Daniels, Terence Michael Paul Percival, Diethelm Ironi Ostry and John Fraser Deane.

• On 11 August 1995, Myriad Genetics, Inc. filed Australian Patent 686004 for "In vivo mutations and polymorphisms in the 17q-linked breast and ovarian cancer susceptibility gene", invented by Donna M Shattuck-Eidens, Jacques Simard, Mitsuru Emi, Francine Durocher and Yusuke Nakamura. The patent claims the human BRCA1 gene. This patent provided the opportunity to test the legal validity of gene patents in the US. The US court held that composition patents were invalid, essentially because they are products of nature. This patent has yet to be tested in Australia.

• On 24 May 2001, John Michael Keogh filed Australian Patent 2001100012 for "Circular Transportation Facilitation Device". This was, in simple fact, the wheel. IP Australia was awarded an Ig Nobel Prize in 2001 for granting this patent for one of the world's oldest known inventions.