I guess that if you're lay off American workers and move the jobs to India, you want to make sure that you do so in an innovative way: IBM patent application diagrams method for offshoring employees.
The patent application, #20090083107, identifies a specific methodology for determining when outsourcing makes sense and to go about it. Other companies, IMO, can and will find other algorithms for outsourcing.
(You will need a TIFF plug-in to view the original diagrams on the USPTO web site.)
By the way, Figure 1 reminds me of a DEC classic "See figure 1."
2 comments:
It'll be interesting to see if this patent issues.
The USPTO has posted to its website a checklist for business method patent issuance (it's a download in .doc format). Those requirements are:
- Useful, concrete, and tangible result.
- Not a judicial exception per se
- Not just data per se.
- Not simply automating a known or obvious process on a computer or on the internet.
- Not a computer program per se.
- Not merely non-functional data on a storage device, i.e., music on a cd.
- If functional signal is being claimed, must be statically embedded in a computer-readable medium.
- The feature that appears to distinguish over the prior art does not merely appear in a recitation of intended use, the name or title of a feature or in non-functional descriptive material.
- Searches for analogous art related to the distinguishing feature were conducted.
- The meanings attributed to the words of the claim are the plain, ordinary, meanings unless criteria for a special definition have been met.
- You must be able to answer yes to all of these statements.
Now, I haven't looked at this patent application itself, but based on the drawing posted I'm wondering just how this application is not "simply automating a known or obvious process"; after all, the process of laying off employees is obvious and has been followed for years: the first to go is the dead wood; the next to go is the documentation team; next go the marketers; finally the company itself slowly sinks under the weight of all those engineers tinkering with layoff algorighms while its officers and Board beg Congress to bail it out.
Update: IBM has dropped this patent application. See this Times Herald Record article:IBM drops patent application for outsourcing offshore jobs
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