The appeal in this case is against the decision of the Opposition Division to revoke European Patent EP-B-2012388. The patent was revoked under Art. 100(c) EPC, extension of subject matter.
Claim 1 of the Main Request in appeal included the added feature:
"wherein a first portion of the coil element does not overlap with the radiation plate (20) in a plan view of the power supply circuit board (10; 50)".
This feature was not literally disclosed in the claims nor in the description of the application as-filed. The applicant argued that the feature found basis in the figures, e.g., could be taken from Figure 23.
The Board disagreed. They were sceptical as to the technical significance of this feature, because the description emphasised that the radiation plate (20) was made of a non-magnetic material, such as copper or aluminum, which have a magnetic permeability close to the one of air. Hence, the technical relevance of the added feature was questionable. Also the description did not state any effect of the extracted feature.
