Google secures patent for phrase identification

Internet major Google has secured a patent in India for phrase identification in an information retrieval system.

The system is adapted to identify phrases that have sufficient frequency and distinct use in a document collection. Good phrases are predictive of other phrases, and are not merely sequences of words that appear in the lexicon.

"For instance, 'President of United States' predicts other phrases such as 'George Bush' and 'Bill Clinton'. However, other phrases are not predictive, such as 'fell down the stairs', or 'top of the morning', or 'out of the blue'," Google said.

Phrase identification avoids having to index every possible phrase resulting from the combination of all the possible sequences of a given number of words, the company submitted to the Patent Office.

The Patent Office initially said the claim was simply a mathematical algorithm and was purely functional. According to the Patents Act, a mathematical or business method or a computer program is not patentable.

Google submitted that the invention was neither a mathematical algorithm nor a computer programme. The end product, an index stored in a memory that includes valid phrases, is inventive. Following a hearing, the deputy controller of patents and designs, Kolkata, observed, "In view of the above submissions, the technical solution i.e., the index consisting of good phrases that enables documents with related concepts to be provided in response to a query is a technical advancement over the prior art." The official added Google’s application was in order to be granted a patent.

Google submitted that the invention was neither a mathematical algorithm nor a computer programme