Apple's patent that covers its slide-to-unlock feature for iPads and iPhones has been deemed invalid by the Federal Court of Justice in Germany.

On Tuesday, Aug. 25, the court ruled that Apple' swipe-to-unlock patent was not based on a new invention, upholding a previous ruling which rejected Apple's claims.

The judges of the Federal Court of Justice in Karlsruhe, Germany noted that the European patent "EP1964022" owned by Apple, which was awarded to the company in 2010, did not exhibit any novelty.

For the unfamiliar, Apple devices tout a graphic manual to unlock the handset. The manual display uses a finger movement that has a preordained pattern on the display. However, the court ruled that the feature was not novel enough to be categorized as an invention. The scrolling bar-like feature on the display is a graphic feature to aid easy use and not a technological advancement, in the court's opinion.

"This user-friendly display was already suggested by the state of the art," writes the Karlsruhe-based court. "The contested patent thus isn't based on an invention.

The court also noted that the method used by the iPhone maker was not sophisticated enough to require a patent protection. The ruling by the Karlsruhe court backed an earlier patent dispute decision, which was in favor of Lenovo-owned Motorola Mobility.

The court of appeals upheld the ruling by the lower Federal Patent Court, which was instrumental in canceling the company's German patent that was based on a methodology deployed by Neonode, Inc. It also averred that a mobile handset from Neonode, a Sweden-based company, had the same characteristic prior to Apple's devices sporting the same.

The Swedish company incidentally released its Neonode N1 handset in 2006, which was prior to the iPhone's 2007 launch. Neonode went on to sell several thousand handsets prior to going bankrupt in 2008.

The swipe-to-unlock feature is synonymous with iPhones and is the basis on which rival Android OEMs have made their versions. The ruling will come as a blow to Apple which has remained silent about the decision.

Photo: Susanne Nilsson | Flickr