b) Examples of cases where the combination was held to be unallowable 

In T 389/13 the composition of claim 1 was defined on filing in a broad manner, its definition including a few structural features as well as two ranges of parametric values, with an indication in the rest of the application of preferences for said structural features and a definition of additional parameters which might be used to characterise the composition, as well as corresponding ranges of values. Subsequently some limits were introduced on the basis of said preferences or on the basis of said additional parameters and corresponding ranges of values. The board emphasised that allowing those various restrictions without there being any – even implicit – indication in the application as filed that the specific combination was envisaged would be unfair to third parties. It would give an applicant who filed a broad speculative claim an unwarranted advantage over other applicants who were the first to attribute any significance to a specific combination of parameters and their ranges of values encompassed by said broad original claim.

In T 770/90 the board ruled that an unduly broad claim not supported by the description as originally filed was not a suitable "reservoir" for amendments.

According to T 1120/05, the original drawings cannot be considered as a reservoir of features on which the applicant or a patent proprietor can draw when amending the claims.

In T 296/96 the board stated that, when assessing whether a feature had been disclosed in a document, the relevant question was whether a skilled person would seriously contemplate combining the different features cited in that document. That was not the case in the application as filed.

In T 2363/10 the board held that the selection of features disclosed in six out of one hundred and forty-three bullet points represented a particular selection which was not disclosed as such. The skilled person had no hint or incentive to choose exactly such a combination of features. The general statement "any such apparatus, means or method has or may have any of the following features" did not change this conclusion, since for a combination of selected elements to form a disclosure, additional information was required which directed the skilled person to this combination.

For a case where the original independent claim was combined with features from a plurality of dependent claims referring back to the independent claim separately ("US style" dependencies), see T 1362/15, summarised below in this chapter II.E.1.6.4.

For further cases concerning an unallowable combination of features see e.g. T 659/97, T 1206/07, T 2044/07.