Landmark Software Copyright Decision from the UK High Court
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The recent UK High Court case of SAS Institute Inc. –v- World Programming Limited marks a significant legal development for software developers in relation to the scope of copyright protection for computer software and source codes in the European Software Directive. The UK High Court has ruled that copyright protects the source code of the software program as a literary work but that the replication of software functionality without access to source codes, at whatever level of detail, is not an infringement of copyright. The judgment has been referred to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) for confirmation of this interpretation of the Software Directive.
SAS Institute Inc. (SAS), one of the world’s largest developers of analytical software, lost it’s case in the UK High Court against World Programming Limited (WPL) for the misuse of the SAS Learning Edition, breach of licence terms, copyright infringement and other IP infringements in respect of it’s SAS System.
WPL developed it’s own language interpreter software product called World Programming System (WPS) to execute application programs written in the SAS Language and which emulated the functionality of the SAS Components in direct competition with SAS’s own products. The WPS software was created without access to SAS’s source codes.
Arnold J held that EU law protected WPL from breach of SAS's licence terms where WPL used the SAS Learning Edition to observe, study and test its programming functions when it developed it's WPS software product.
While the precise wording of the reference to be made to the ECJ is yet to be formulated, it will seek confirmation as to whether programming languages, interfaces and functional aspects of software are excluded from protection under Article 1(2) of the Software Directive and the extent of the exclusion from infringement for acts of observation, studying and testing of a program under Article 5(3).
