OpenAI, Adobe, others are on winning track against world’s first serious patent infringement lawsuit over ChatGPT: patent likely invalid

Context:

• Last year, KeeeX, a French company affiliated with a research institute, filed the world’s first reasonably serious patent infringement action targeting OpenAI’s ChatGPT (August 2, 2025 ip fray article) with the UPC.
• The patent-in-suit, EP2949070 (“Verification process of the integrity of numerical data bloc”), is about content authentication, not about the inner workings of language models.
• There is a theoretical risk to OpenAI and its codefendants of an injunction and damages resulting fromt his case with respect to eight UPC contracting member states: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Sweden.
• With respect to some other countries, KeeeX’s claims were thrown out definitively by the UPC’s Court of Appeal (CoA) (March 13, 2026 ip fray article) for lack of jurisdiction, meaning that the UPC won’t entertain those claims, but KeeeX could still sue in the respective countries such as the UK, Spain, and Switzerland.

What’s new: The UPC’s Paris Local Division (LD) held the oral hearing (the equivalent of what in U.S. federal court would be called trial) yesterday (October 6, 2026). Based on what Presiding Judge Camille Lignières (November 4, 2025 ip fray interview) said toward the end of her introductory remarks, OpenAI and its codefendants have raised “very serious arguments” that the patent-in-suit is invalid.

Direct impact: This preliminary opinion by the court does not guarantee a particular outcome, but it is a strong indication that OpenAI, Adobe, and the other defendants are on the winning track. Unlike judges in some other places such as Germany, French judges rarely take a position on the merits of a case before they issue a formal ruling. If the Paris LD indeed revokes the patent, KeeeX can appeal that decision to the UPC’s CoA.

Wider ramifications:

• It appears unlikely that KeeeX will try to enforce the patent in countries outside the UPC’s jurisdiction (such as the UK). An invalidity holding by the Paris LD will not be binding on other courts, but it will bear substantial persuasive weight unless and until KeeeX achieves a reversal on appeal.
• Presiding Judge Linières’s revelation of the panel’s preliminary position may be unprecedented for a French patent court, or at least for the UPC’s Paris LD.
  • But many patent law practitioners have publicly requested that all UPC divisions outline their preliminary views at the start of their hearings in order to give UPC representatives the chance to focus their argument on the issues that appear outcome-determinative and on which one side may still have some persuading to do.
  • It’s possible that the Paris LD will also reveal its inclination at other trials going forward.
  • There has been some debate over the very high percentage of all UPC cases that are filed with Germany-based UPC local divisions: more than 70% year-to-date, and more than 80% last month (October 6, 2026 LinkedIn post by ip fray). Preliminary opinions can make non-German UPC venues more attractive.