Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca13-14-01384/USCOURTS-ca13-14-01384-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
Appellee
Amazon.com Inc.
Appellee
Lexington Luminance LLC
Appellant

Document Text:

NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

United States Court of Appeals 

for the Federal Circuit ______________________ 

LEXINGTON LUMINANCE LLC,

Plaintiff-Appellant

v.

AMAZON.COM INC., 

AMAZON DIGITAL SERVICES, INC.,

Defendants-Appellees

______________________ 

2014-1384

______________________ 

Appeal from the United States District Court for the 

District of Massachusetts in No. 1:12-cv-12216-DJC, 

Judge Denise J. Casper.

______________________ 

Decided: February 9, 2015

______________________ 

ROBERT D. KATZ, Katz PLLC, Dallas, Texas, argued 

for plaintiff-appellant. Also represented by DAVID S.

GODKIN, Birnbaum & Godkin, LLP, Boston, MA. 

MICHAEL J. MCKEON, Fish & Richardson P.C., Washington, DC, argued for defendants-appellees. Also represented by ROBERT P. COURTNEY, Minneapolis, MN; KURT 

LOUIS GLITZENSTEIN, Boston, MA; INDRANIL MUKERJI, 

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2 LEXINGTON LUMINANCE LLC v. AMAZON.COM INC. 

Washington, DC; JEFFREY H. DEAN, Amazon.com Inc., 

Seattle, WA.

______________________ 

Before LOURIE, CHEN, and HUGHES, Circuit Judges.

LOURIE, Circuit Judge. 

Lexington Luminance LLC (“Lexington”) appeals from 

the decision of the United States District Court for the 

District of Massachusetts construing claim 1 of U.S. 

Patent 6,936,851 B2 (the “’851 patent”) and granting 

judgment on the pleadings that the claim was indefinite. 

See Lexington Luminance LLC v. Amazon.com Inc., 6 F. 

Supp. 3d 179 (D. Mass. 2014) (“Opinion”). Because we 

conclude that the district court erred in construing the 

claim and in holding the claim indefinite, we vacate the

judgment of invalidity and remand. 

BACKGROUND

Lexington owns the ’851 patent relating to “the fabrication of semiconductor devices such as light-emitting 

devices in misfit systems.” ’851 patent col. 1 ll. 8–10. The 

’851 patent’s specification explains that, in certain lightemitting devices, multiple layers of crystalline semiconductor material are grown on a crystalline substrate that 

has different crystal lattice constants. Id. col. 1 l. 17–col. 

2 l. 9. The crystal lattices of the substrate and the adjacent semiconductor layer do not align perfectly, leading to 

lattice defects that can propagate in a direction perpendicular to the surface of the substrate through the semiconductor layers into the light-emitting active layer. Id.

Addressing this problem, the ’851 patent teaches using a substrate that has a “textured surface district” in 

order to direct lattice defects to the sides and to reduce 

the defect density in the active layer. Id. col. 2 ll. 12–26. 

The textured district is fabricated “using conventional 

lithographic methods, followed by thermal anneal to 

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smooth out sharp corners and etching defects.” Id. col. 2 

ll. 27–34. The patent describes the textured district as

comprising “a plurality of etched features such as trenches and mesa having a smooth rotation of micro-facets,” id.

col. 3 ll. 33–46, and also describes the surface features as 

“stripe or mesa,” id. col. 2 ll. 30–32, col. 3 ll. 47–50. The 

patent provides several cross-sectional views of the etched 

features in its figures, including Figures 1C, 2A, and 2B. 

Id. figs. 1C, 2A, 2B.

Claim 1 is at issue and reads as follows:

1. A semiconductor light-emitting device comprising: 

a substrate; 

a textured district defined on the surface, of 

said substrate comprising a plurality of etched 

trenches having a sloped etching profile with a 

smooth rotation of micro-facets without a prescribed angle of inclination; 

a first layer disposed on said textured district; 

comprising a plurality of inclined lower portions so as to guide the extended lattice defects

away from propagating into the active layer, 

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said first layer and said substrate form a lattice-mismatched misfit system, said substrate 

is selected from the group comprising group IIIV, group IV, group II-VI elements and alloys, 

ZnO, spinel and sapphire; and 

a light-emitting structure containing an active 

layer disposed on said first layer.

Id. col. 8 ll. 36–52 (emphases added).

In 2012, Lexington sued Amazon.com Inc. and Amazon Digital Services, Inc. (collectively, “Amazon”), alleging

that Amazon’s Kindle e-readers infringed claim 1 of the 

’851 patent. Opinion, 6 F. Supp. 3d at 184–85. Amazon 

moved for judgment on the pleadings, urging that the 

claim was indefinite. The parties concurrently filed claim 

construction briefs. After a hearing, the district court 

issued an order in which it construed the claim and 

granted Amazon’s motion. Id. at 185–90, 195.

The district court construed “trenches having a sloped 

etching profile with a smooth rotation of micro-facets 

without a prescribed angle of inclination” as follows: 

(1) the word “trenches” means “depressions bounded on 

the sides and bottom and open at the top”; (2) the word 

“having” means “consisting of”; (3) “micro-facets” means 

“very small planar crystal surfaces”; (4) “sloped etching 

profile with a smooth rotation of micro-facets” means 

“when viewed in cross-section, the side and bottom walls 

of the etched trenches are made up of micro-facets with a 

gradual, incremental rotation in slope from micro-facet to 

micro-facet such that there are no sharp corners”; and 

(5) “sloped etching profile . . . without a prescribed angle 

of inclination” means “when viewed in cross-section, the 

side and bottom walls of the etched trenches have no 

constant angle of inclination, and so they have no linear 

portions.” Id. at 185–90.

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In construing the claim, the district court rejected 

Lexington’s proposed construction of “trenches” based on

the ’851 patent’s disclosure that the substrate surface 

features can be mesas. The court noted that “[a]n aerial 

view of ‘mesa’ . . . does not appear in the specification,” 

and adopted an ordinary meaning construction based on 

the definitions of “trench” in general-purpose dictionaries. 

Id. at 186. The district court also rejected Lexington’s 

proposed constructions of “having” and “sloped etching 

profile with a smooth rotation of micro-facets without a 

prescribed angle of inclination,” which would encompass 

the embodiments disclosed in Figures 2B and 4B, in 

which the surface features are spaced by areas of a flat 

bottom. Id. at 187–90. The court reasoned that “a flat 

bottom is inconsistent with the purpose of the invention,” 

which is “to guide the lattice defects away from the active 

layer,” because “a proportionately higher amount of . . . 

defects would propagate directly up at a 90 degree angle” 

to the active layer. Id. at 187, 189. The court also reasoned that the claim language required the trenches to 

have no sharp corners or linear portions and it thus

mandated the exclusion of the embodiments disclosed in

Figures 2B and 4B. Id. at 189.

The district court next considered Amazon’s motion 

for judgment on the pleadings in which Amazon alleged 

that claim 1 was indefinite on two grounds. Amazon first 

argued that the expression “so as to guide the extended 

lattice defects away from propagating into the active 

layer” rendered the claim indefinite because the claim

failed to specify which extended lattice defects were 

guided away. Id. at 191. The court, however, reasoned 

that “it is clear that the goal of the invention is to ‘reduce’ 

the number of lattice defects” and held that the claim was 

not indefinite for not specifying “exactly how many defects 

[were] reduced.” Id. at 191–92. The court then construed

the term to mean “such that free propagation of extended 

lattice defects into the active layer is significantly reduced 

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relative to a device made by the same process without the 

textured districts.” Id. at 192.

Amazon also argued that the claim was indefinite in 

its use of the phrase “said substrate is selected from the 

group comprising group III-V, group IV, group II-VI 

elements and alloys, ZnO, spinel and sapphire.” The 

district court granted Amazon’s motion on that ground. 

Id. at 192–95. Specifically, the court concluded that the 

phrase at issue constituted a Markush group. Id. at 193. 

The court then reasoned that a Markush group using the 

term “comprising” instead of “consisting of” was not 

closed, id., and thus the substrate may be one of the 

enumerated elements or alloys, but may also be an indeterminate number of other elements or alloys, id. at 194. 

The court thus concluded that the claim was indefinite

because it “fail[ed] to narrow down the composition of the 

claimed substrate to any degree of substantial certainty.” 

Id. (citing M.P.E.P. § 2173.05(h) (Markush groups)).

In March 2014, the district court entered final judgment of invalidity, and Lexington timely appealed to this 

court. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(1).1

1 In 2013, while the action was pending at the district court, a third party requested ex parte reexamination 

of the ’851 patent, which the United States Patent and 

Trademark Office (“PTO”) granted. During reexamination, Lexington amended the two limitations of claim 1 

that Amazon asserted to be indefinite, even though the 

PTO did not reject the claim as indefinite. In December 

2014, the PTO issued a reexamination certificate, affirming the patentability of the amended claim 1. U.S. Patent 

6,936,851 C1. Amazon argues that this appeal then 

became moot. We disagree. While it is true that the 

originally issued claim 1, which the district court invalidated, may no longer exist, the PTO has affirmed the 

 

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DISCUSSION

I. Indefiniteness

We apply regional circuit law, here the law of the 

First Circuit, when reviewing a district court’s grant of a 

motion for judgment on the pleadings. Merck & Co. v. HiTech Pharmacal Co., 482 F.3d 1317, 1320 (Fed. Cir. 2007). 

The First Circuit reviews a district court’s grant of judgment on the pleadings de novo. Pérez-Acevedo v. RiveroCubano, 520 F.3d 26, 29 (1st Cir. 2008). “A motion for 

judgment on the pleadings is treated much like a Rule 

12(b)(6) motion to dismiss.” Id. To survive a motion for 

judgment on the pleadings, the pleadings must contain 

factual allegations that raise a right to relief above the 

speculative level. Id.

Indefiniteness is a question of law that we review de 

novo. Interval Licensing LLC, v. AOL, Inc., 766 F.3d 

1364, 1370 (Fed. Cir. 2014).2 A patent must “conclude 

with one or more claims particularly pointing out and 

distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant 

patentability of the amended claim 1. If, and as indicated 

herein, the district court erroneously invalidated the 

original claim, then on remand Lexington may be entitled 

to past damages for infringement of the original claim, 

absent a finding of intervening rights or a judgment of 

noninfringement or invalidity on other grounds. Accordingly, an actual controversy based on the originally issued 

claim still exists, and the parties maintain a legally 

cognizable interest in the outcome of this appeal. See 

Already, LLC v. Nike, Inc., 568 U.S. __, 133 S. Ct. 721, 

726–27 (2013). We therefore conclude that the appeal is 

not moot.

2 We also note that the district court’s indefiniteness determination here was based on the pleadings and 

the attached ’851 patent.

 

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regards as his invention.” 35 U.S.C. § 112, ¶ 2 (2006).3 A 

patent claim is invalid for indefiniteness if its language, 

when read in light of the specification and the prosecution 

history, “fail[s] to inform, with reasonable certainty, those 

skilled in the art about the scope of the invention.” Nautilus, Inc. v. Biosig Instruments, Inc., 572 U.S. __, 134 S. Ct. 

2120, 2124 (2014). Patents are presumed to be valid and 

the burden of establishing invalidity rests on the challenger. 35 U.S.C. § 282; Nautilus, 134 S. Ct. at 2130 n.10.

We first consider the district court’s conclusion that 

the claim was indefinite in its use of the phrase “said 

substrate is selected from the group comprising group IIIV, group IV, group II-VI elements and alloys, ZnO, spinel 

and sapphire.” Lexington argues that the court erred in 

construing the phrase as a Markush group that is not 

limited to the enumerated members. According to Lexington, the phrase means that the substrate must contain 

one or more of the enumerated members. Lexington 

argues that this construction is consistent with the specification and narrower than the construction adopted by 

the court, and thus does not unfairly expand the claim 

scope. Lexington also argues that the court erred in not 

evaluating definiteness from the perspective of those 

skilled in the art. 

Amazon responds that the claim uses the Markush

group claiming technique, but recites a group not limited 

3 Paragraph 2 of 35 U.S.C. § 112 has been replaced 

with newly designated § 112(b) when the Leahy-Smith 

America Invents Act (“AIA”) took effect, and the AIA 

makes the change applicable “to any patent application 

that is filed on or after” September 16, 2012. Pub. L. No. 

112-29, § 4(c), (e), 125 Stat. 284, 296–97 (2011). Because 

the application resulting in the ’851 patent was filed 

before that date, we refer here to the pre-AIA version of 

§ 112.

 

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to the enumerated members because it uses “comprising”

to modify the preceding word “group,” rather than “consisting of,” the usual terminology in Markush practice. 

Amazon argues that the claim lacks boundaries because 

the substrate can be one of those enumerated members or 

any other material. Amazon responds that Lexington 

failed to proffer evidence of the understanding of those

skilled in the art and, moreover, the record is bereft of any 

indication that a skilled artisan would disagree with the 

court’s conclusion.

We conclude that the district court erred in holding 

the claim indefinite in reciting an open Markush group. 

The issue before us on review from the district court is 

whether the claim is indefinite, not whether it recites an 

“improper” Markush group. A Markush group is commonly used in certain areas of patent practice to indicate with 

definiteness that a claim limitation is “selected from the 

group consisting of . . . ,” meaning only those recited 

members of the group. Gillette Co. v. Energizer Holdings, 

Inc., 405 F.3d 1367, 1372 (Fed. Cir. 2005); Abbott Labs. v. 

Baxter Pharm. Prods., Inc., 334 F.3d 1274, 1280 (Fed. Cir. 

2003). It is the job of the Patent and Trademark Office to 

ensure, on examination, that a claim is definite and that, 

when a Markush expression is used, it is used properly. 

But that is not our task in reviewing a claim that has 

been held to be indefinite. Our task involves determining 

the definiteness of a claim, i.e., whether the district court 

erred in finding the claim to be indefinite, not evaluating 

the propriety of Markush language. 

Definiteness involves more than an examination of 

the technical correctness of the use of a Markush expression that may have slipped past the examining process. It 

involves evaluation of the claim in light of the written 

description. Here, the written description provides a clear

description of the substrates that are part of the claim. 

’851 patent col. 3 ll. 52–54 (“Exemplary substrates include

GaAs, InP, spinel, sapphire, GaN, GaN-on-sapphire, 

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GaAs, Si, Si-on-insulator, SiC, SiC-on-Si.”). The intrinsic 

record is reasonably definite in indicating what the claim 

covers because the specification lays out a considerable

list of exemplary substrates that correspond to the materials specified in the claim and combinations thereof, see 

id. (listing GaN-on-sapphire and SiC-on-Si as exemplary 

substrates). We therefore conclude that the reasonably 

ascertainable meaning of the contested claim language is 

that the substrate must contain one or more of the enumerated members of the claimed group. 

While other “improper” Markush usage in other patents may not pass the definiteness test, depending upon 

what else is in the record, the written description here 

provides support for the claim to satisfy the test for definiteness that the Supreme Court laid out in Nautilus, 

that is, that the claim, in light of the specification, informs one skilled in the art, with reasonable certainty, of 

the scope of the invention. Nautilus, 134 S. Ct. at 2124. 

We therefore hold that the district court erred in finding 

the claim to be indefinite because of the imperfect usage 

of Markush terminology. 

We also note that the substrate that is described in 

the contested language is not the essence of the invention 

that is being claimed. The claim is particularly directed 

to a textured district having trenches with a sloped etching profile. A person skilled in the art would therefore 

reasonably ascertain the scope of the invention in view of 

the intrinsic record.

As an additional argument for affirming the invalidity 

judgment, Amazon contends that the district court erred 

in not invalidating the claim for indefiniteness based on 

the expression “so as to guide the extended lattice defects 

away from propagating into the active layer.” The essence of Amazon’s contention is that the word “the” has no 

antecedent. We have considered Amazon’s arguments on 

that point but find them unpersuasive. As the district 

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court correctly noted, the specification explains that “the 

goal of the invention is to ‘reduce’ the number of lattice 

defects.” Opinion, 6 F. Supp. 3d at 191–92. The contested 

claim language specifies the intended function or purpose 

of the claimed structure. It thus applies wherever the 

function or purpose requires. We therefore agree with the 

district court that the claim is not indefinite for not specifying “exactly how many defects [were] reduced.” Id. 

Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s decision not to 

invalidate the claim on that basis. 

Moreover, we vacate the district court’s construction 

of the limitation “so as to guide the extended lattice 

defects away from propagating into the active layer.” 

Both parties focused their arguments to the district court 

on whether this limitation was definite. After determining that the limitation was definite, and without performing its own analysis of the proper construction of the 

limitation, the district court simply adopted the construction of another district court.4 On remand, the district 

court may construe this limitation or, as both parties 

initially proposed, determine that no construction is 

necessary.

For the foregoing reasons, we conclude that claim 1 of 

the ’851 patent is not invalid for indefiniteness and vacate 

the judgment of invalidity. 

II. Claim Construction

The district court construed “trenches having a sloped 

etching profile with a smooth rotation of micro-facets 

without a prescribed angle of inclination” as five separate 

limitations: (1) trenches, (2) having, (3) micro-facets, 

4 The district court was not required to adopt the 

construction of another district court under principles of 

collateral estoppel because there the parties settled the 

dispute before a final judgment was entered.

 

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(4) sloped etching profile with a smooth rotation of microfacets, and (5) sloped etching profile . . . without a prescribed angle of inclination. On appeal, Lexington challenges all five constructions. Amazon asks us to decline 

review because those constructions are unrelated to the 

invalidity judgment. In the alterative, Amazon argues

that those constructions should generally be affirmed. 

Under our precedent, we have the discretion to review 

a non-dispositive claim construction in the interest of 

judicial economy, if the construction may become important on remand. Interval Licensing, 766 F.3d at 1376 

(citing Deere & Co. v. Bush Hog, LLC, 603 F.3d 1349, 

1357 (Fed. Cir. 2012); Advanced Software Design Corp. v. 

Fiserv, Inc., 641 F.3d 1368, 1378 (Fed. Cir. 2011)). Because we now vacate the invalidity judgment and remand

for further proceedings at the district court, we address 

the claim construction issues raised by the parties.5

In this case, we review the district court’s claim constructions de novo, because the intrinsic record fully

determines the proper constructions and the district 

court’s constructions were not based on expert testimony. 

See Teva Pharms. USA, Inc. v. Sandoz, Inc., 574 U.S. __, 

5 The joint appendix and arguments before us do

not include the prosecution history of the reexamination 

proceeding. We leave it to the district court to determine 

whether the meanings of the disputed claim limitations 

have been altered by the reexamination history. Moreover, on remand, the district court may supplement its 

claim constructions consistent with the controlling appellate mandates as the case moves forward. See Jack 

Guttman, Inc. v. Kopykake Enters., Inc., 302 F.3d 1352, 

1361 (Fed. Cir. 2002) (“District courts may engage in a 

rolling claim construction, in which the court revisits and 

alters its interpretation of the claim terms as its understanding of the technology evolves.”).

 

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135 S. Ct. 831, 840–42 (2015). A patent is a fully integrated written instrument and the claims must be read in 

view of the specification, of which they are a part. Phillips v. AWH Corp., 415 F.3d 1303, 1315 (Fed. Cir. 2005) 

(en banc). A court should also consult the patent’s prosecution history, which can provide further evidence of how

the inventor understood the claimed invention. Id. at 

1317. Extrinsic evidence, including dictionaries, can at 

times shed useful light on the relevant art; but extrinsic 

evidence is less significant than the intrinsic record in 

determining the meaning of claim language. Id.

The district court construed “trenches” as “depressions bounded on the sides and bottom and open at the 

top.” Opinion, 6 F. Supp. 3d at 187. Lexington argues 

that the district court erred by construing “trenches” 

based on general-purpose dictionaries and that the court’s 

construction is inconsistent with “mesas” described in the 

specification. According to Lexington, “trenches” has a 

special meaning in the semiconductor art as threedimensional areas that are removed from the surface of 

the substrate. Amazon responds that the construction is 

largely consistent with the plain and ordinary meaning of 

“trench.” Amazon nonetheless asks us to modify the 

construction by requiring the claimed trenches to be 

“generally elongated.” 

We agree with Lexington that the district court erred 

by adopting a construction based on general-purpose 

dictionaries that is inconsistent with the intrinsic record. 

Phillips, 415 F.3d at 1316 (“A construction that stays true 

to the claim language and most naturally aligns with the 

patent’s description of the invention will be, in the end, 

the correct construction.”). “Trenches” as described in the 

’851 patent are not necessarily “bounded on the sides and 

bottom and open at the top.” According to the ’851 patent, 

trenches are formed by etching away certain material

from the surface of the substrate, leaving behind threedimensional surface features, which the patent describes 

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in the alternative as “stripe” or “mesa.” See, e.g., ’851 

patent col. 2 ll. 30–32, col. 3 ll. 47–50. Moreover, the 

patent describes “trenches” and “mesa” in the conjunctive, 

id. at col. 3 ll. 35–37, 62–65, col. 4 ll. 5–13, col. 5 ll. 41–44, 

suggesting that “trenches” and “mesa” are complementary 

to each other as, respectively, areas removed and areas 

retained after a given etching process. When the surface 

features are island-shaped mesas, rather than elongated 

stripes, the corresponding trenches are not necessarily 

“bounded” on the sides and bottom.

We therefore hold that the district court erred in construing “trenches.” We adopt Lexington’s proposed construction that “trenches” means “areas in the surface of 

the substrate from which some amount of material is 

removed in order to create a pattern on the surface of the 

substrate.” They are not necessarily elongated. 

The district court construed “having” as “consisting 

of.” Opinion, 6 F. Supp. 3d at 188. Under that construction, the claimed trenches consist entirely and exclusively 

of a “sloped etching profile” and cannot have a flat bottom. 

Lexington argues that the district court’s construction 

incorrectly excludes the embodiments disclosed in Figures 

2B and 4B, which have areas with a flat bottom in addition to a “sloped etching profile.” Amazon responds that 

the flat bottom shown in Figures 2B and 4B cannot be 

reconciled with the claim language “etched trenches 

having a sloped etching profile with a smooth rotation of 

micro-facets without a prescribed angle of inclination,” 

and thus that the claim language requires the exclusion of 

those disclosed embodiments.

We agree with Lexington that the district court erred 

in construing the claim to exclude the embodiments 

disclosed in Figures 2B and 4B because the claim language does not require the exclusion of those embodiments and there is no basis in the specification or 

prosecution history of the ’851 patent for doing so. It is 

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true that the claim includes the phrase “with a smooth 

rotation of micro-facets without a prescribed angle of 

inclination,” but that phrase modifies the “sloped etching 

profile” rather than “trenches.” Accordingly, the claimed 

trenches can have, in addition to sloped areas, areas of a 

flat bottom as well as corners where the flat bottom and 

the inclined slope intersect with each other, as shown in 

Figures 2B and 4B.

As we have stated, constructions that exclude disclosed embodiments without a clear justification are 

disfavored. In re Katz Interactive Call Processing Patent 

Litig., 639 F.3d 1303, 1324 (Fed. Cir. 2011). Here, the

district court erroneously concluded that the embodiment 

disclosed in Figure 2B conflicts with the purpose of the 

invention, Opinion, 6 F. Supp. 3d at 187, when in fact the

specification describes Figure 2B as accomplishing “results [that] are similar” to Figure 2A and that “[t]he 

defect level is much reduced.” ’851 patent col. 5 ll. 16–20. 

The district court construed “micro-facets” as “very 

small planar crystal surfaces,” Opinion, 6 F. Supp. 3d at 

188; “sloped etching profile with a smooth rotation of 

micro-facets” as “when viewed in cross-section, the side 

and bottom walls of the etched trenches are made up of 

micro-facets with a gradual, incremental rotation in slope 

from micro-facet to micro-facet such that there are no 

sharp corners,” id. at 189; and “sloped etching profile . . .

without a prescribed angle of inclination” as “when 

viewed in cross-section, the side and bottom walls of the 

etched trenches have no constant angle of inclination, and 

so they have no linear portions,” id. at 190. Lexington 

challenges each of those constructions on appeal.

On this record, we find no error in the district court’s

construction of “micro-facet.” However, the district court’s 

constructions of “sloped etching profile with a smooth 

rotation of micro-facets” and “sloped etching profile . . .

without a prescribed angle of inclination” require the side 

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and bottom walls of the etched trenches (not just the 

sloped portions of the trenches) to have no sharp corners 

or linear portions, which in effect excludes the embodiments disclosed in Figures 2B and 4B. As indicated, such 

constructions are inconsistent with the intrinsic record. 

We therefore vacate the district court’s constructions of 

“sloped etching profile with a smooth rotation of microfacets” and “sloped etching profile . . . without a prescribed angle of inclination” and remand for the district 

court to construe those limitations in a manner that does 

not exclude Figures 2B and 4B, consistent with this 

opinion.

CONCLUSION

Because the district court erred in granting judgment 

on the pleadings that claim 1 of the ’851 patent was 

indefinite and in construing certain claim limitations in 

the phrase “trenches having a sloped etching profile with 

a smooth rotation of micro-facets without a prescribed 

angle of inclination,” we vacate the judgment of invalidity 

and remand the case to the district court for further 

proceedings consistent with this opinion.

VACATED AND REMANDED

COSTS

Costs to Lexington. 

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