NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

 

United States Court of Appeals 

for the Federal Circuit ______________________ 

ANVIK CORPORATION,

Plaintiff-Appellant,

v.

NIKON PRECISION, INC.,

NIKON RESEARCH CORPORATION OF AMERICA,

NIKON CORPORATION, AND HANNSTAR DISPLAY 

CORPORATION,

Defendants-Appellees,

AND

L.G. PHILIPS LCD CO., LTD. AND L.G. PHILIPS 

LCD AMERICA, INC.,

Defendants-Appellees,

AND

SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS AMERICA, INC. 

AND SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS CO., LTD.,

Defendants-Appellees,

AND

CHI MEI OPTOELECTRONICS,

CHI MEI OPTOELECTRONICS USA, INC., AND

INNOLUX DISPLAY CORP., 

Defendants-Appellees,
2 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION, INC. 

AND

AU OPTRONICS CORPORATION AND

AU OPTRONICS CORPORATION AMERICA,

Defendants-Appellees,

AND

SHARP CORPORATION AND SHARP 

ELECTRONICS CORPORATION,

Defendants-Appellees,

AND

AFPD PTE LTD., 

Defendant-Appellee, 

 

AND

IPS ALPHA TECHNOLOGY, LTD.,

PANASONIC CORPORATION OF NORTH 

AMERICA, PANASONIC CORPORATION, HITACHI, 

LTD., HITACHI DISPLAYS, LTD., HITACHI 

AMERICA, LTD., HITACHI ELECTRONIC DEVICES 

USA, INC., HITACHI CONSUMER ELECTRONICS 

CO., LTD., TOSHIBA CORPORATION, TOSHIBA 

AMERICA, INC., AND TOSHIBA AMERICA 

CONSUMER PRODUCTS, LLC,

Defendants-Appellees. 

______________________ 

2012-1320, -1321, -1322, -1323, -1324, -1325, -1326, -1327, 

-1328, -1329

______________________ 
 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION , INC. 3

Appeals from the United States District Court for 

the Southern District of New York in Nos. 05-CV-7891, 

07-CV-0816, 07-CV-0818, 07-CV-0821, 07-CV-0822, 07-

CV-0825, 07-CV-0826, 07-CV-0827, 07-CV-0828, and 

08-CV-4036, Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein.

______________________ 

Decided: March 22, 2013 

______________________ 

 DARYL JOSEFFER, King & Spalding, LLP, of Washington, 

DC, argued for plaintiff-appellant. On the brief were

JOSHUA L. RASKIN, and JAI K. CHANDRASEKHAR, Bernstein 

Litowitz Berger & Grossmann, LLP, of New York, New 

York. 

 DONALD R. DUNNER, Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, 

Garrett & Dunner, L.L.P., of Washington, DC, argued for 

all defendants-appellees. With him on the brief was 

ANDREW J. VANCE. Of counsel on the brief were JACK W.

LONDEN, Morrison & Foerster, LLP, of Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, Japan, DEANNE E. MAYNARD, of Washington, DC, and 

MATTHEW M. D’AMORE, of New York, New York, for 

defendants-appellees, Nikon Precision, Inc., et al.; 

GASPARE J. BONO, McKenna Long & Aldridge, L.L.P., of 

Washington, DC, for defendants-appellees, L.G. Philips 

LCD Co., Ltd., et al.; PETER J. WIED, VINCENT K. YIP, JAY 

CHIH-FAN CHIU and TERRENCE D. GARNETT, Goodwin 

Procter L.L.P., of Los Angeles, California, for defendantsappellees, AU Optronics Corporation, et al.; ARTHUR I.

NEUSTADT, CARL E. SCHLIER and ALEXANDER E. GASSER, 

Oblon, Spivak, McClelland, Maier & Neustadt, L.L.P., of 

Alexandria, Virginia, for defendant–appellee, AFPD PTE, 

Ltd.; NEIL P. SIROTA, Baker Botts L.L.P., of New York, 

New York, and MICHAEL J. BARTA, of Washington, DC, for 

defendants-appellees, Samsung Electronics America, Inc., 

et al.; ROBERT W. ADAMS, GILL S. UPDEEP and GORDON 
4 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION, INC. 

KLANCNIK, Nixon & Vanderhye, P.C., of Arlington, Virginia, for defendants-appellees, Sharp Corporation, et al.; 

ERIC J. LOBENFELD, IRA J. SCHAEFER and ARLENE L.

CHOW, Hogan Lovells, US LLP, of New York, New York, 

for defendants–appellees, IPS Alpha Technology, Ltd., et 

al.; JOHN R. ALISON, LAURA P. MASUROVSKY, DENISE W.

DEFRANCO and STEPHEN L. HENNESSY, Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner L.L.P., of Washington, 

DC, for defendant–appellee, Hannstar Display Corporation, and BRUCE D. DERENZI and SCOTT L. BITTMAN, 

Crowell & Moring, LLP, of New York, New York, for 

defendants–appellees, Chi Mei Optoelectronics, et al. 

______________________ 

Before NEWMAN, BRYSON, and MOORE, Circuit Judges.

BRYSON, Circuit Judge. 

The district court held the three asserted patents in 

this case invalid for failing to satisfy the “best mode” 

requirement found in 35 U.S.C. § 112. The America 

Invents Act, Pub. L. No. 112–29 (2011), eliminated failure 

to satisfy the best mode requirement as a ground for 

invalidating issued patents. However, the statutory 

amendment that removed best mode from the list of 

invalidating conditions for issued patents was not given 

retroactive effect for cases, such as this one, that were 

filed before the new statute was enacted. Accordingly, the 

district court properly considered whether the best mode 

requirement had been satisfied.

The question whether the best mode requirement has 

been satisfied is highly factual. In this case, after reviewing the deposition testimony of Dr. Kanti Jain, the named 

inventor of all three patents and the founder and president of Anvik Corporation, the district court was understandably concerned that Dr. Jain may have concealed 

certain aspects of the best mode for practicing the invention claimed in the patents. While Dr. Jain did his cause 
 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION , INC. 5

no favors with his testimony, we are persuaded based on 

the record as a whole that there remain disputed issues of 

material fact bearing on the best mode question, and we 

therefore reverse the grant of summary judgment and 

remand the case for further proceedings.

I 

Anvik brought suit against a number of manufacturers and sellers of electronic equipment, alleging that they 

had infringed the three patents in suit, U.S. Patents No. 

4,924,257 (“the ’257 patent”); 5,285,236 (“the ’236 patent”); and 5,291,240 (“the ’240 patent”). Anvik’s theory 

was that the manufacturer and seller defendants had 

infringed by using scanners made by the Nikon defendants. The patents at issue in this case are directed to 

photolithography systems used to make electronic products such as liquid crystal display panels. The claimed 

systems selectively expose a substrate to electromagnetic 

radiation through a mask by the use of partially overlapping scans of the mask and substrate to ensure that the 

substrate is exposed uniformly and seamlessly.

All three of the patents in suit follow the same basic 

pattern: each claims a “scan and repeat” system for highresolution, large-field lithography. In each patent, the 

asserted claims recite, as part of the claimed lithography 

system, an illumination subsystem satisfying certain 

requirements. The illumination subsystem set forth in 

asserted claim 17 of the ’257 patent is representative. 

That portion of claim 17 recites: “an illumination subsystem having the desired characteristics of wavelength and 

intensity distribution, having an effective source plane in 

the shape of a polygon, and capable of uniformly illuminating a polygon-shaped region on the mask.” The specification of the ’257 patent, which is also representative, 

describes the illumination subsystem as consisting of an 

illumination source system, a relay lens, and a beamsteering mechanism. The illumination subsystem is 
6 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION, INC. 

described as being “such that its effective emission 

plane . . . is in the shape of a regular hexagon.” The 

illumination source system is not otherwise described, but 

is depicted in the patent figures as a box with a hexagonal-shaped emission plane at one end. ’257 patent, col. 4, 

ll. 7–21. 

In a separate patent application filed before the applications for the patents in suit, Dr. Jain described and 

claimed a particular illumination system. That application became U.S. Patent No. 5,059,013 (“the ’013 patent”), 

which was issued to Dr. Jain on October 22, 1991, after 

the issuance of the ’257 patent in 1990 but before either 

the application for, or issuance of, the ’236 and ’240 patents in 1994. The ’013 patent claimed an illumination 

system producing a light beam that could be used in 

lithography systems such as those claimed in the ’257, 

’236, and ’240 patents. In its preferred embodiment, the 

illumination system of the ’013 patent used a hexagonal 

“shaping aperture” and a hexagonal-shaped tunnel lined 

on the inside with mirrors, which the ’013 patent referred 

to as a “hexagonal beam-shaper-uniformizer.”

At the time, Dr. Jain recorded his ideas for improving 

lithography systems, along with illustrations and detailed 

descriptions, in his notebook. His drawing of the illumination system that formed the basis for the ’013 patent 

was found in the same notebook as the drawings that 

formed the bases for the ’257, ’236, and ’240 patents. 

Specifically, he drew a hexagonal light tunnel that appears virtually identical to the one that would be depicted 

in Figure 1b of the ’013 patent. Dr. Jain’s notebook refers

to the hexagonal tunnel in the course of discussing of how 

to create a hexagonal-shaped light beam required for the

scan and repeat method claimed in the patents in suit. 

During pretrial discovery, the defendants sought to 

establish that Dr. Jain regarded the illumination system 

used in the ’013 patent as the best mode for creating the 
 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION , INC. 7

overlapping hexagonal light beams used in his scan and 

repeat method. They argued that the evidence showed he 

considered it his best mode and failed to disclose it in the 

’257, ’236, and ’240 patents, and that those patents were 

therefore invalid. 

II

The district court granted summary judgment, holding all three patents invalid for failing to satisfy the best 

mode requirement. The court based its ruling mainly on 

Dr. Jain’s deposition testimony, which the court interpreted as admitting that the illumination source recited 

in the ’013 patent was “better than anything in the prior 

art and anything of which he was aware and which he 

could remember at the time.” 

The district court pointed to several of Dr. Jain’s 

statements during his deposition to support its interpretation. Dr. Jain testified that when he filed the application for the ’013 patent, he believed that the method it 

described “had advantages over prior art methods,” and 

that it “had advantages over some other methods.” While 

he stated that he did not regard the illumination system 

of the ’013 patent as the best illumination source to use in 

connection with the asserted claims, he was unable to 

identify any particular alternatives that would serve that 

purpose better. Nonetheless, Dr. Jain testified that “there 

were many variations” among illumination methods that 

could provide uniform hexagonal illumination on the 

substrate and that the method of the ’013 patent “certainly is not the only optimum method.” He added, however, 

that he “[could] not recall what the other methods were.” 

When asked whether he had any other pending patent 

applications “that dealt with the uniformization of the 

light in an illumination system besides the application 

that led to the ’013 patent,” Dr. Jain replied, “I don’t 
8 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION, INC. 

recall, but I think what I described in the ’013 patent, 

that configuration for an illumination system to produce 

uniform polygonal exposure, most likely was the best that 

I had thought of until then.” However, when he was 

directly asked whether the preferred embodiment “of a 

lithography system practicing the methods of the ’257 

patent . . . used light provided by a hexagonal beam 

shaper and uniformizer tunnel to provide nominal hexagon shape and uniform light,” Dr. Jain replied that was 

“not right.” In addition, Dr. Jain later submitted a declaration explaining that the ’013 patent represented only 

the best mode that he himself had invented, and that at 

the relevant time he was aware of other effective ways to 

practice his lithography system.

As further evidence that the illumination system of 

the ’013 patent was Dr. Jain’s best mode, the defendants 

showed that he attended a professional conference in 

March of 1991 to discuss his lithography system, and that 

during his presentation he did not disclose any details of 

the illumination source system described in his notebook. 

When asked at his deposition why he chose not discuss 

that aspect of his invention, Dr. Jain explained that he 

was “simply not ready, prepared[,] and willing to give 

details about the illumination part of the lithography 

system” while the ’013 patent was still pending. 

The district court acknowledged that the defendants 

had not obtained a direct admission from Dr. Jain that he 

had concealed what he knew to be the best mode for 

practicing the asserted claims. Nonetheless, referring to 

the portion of Dr. Jain’s testimony in which he denied 

that he regarded the illumination source of the ’013 

patent as the best mode for practicing the invention, the 

court stated that “[i]t’s hard for me to accept that there is 

any credibility whatever to [that] portion” of his testimony. The court concluded:
 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION , INC. 9

But he refuses to answer what may be other optimum methods, so that suggests to me that when 

he says that this is better than other methods and

he can’t name another method that’s equal or better than the ’013 method, then he’s saying the ’013 

method is the best. He knows that.

Based on that evidence, the court granted the defendants’ 

motion for summary judgment of invalidity and dismissed 

the complaint. The court explained that it regarded Dr. 

Jain’s testimony as amounting to an admission that 

although the ’013 patent was not mentioned in the ’257 

patent, the method described in the ’013 patent “was 

better than anything in the prior art and anything of 

which he was aware and which he could remember at the 

time.” The court relied heavily on the fact that Dr. Jain 

could not identify anything in the prior art that could

create a better illumination source than the system

described in the ’013 patent. As for the post-deposition 

declaration in which Dr. Jain sought to explain some of 

the answers he gave during his deposition, the court 

characterized that declaration as “a gloss of what he may 

have wanted to mean or may have tried to mean or how 

he wanted to argue.” The statements in that declaration, 

the court concluded, were “beside the point, and they don’t 

contribute anything at all.” 

III 

Whether the best mode requirement has been satisfied is a question of fact. Bayer AG v. Schein Pharms., 

Inc., 301 F.3d 1306, 1312 (Fed. Cir. 2002). In order to 

determine whether there has been a violation of the best 

mode requirement, two factual questions must be answered. The first is whether, at the time of filing the 

patent application, the inventor had a best mode of practicing the claimed invention—a subjective question. The

second is whether, assuming the inventor had a preference for one mode over all others, the inventor objectively 
10 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION, INC. 

concealed his preferred mode from the public. See Wellman, Inc. v. Eastman Chem. Co., 642 F.3d 1355, 1360 

(Fed. Cir. 2011).

Patents are presumed valid, and the opposing party

must prove invalidity by clear and convincing evidence. 

See High Concrete Structures, Inc. v. New Enter. Stone &

Lime Co., Inc., 377 F.3d 1379, 1382 (Fed. Cir. 2004). On 

summary judgment in this case, the issue before the 

district court was whether a reasonable finder of fact 

could reach no conclusion other than that Dr. Jain considered his patented illumination source system to be the

best mode for practicing the inventions and concealed it. 

Id.

The defendants’ documentary evidence is susceptible 

to reasonable inferences in Anvik’s favor. For instance,

Dr. Jain may have drawn the illumination source system 

in his notebook to provide an example of an illumination 

source that could be used in his lithography system without meaning to suggest that the depicted example was the 

best illumination design for that purpose. Nor does the 

existence of the ’013 patent prove that Dr. Jain had a best 

mode. Rather, it suggests only that its claimed illumination system had advantages over the prior art in some 

contexts, not necessarily that it, or the hexagonal light 

tunnel component, was the best illumination source 

system to use in practicing the scan and repeat system 

claimed in the patents in suit. 

Ultimately, the district court’s ruling turned on Dr. 

Jain’s credibility. The court was troubled by aspects of 

Dr. Jain’s testimony, and in particular what the court 

referred to as his “fencing” with counsel at various points 

in response to questions. The court therefore found Dr. 

Jain to lack credibility, and it based its summary judgment ruling in large measure on that finding. That was 

error. While it is possible that a witness’s credibility 

could be so undermined in the course of a deposition that 
 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION , INC. 11

a court could conclude that no reasonable finder of fact 

could believe him, the task of evaluating a witness’s 

credibility is normally for the fact-finder, not for a court 

on summary judgment, and this case is not so extreme as 

to fall outside that general rule. See Wanlass v. Fedders 

Corp., 145 F.3d 1461, 1463 (Fed. Cir. 1998). 

As the district court acknowledged, counsel for the defendants did not obtain a direct admission from Dr. Jain,

either that he knew of a best mode for practicing the 

asserted claims or that he concealed it. What counsel 

elicited from Dr. Jain was a repeated denial on his part 

that the illumination system of the ’013 patent was the 

best mode for practicing the “illumination source” limitation of the asserted claims, accompanied by an inability 

on Dr. Jain’s part to identify any other particular mode 

that would have been as good or better. From that testimony, the district court concluded that Dr. Jain was not 

being truthful and that in fact he both had a best mode 

for the illumination source and concealed it.

The district court focused on the following aspects of 

Dr. Jain’s deposition testimony: (1) his admission that the 

illumination system disclosed in the ’013 patent, which he 

depicted in his notebook, was one method for producing a 

uniform source of light in a polygonal shape; (2) his admission that the notebook also depicted his lithography 

system claimed in the patents in suit and that it related 

the hexagonal light tunnel component in the illumination 

system of the ’013 patent to that depiction; (3) his admission that when he filed the ’013 patent he believed it had 

advantages over some prior art methods; and (4) his 

statement, when asked if he had in mind any method 

superior to the hexagonal beam shaper and uniformizer 

tunnel for providing uniform light to the mask, that he 

did not recall, but that he “certainly may have had, because this method of providing uniform hexagonal illumination on the substrate certainly is not the only optimum 

method. And I was quite aware of that.” Notably, 
12 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION, INC. 

throughout his deposition Dr. Jain contended that the 

illumination system of the ’013 patent was only one of 

many possible options and that he never considered that 

system to be part of the preferred embodiment of the 

patents in suit.

From that evidence, the district court concluded that 

Dr. Jain had effectively admitted that he “knew of something that subjectively was the best,” yet he “did not

declare it; he did not disclose it.” The court interpreted 

Dr. Jain’s statements to establish only that “there was [a] 

logical possibility” that a better mode could have existed, 

but that Dr. Jain did not have one in mind when he 

invented his lithography system. Based on that finding, 

the court ruled that “there is no issue of fact, that Dr. Jain

was clear in his admission . . . and he therefore failed to 

satisfy what is clearly set out in section 112.”

In reaching its conclusion, the district court drew unfavorable inferences from Dr. Jain’s testimony and disregarded two pieces of evidence that bear on the propriety of 

the grant of summary judgment. The court in effect 

concluded that even though Dr. Jain professed to have 

known of other methods for providing a source of uniform 

hexagonal illumination, his inability to identify any such 

methods showed conclusively that he was unaware of any 

that were as good as the one disclosed in the ’013 patent. 

But that discounts the interpretation of Dr. Jain’s testimony offered by Anvik—that, as he testified, he knew of 

other suitable methods for producing a uniformly illuminated hexagonal field but at the time of his deposition 

could not recall the details of any of those other methods. 

A finder of fact might reject that interpretation of Dr. 

Jain’s testimony by finding his explanation to lack credibility. On the other hand, the fact-finder might find his 

explanation plausible in light of the passage of nearly 20 

years from the time of the ’257 application to the time of 

the deposition, particularly considering the high burden of 

proof requiring the defendants to produce clear and 
 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION , INC. 13

convincing evidence of facts invalidating the asserted 

claims. 

In his declaration submitted following his deposition, 

Dr. Jain sought to clarify his responses to some of the 

questions asked at his deposition relating to the best 

mode issue. He explained that he did not regard the 

hexagonal light tunnel described in the ’013 patent as 

either a new invention or the best method of providing 

illumination for the invention of the ’257 patent. Instead, 

the light tunnel was inventive only in combination with 

the light beam source system of the ’013 patent, consisting of both a laser and a lamp. He added that he had not 

said, and did not believe, that the illumination system 

including the hexagonal mask and tunnel was the preferred method for providing illumination in the practice of 

the ’257 patent; it was, he said, “one system of many 

known to me at the time that were capable of illuminating 

a uniform region on a mask.” He stated that while the 

illumination system of the ’013 patent “had advantages 

over some prior-art systems,” he did not consider it to be 

“the best or only means of providing a source of illumination for practicing the microlithography method that 

became the ’257 patent.” He further explained that when 

he said in his testimony that the method of the ’013 

patent was “the best I had thought of until then,” he 

meant that he “personally had not invented a better way 

to produce uniform illumination.”

It is true, as the defendants point out, that a declaration that seeks to withdraw admissions made in a witness’s deposition is not entitled to weight. Second Circuit 

law applies because this is a procedural issue that is not 

unique to patent law. See Micro Chem., Inc. v. Lextron,

Inc., 317 F.3d 1387, 1390–91 (Fed. Cir. 2003). The Second 

Circuit has held that a party “may not, in order to defeat 

a summary judgment motion, create a material issue of 

fact by submitting an affidavit disputing his own prior 

sworn testimony.” Trans-Orient Marine Corp. v. Star 
14 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION, INC. 

Trading & Marine, Inc., 925 F.2d 566, 572 (2d Cir. 1991). 

On the other hand, the Second Circuit has made clear 

that this principle does not apply “if the deposition and 

the later sworn statement are not actually contradictory.” 

Palazzo ex rel. Delmage v. Corio, 232 F.3d 38, 43 (2d Cir. 

2000). 

In this case, Dr. Jain’s post-deposition declaration 

sought to explain and expand upon Dr. Jain’s deposition 

testimony. It did not clearly contradict that previous 

testimony and therefore should have been considered by 

the court in assessing the defendants’ summary judgment 

motion. 

A second piece of evidence that was before the court in 

the summary judgment proceedings was an expert declaration from Dr. Bruce W. Smith, who stated that “beamshaper-uniformizers such as the one that constitutes part 

of the ’013 patent were well known in the prior art at the 

time of filing of the ’013 and ’257 patent applications.” 

The ’257 patent’s method, he stated, can be practiced 

using many types of illumination systems other than the 

single, specific type of illumination system described in 

the ’013 patent, and those other types of illumination

systems were well known at the time of filing of the ’257 

patent. Dr. Smith described the prior art beam-shaperuniformizers in some detail. He added that the same 

analysis applies to the illumination source systems disclosed in the ’236 and ’240 patents.

The district court should also have considered Dr. 

Smith’s expert declaration in connection with the summary judgment motion. The fact that better alternatives

for practicing the invention may be found in the prior art 

cannot establish that an inventor lacked a subjective best 

mode. See Bayer, 301 F.3d at 1314. However, Dr. Smith’s 

declaration at a minimum served to support Dr. Jain’s 

assertion that other, equally effective illumination sources 

were quite well known and therefore that he would have 
 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION , INC. 15

had no reason to focus on a best mode of practicing the

illumination source limitations of the ’257 patent. Both 

parties agree that Dr. Jain is more than qualified to be 

considered a person of ordinary skill in the art. Thus,

accepting all reasonable inferences in Anvik’s favor, a 

finder of fact could conclude that Dr. Jain testified truthfully when he claimed that, at the time of the invention, 

he was aware of other, equally useful modes of practicing 

his invention, even though he was unable to recall them 

during his deposition.

Dr. Jain’s reluctance to discuss the ’013 patent at the 

March 1991 conference also does not conclusively show 

that he regarded it as the best mode. The focus of Dr. 

Jain’s conference presentation was on his lithography 

method, not the illumination source, and his reluctance to 

discuss his illumination system, on which he had a patent 

application pending, does not necessarily mean that he 

considered it the best illumination option for his lithography system. In fact, he testified that one reason he did 

not discuss his own idea for an illumination source system

at the 1991 conference was that “several other types of 

beam uniformization or illumination systems were possible.”

There does remain a conspicuous gap in Dr. Jain’s 

testimony. Both at his deposition and in his declaration, 

he failed to identify any illumination source he deemed 

suitable for use in practicing the asserted claims, other 

than the one described in the ’013 patent. That omission 

may ultimately lead a finder of fact to conclude that Dr. 

Jain did, in fact, conceal what he believed to be the best 

mode of practicing the invention. At this juncture, however, that omission is not sufficient, in light of the other 

evidence of record, to persuade us that a finder of fact 

would be required to find clear and convincing evidence 

that Dr. Jain believed the illumination system of the ’013 

patent was the best mode for practicing the inventions of 

the asserted claims, and that he concealed that best mode 
16 ANVIK CORPORATION v. NIKON PRECISION, INC. 

from the public. Because a judicial determination of this 

factual dispute before trial is premature, we reverse the 

grant of summary judgment and remand this case to the 

district court for further proceedings.

REVERSED and REMANDED