Source: http://patents.hdp.com/?cat=14
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 15:06:49+00:00

Document:
In Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. T-Mobile USA, Inc., [2017-2434, 2017-2435](September 4, 2018), the Federal Circuit affirmed the district court’s determination that the claims of U.S. Patent No. 6,640,248 were indefinite, and vacated and remanded summary judgment of non-infringement because of erroneous claim construction.
patentee demonstrated an intent to deviate from the ordinary and accustomed meaning of a claim term through expressions of manifest exclusion or restriction, representing a clear disavowal of claim scope, and the statements in the prosecution history did not meet this exacting standard.
In Mastermine Software, Inc., v. Microsoft Corp., [2016-2465](October 30, 2017), the Federal Circuit affirmed the court’s claim construction, but reversed the court’s indefiniteness determination, and remand for proceedings consistent with its opinion.
U.S. Patent Nos. 7,945,850 and 8,429,518 describe a process by which an electronic worksheet is automatically created. The district court construed the term “pivot table,” resulting in a stipulation of non-infringement. The district court also agreed with Microsoft that certain of the claims were indefinite for improperly claiming two different subject-matter classes.
that the generated pivot table contains data or presents data. The Federal Circuit further found that the specification further supports the district court’s construction, noting that in the context of the invention is to display data that can be viewed, summarized, and manipulated by users, and such user action is available upon the generation of the pivot tables. The Federal Circuit further found that prosecution history of the patents provides additional support for the district court’s construction. Finally, the Federal Circuit found that MasterMine’s arguments in support of its contrary claim construction were not compelling.
explicitly claim the user’s act of selection, but rather, claim the system’s capability to receive and respond to user selection.
affirmed the jury verdict of infringement of U.S. Patent Nos. 6,240,376, the denial of JMOL, and the award of $36,000,000 in damages, and that that assignor estoppel bars Synopsys from challenging the validity of the patent.
reversed summary judgment that U.S. Patent No.
affirmed summary judgment that U.S. Patent No. 7,069,526 lacks patent-eligible subject matter.
presenting evidence of willful infringement.
Regarding Assignor Estoppel, the Federal Circuit rejected Synopsys argument that the Supreme Court abolished the doctrinal underpinnings of assignor estoppel in Lear, Inc. v. Adkins.
Regarding the Damage Award, the Federal Circuit noted that the facts of this case are remarkably simple for a patent damages appeal and Synopsys does not dispute any of them.
profits analysis. However, the Federal Circuit said that Panduit’s requirement that patentees prove demand for the product as a whole and the absence of non-infringing alternatives ties lost profit damages to specific claim limitations and ensures that damages are commensurate with the value of the patented features.
reasonable certainty, noting that a skilled artisan would understand “near” requires the HDL code and its corresponding circuit analysis to be displayed in a manner that physically associates the two.
subject matter invalid under 35 U.S.C. § 101. The specification defined machine-readable medium as including carrier waves, found to be unpatentable in In re Nuijten, 500 F.3d 1346 (Fed. Cir. 2007).
With respect to willful infringement, the Federal Circuit found the district court erred in barring evidence of willful infringement. Specificaly, the Federal Circuit rejected a rigid rule that post-filing willful infringement cannot be presented unless the party moves for a preliminary injunction.
With respect to written description, the Federal Circuit found that there was adequate written description. The Federal Circuit found that the very language of claim 1 which the court held was not supported by the specification was present in the originally-filed claims. Original claims are part of the original specification and in many cases will satisfy the written description requirement.
Finally, with respect to claim preclusion, the Federal Circuit said that claim preclusion does not bar later infringement allegations with respect to accused products that were not in existence at the time of the previous actions for the simple reason that claim preclusion requires that in order for a particular claim to be barred, it is necessary that the claim either was asserted, or could have been asserted, in the prior action.
In Massachusetts Institute of Technology v. Shire Pharmaceuticals, Inc., [2015-1881] (October 13, 2016), the Federal Circuit affirmed the district court’s construction of “vascularized organ tissue” and “cells derived from a vascularized tissue” and its determination that the term “three-dimensional scaffold” was not indefinite, and thus the parties stipulated to a final judgment of validity and infringement stands.
The Federal Circuit said that the doctrine of prosecution disclaimer precludes patentees from recapturing through claim interpretation specific meanings disclaimed during prosecution. In order for prosecution disclaimer to attach, the disavowal must be both clear and unmistakable. Where the alleged disavowal is ambiguous, or even amenable to multiple reasonable interpretations, the Federal Circuit said that it has declined to find prosecution disclaimer.
On the first term, “vascularized organ tissue,” the district court determined that there was no clear and unmistakable disclaimer that would exclude skin from the term’s ordinary meaning, and construed the term “vascularized organ tissue” as “vascularized tissue from an organ,” reasoning that because “the dermal layer of skin contains blood vessels, this term encompasses skin,” and the Federal Circuit agreed. The Federal Circuit analyzed the statements identified by Shire in the context of the claims pending at the time they were made. Federal Circuit determined that a skilled artisan, reading the prosecution history as a whole, would conclude that MIT’s invention does in fact cover vascularized skin.
The Federal Circuit also agreed with the district court’s construction of “cells derived from a vascularized tissue” to include both parenchymal and non-parenchymal cells, noting that the claims themselves do not make a distinction. After reading the full prosecution history in light of the then-pending claim language, the Federal Circuit concluded that a skilled artisan would not read MIT’s statements made during prosecution — and directed to very different claim language — as limiting the term “cells derived from a vascularized tissue” to parenchymal cells.
Lastly with respect to the district court’s determination that the term “three-dimensional scaffold” is not indefinite, the Federal Circuit affirmed the district court’s claim construction and validity determination. While Shire asserted that there was no definition of “three-dimensional,” the district court construed the term “three dimensional” according to its accepted, ordinary meaning, as confirmed by dictionary definitions. Shire complained that these were current, non-technical dictionaries, but the Federal Circuit pointed out that Shire failed to show how technical dictionaries or dictionaries contemporaneous to the patents’ filing date would define the term any differently, and in fact the definitions were consistent with Shires own experts.
In Cox Communications, Inc. v. Sprint Communication Company LP, [2016-1013] (September 23, 2016), the Federal Circuit reversed the district court’s determination that the asserted claims of U.S. Patent Nos. 6,452,932; 6,463,052; 6,633,561; 7,286,561; 6,298,064; and 6,473,429 were not invalid for indefiniteness.
term, and confined its review to whether “processing system” renders the asserted patents indefinite under 35 U.S.C. § 112, ¶ 2. The Federal Circuit found that the claim term “processing system” does not prevent the claims, read in light of the specification and the prosecution history, from informing those skilled in the art about the scope of the invention with reasonable certainty.
scope of the claims, it is difficult to see how this term would prevent the claims from serving their notice function under § 112, ¶ 2.
does not prevent the claims from doing just that.
In Advanced Ground Information Systems, Inc. v. Life360, Inc., [2015-1732] (July 28, 2016) the Federal Circuit affirmed summary judgment of invalidity of U.S. Patent Nos. 7,031,728 and 7,672,681 for indefiniteness.
At issue was the term “symbol generator” in the claims in a cellular communication system. The Federal Circuit agreed that “symbol generator” invoked 35 U.S.C. § 112, ¶ 6, but were indefinite under 35 U.S.C. § 112, ¶ 2.
and otherwise recites abstract elements “for” causing actions, or elements “that can” perform functions.
does not identify a structure by its function.
“symbol generator.” The function of generating symbols must be performed by some component of the patents-in-suit; however, the Federal Circuit said that the patents-in-suit do not describe this component.

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