Case Name: EXXON CHEMICAL PATENTS, INC., Exxon Corporation and Exxon Research and Engineering Co., Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. LUBRIZOL CORPORATION, Defendant-Appellant
Court: United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
Jurisdiction: United States
Decision Date: 1995-09-01
Citations: 64 F.3d 1553
Docket Number: Nos. 93-1275, 94-1309
Parties: EXXON CHEMICAL PATENTS, INC., Exxon Corporation and Exxon Research and Engineering Co., Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. LUBRIZOL CORPORATION, Defendant-Appellant.
Judges: Before NIES, PLAGER, and CLEVENGER, Circuit Judges.
Reporter: Federal Reporter 3d Series
Volume: 64
Pages: 1553–1570

Head Matter:
EXXON CHEMICAL PATENTS, INC., Exxon Corporation and Exxon Research and Engineering Co., Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. LUBRIZOL CORPORATION, Defendant-Appellant.
Nos. 93-1275, 94-1309.
United States Court of Appeals, Federal Circuit.
Sept. 1, 1995.
William C. Slusser, Baker & Botts, L.L.P., Houston, Texas, and Donald R. Dunner, Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner, Washington, D.C., argued for plaintiffs-appellees. With them on the brief were Lawrence F. Seinto, Hugh C. Barrett, Fitzpatrick, Celia, Harper & Seinto, New York, New York, Thomas Gibbs Gee, Lee L. Kap-lan, and David Hrieik, Baker & Botts, L.L.P., Houston, Texas, and George E. Glober, Jr., Exxon Chemical Co., Houston, Texas and Allen M. Sokal, Finnegan, Henderson, Fara-bow & Garrett, Washington, D.C.
S. Leslie Misrock, Pennie & Edmonds, New York, New York, and Timothy B. Dyk, Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue, Washington, D.C., argued for defendant-appellant. With them on the brief were George J. Moscarino, John W. Edwards, II, Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue, Cleveland, Ohio, Stanton T. Lawrence, III, Paul J. Zegger, Pennie & Ed-monds, New York, New York, and Kenneth R. Adamo, Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue, Dallas, Texas.
Before NIES, PLAGER, and CLEVENGER, Circuit Judges.

Opinion:
CLEVENGER, Circuit Judge.
Lubrizol Corporation (Lubrizol) appeals the February 5,1993 judgment of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas, Houston Division, inter alia holding that U.S. Patent No. 4,867,890 assigned to Exxon Chemical Patents, Inc. (Exxon) is not invalid under 35 U.S.C. § 102 or § 103 (1988) and is enforceable, and that Lubrizol willfully infringed the claims of the '890 patent. We reverse the judgment of infringement. We vacate the award of attorneys' fees and costs to Exxon, the injunction entered against Lubrizol, and the damage award entered on February 15, 1994.
I
After extensive discovery, this patent infringement case was tried to a jury. Following the jury's verdict of willful infringement, the judge concluded that the case was exceptional under 35 U.S.C. § 285 (1988) and awarded Exxon its attorneys' fees and costs. Lubrizol's post trial motion for judgment as a matter of law or for a new trial was denied by the judge, and Lubrizol timely brought this appeal. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(1) (1988).
The central issue in this appeal is claim interpretation. Exxon's claims are to a lubricating oil composition suitable for use as a crankcase lubricant in internal combustion engines. The claimed composition is defined as comprising—meaning containing at least—five specific ingredients. Exxon contends that its patent claims a "recipe" of ingredients that extends to any product made by using the claimed ingredients, even if the product itself—as a result of chemical com-plexing—fails to include one of the claimed ingredients. Lubrizol argues that since Exxon claims a composition product—not a process for making a product or a product made by a claimed process—the '890 patent only extends to final products that include the specified claimed ingredients.
The trial judge, candidly expressing considerable difficulty in understanding the chemistry and law involved in the case, treated the issue of claim interpretation as a matter of deciding which of the two parties offered the correct meaning of the claims. The jury was charged according to Exxon's preferred claim interpretation.
The duty of the trial judge is to determine the meaning of the claims at issue, and to instruct the jury accordingly. Markman v. Westview Instruments, Inc., 52 F.3d 967, 970 (Fed.Cir.1995). In the exercise of that duty, the trial judge has an independent obligation to determine the meaning of the claims, notwithstanding the views asserted by the adversary parties. The pursuit of that obligation in this case would have resulted in a determination that Exxon's preferred claim interpretation is incorrect, and that Lubrizol's is only partly correct. As we explain below, under a jury charge stating the correct interpretation of the claims, no jury could reasonably have found—on the evidence submitted by Exxon—that Lubrizol's accused products literally infringe Exxon's claims. Because of Exxon's failure of proof, Lubrizol is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. See Zenith Labs., Inc. v. Bristolr-Myers Squibb Co., 19 F.3d 1418, 1424, 30 USPQ2d 1285, 1290 (Fed.Cir.1994). Accordingly, we reverse the final judgment on liability entered on the jury verdict and vacate the order awarding attorneys' fees and costs and the injunction entered against Lubrizol. The judgment of the District Court which is the subject of Lubrizol's companion appeal challenging the award of damages is vacated.
II
Exxon and Lubrizol manufacture crankcase lubricating oil compositions and concentrate compositions which are mixed with oil basestock to produce lubricating oils for motor vehicle engines. Such products typically contain the following components as additives: (1) a dispersant, which suspends impurities to prevent sludge and varnish deposits on engine parts, (2) ZDDP, a zinc-containing compound that inhibits engine wear and produces antioxidant results for the oil, (3) a detergent, which helps prevent engine deposits, and (4) a supplemental antioxidant, necessary because use of ZDDP is limited by environmental concerns. Oxidation of the oil component substantially shortens the life of lubricating oils. Oxidation results in increased acidity of the lubricant, which can enhance corrosion of engine parts and increase viscosity of the product, thereby degrading its lubricant qualities.
Exxon's '890 patent seeks enhanced antioxidant results by the addition of a small amount of copper as the supplemental antioxidant to the other typical ingredients of the product. The prosecution history of Exxon's patent emphasized the beneficial synergistic effects caused by the added copper when in the presence of an ashless dispersant.
Ill
We have recently concluded in banc that claim interpretation is a matter of law, and that the trial judge alone has the duty and responsibility to interpret the claims at issue. Markman, 52 F.3d at 970. After close of the evidence in this ease, the judge heard argument from the parties on the meaning of Exxon's claims. During that argument, Lubrizol argued that the meaning of the claims should be left to the jury for decision, if the court failed to agree with Lubrizol's preferred claim interpretation. The judge correctly refused to submit the issue to the jury, and instead decided which of the two proffered interpretations seemed most correct. It may well be that in some cases one side or the other will offer the correct claim interpretation to the judge. More often, however, it is likely that the adversaries will offer claim interpretations arguably consistent with the claims, the specification and the prosecution history that produce victory for their side. In any event, the judge's task is not to decide which of the adversaries is correct. Instead the judge must independently assess the claims, the specification, and if necessary the prosecution history, and relevant extrinsic evidence, and declare the meaning of the claims. No matter when or how a judge performs the Markman task, on appeal we review the issue of claim interpretation independently without deference to the trial judge.
IV
Representative of the claims of the '890 patent, claim 1 is directed to "[a] lubricating oil composition suitable as a crankcase lubricant in internal combustion engines comprising" (1) a major amount of lubricating oil, (2) an ashless dispersant (ie. one that neither contains nor is eomplexed with metal) in specified amounts of "about 1 to 10 wt. (3) from about 0.01 to 5.0 parts by weight of oil soluble ZDDP, (4) 5 to 500 parts per million by weight of added copper in the form of an oil soluable copper compound, and (5) magnesium or calcium detergent.
The subject of claim interpretation was argued to the judge at the close of Exxon's case and was considered again in extensive argument at the close of all the evidence. At the conclusion of the arguments, the judge decided that Exxon was correct in its view of the claims' meaning. The parties did not contend that the claims of the '890 patent are process claims drawn to a specified manner of manufacture, and the claims as written could not have such meaning. Nor are the claims said to be, or could they be, product-by-process claims. The claims of the '890 patent are drawn to a particular composition: they are product claims. According to Exxon, its claims cover any product that is made by using the specific ingredients identified in the limitations of claim l. During the trial, Exxon's claims were thus said to be to a "recipe" for making the composition. Whether the specified ingredients could be found in the actual composition produced by mixing the ingredients is, according to Exxon, simply irrelevant to the meaning of the claims. To emphasize this point, Exxon's counsel stated — both to the trial judge and this court — that Exxon's claims will cover a composition that has the added copper regardless of whether any ashless dispersant can be found in the mixture. In short, in Exxon's view the claimed "recipe" for making the claimed product is the claimed product.
The trial judge charged the jury accordingly:
I instruct you that Exxon's claims cover the ingredients which go into the composition. If you find that Exxon has proved that a Lubrizol product is made by using the starting ingredients in the amounts called for in one or more of Exxon's claims, then that product directly infringes.
The issue of claim interpretation had been raised first by Lubrizol in its motion for a directed verdict at the close of Exxon's ease, which the judge denied. The issue was raised again by Lubrizol's motion for judgment as a matter of law at the close of all the evidence, also denied by the judge. The charge to the jury on claim interpretation was also challenged by Lubrizol, both before the case was submitted to the jury and by the post trial motion for judgment as a matter of law.
As noted above, Exxon's claims are drawn to a specific product which has particularly defined ingredients. Nothing in the claims, the specification, or the prosecution history suggests that Exxon's claims are not drawn to a product that contains particular ingredients. Indeed, to the contrary, the title to the '890 patent reads, with the emphasis added, "Lubricating Oil Compositions Containing Ashless Dispersant, [ZDDP], Metal Detergent and a Copper Compound". See Titanium Metals Corp. of Am. v. Banner, 778 F.2d 775, 780, 227 USPQ 773, 777-78 (Fed.Cir.1985) (referring to patent's title as interpretative aid). The language of claim 1 refers to "added" copper and to a detergent "additive." The specification demonstrates that those claim references aim at a chemical composition to which ingredients are being introduced. We must give meaning to all the words in Exxon's claims. In re Sabatino, 480 F.2d 911, 913, 178 USPQ 357, 358 (CCPA 1973) ("Claim limitations defining the subject matter of the invention are never disregarded.") In addition, the text of the '890 specification includes over twenty references to "containing" in reference to the ingredients claimed in the composition. Furthermore, during prosecution of the applications that resulted in the '890 patent, Exxon repeatedly emphasized that the genius of its invention lay "in the previously unknoum synergism of this material [copper] with ZDDP in the presence of an ashless dispersant of the type described in the application...."
In sum, a review of the claims, the specification, and the prosecution history all point to the conclusion that Exxon claims a product, not merely a recipe for making whatever product results from the use of the recipe ingredients. This conclusion respects that which is claimed, namely a chemical composition. The chemical composition exists at the moment the ingredients are mixed together. Before creation of the mixture, the ingredients exist independently. The particular proportions specified in the claims simply define the characteristics of the claimed composition.
Under Lubrizol's view of the claims, as asserted at trial and on appeal, the composition claimed by Exxon is limited to the final product made and ready for use in the engine environment. Lubrizol is correct that the claims read on a product, not simply a recipe, but Lubrizol errs in thinking that the claims read only on end product compositions. Lubrizol thus asserts a claim meaning that depends upon the time at which one views the composition claimed. The specification as a whole, and the claims in particular, contain no temporal limitation to the term "composition." Indeed, claim 61 reads on a concentrate for preparing lubricants, which is hardly a product ready for consumer end use. The composition of claim 1, once its ingredients are mixed, is a composition existing during manufacture that is being used to produce the end product. Consequently, as properly interpreted, Exxon's claims are to a composition that contains the specified ingredients at any time from the moment at which the ingredients are mixed together. This interpretation of Exxon's claims preserves their identity as product claims, and recognizes as a matter of chemistry that the composition exists from the moment created. Although Lubrizol is correct in taking Exxon's claims to read on a product, its interpretation of Exxon's claims is too narrow. Exxon is entitled to a broader scope that is not time-limited, one that reads on any product at any time that contains the claimed proportions of ingredients. The correct interpretation simply affords Exxon a wider range of product on which to assert infringement. Indeed, Exxon even took advantage of the correct interpretation during trial. When defending its case under Lubrizol's claim interpretation, Exxon did not introduce evidence that Lubrizol's final product infringed. Instead of offering evidence that analyzed the components of Lubrizol's final product, Exxon's witnesses testified to the reaction that occurs when the Lubrizol product is in the process of being made into the final product. According to Exxon's witnesses, that reaction did not result in complete elimination of ash-less dispersant in the product. Exxon thus did not focus on Lubrizol's final product to prove infringement. Exxon adopted the broader view and described the infringing activity as occurring while the claimed ingredients were undergoing chemical reactions, necessarily a time before the final product, ready for sale, exists.
We thus hold that the judge erred as a matter of law in giving Exxon's preferred claim interpretation to the jury, and in using that interpretation in ruling on Lubrizol's post trial motion. Under the proper charge, the jury would not have been asked if Lubri-zol used Exxon's starting ingredients. Instead, the jury would have been asked to find whether Exxon had proved by a preponderance of the evidence that Lubrizol's products at some time contained each of the claimed recipe ingredients in the amounts specifically claimed.
V
Given the correct interpretation of Exxon's claims, the dispositive question before us is whether any jury could reasonably have found that Lubrizol's accused products literally infringe the claims of the '890 patent as properly construed. Jamesbury Corp. v. Litton Indus. Prods., 756 F.2d 1556, 1560-61, 225 USPQ 253, 257 (Fed.Cir.1985). Our authority to decide this question has been explicitly stated by the Supreme Court:
If the evidence presented in the first trial would not suffice, as a matter of law, to support a jury verdict under the properly formulated defense, judgment could properly be entered for the respondent at once, without a new trial. And that is so even though (as petitioner claims) respondent failed to object to jury instructions that expressed the defense differently, and in a fashion that would support a verdict.
Boyle v. United Technologies Corp., 487 U.S. 500, 513-514, 108 S.Ct. 2510, 2519, 101 L.Ed.2d 442 (1988). Lubrizol thus may be entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Id.
"The question of whether the evidence is sufficient to create an issue of fact for the jury is itself a question of law, which we will now decide." Jamesbury, 756 F.2d at 1560, 225 USPQ at 257. Literal infringement requires that every limitation in Exxon's claims be found in the accused product. Laitram, 939 F.2d at 1585, 19 USPQ2d at 1369. Exxon's burden is thus to prove by a preponderance of the evidence, among other things, that Lubrizol's products contained at some time ashless dispersant in the amounts specifically claimed.
From the beginning of the trial, Exxon was on notice that Lubrizol's view of claim interpretation required Exxon to prove that Lubrizol's products contained ashless dispersant in the amounts specified. Exxon was also aware from discovery that Lubrizol would defend against the charge of infringement by proof that its products as manufactured contained no ashless dispersant. Exxon thus had the choice of simply proving infringement under its view of the claims, or in addition proving infringement under Lu-brizol's view as well. Exxon chose to do both. Lubrizol's defense on its view of the claims is based on its evidence that, when one mixes the ingredients specified in Exxon's claims, (1) the soluble copper compound reacts with ZDDP to form a zinc compound and CuDDP and (2) zinc then bonds to the formerly ashless dispersant to render it non-ashless, inasmuch as, after the reaction, it is complexed with a metal. According to Lu-brizol, the reactions are immediate and the bond formed between the dispersant and zinc is firm, and as a result, its product lacks the ashless dispersant specified as a necessary ingredient in Exxon's claims.
At trial, Exxon sought to prove its case, under Lubrizol's claim interpretation, with testimony that the bond formed between the zinc and the dispersant was a weak one. The bond was described as unstable, with the moleeules bonding, unbonding and rebonding constantly. The process was described variously as analogous to a square dance with partners swapping around, to hand-holding and unholding, and to hats being taken on and off. The bonding and unbonding, also described as a "dynamic equilibrium," occurs an infinite number of times. According to Exxon, the weak bond — with its constant reversal and rebonding — proved that Lubrizol's dispersant was not always nonashless, and therefore sometimes ashless. Exxon's proof was supplied by expert opinion and did not include any scientific measurements resulting from tests of Lubrizol's accused products. Exxon's proof did not relate to infringement by Lubrizol's final products. Instead, its proof was aimed at the presence of ashless dispersant during manufacture of the end product.
Lubrizol's expert witnesses countered with their opinion that the bond created between the zinc and the dispersant was a strong complex, and that the dispersant remained non-ashless 99.999% of the time. The testimony of Lubrizol's witnesses relied on nuclear magnetic resonance tests performed by Lubrizol on its products, and concluded that there is no ashless dispersant in Lubrizol's accused products after blending their starting ingredients.
We may assume for purposes of this appeal that a jury hearing such evidence could reasonably have concluded that — at some time — during the manufacture of the product or in its manufactured state — ashless dispersant is found in Lubrizol's product. That assumption, however, is not dispositive of Lubrizol's post trial motion for judgment as a matter of law. It is not enough for Exxon to prove that some of the dispersant in Lubri-zol's product is ashless even if momentarily. Lubrizol's motion is only thwarted if Exxon has supplied testimony from which a reason able jury could conclude that Lubrizol's products contain ashless dispersant in the specific amounts claimed. Exxon offered no testimony on the amounts of ashless dispersant present in Lubrizol's products. Nor did Exxon provide the jury with direct evidence from which it could have inferred that the required percentages are found in the composition after it is created out of its specified starting ingredients. In its briefs to this court, Lubrizol emphasized Exxon's failure of proof with regard to the quantities of the ingredients contained in the accused products. Exxon did not respond with assertions that the record included proofs of the quantities of ingredients present in the accused products. Instead, Exxon argued only that "Lubrizol started with the requisite amount of ashless dispersant and, even under its theory, ashless dispersant is still present in Lubrizol's final product, albeit in ever-changing form." In order to prevail under properly interpreted claims, Exxon was obliged to prove both the presence of ashless dispersant and presence of the required quantity. Exxon's failure as to the latter requires us to conclude as a matter of law in Lubrizol's favor.
Post-trial motion practice entails, inter alia, ascertainment of whether correct law has been applied to the facts presented at trial in reaching a verdict or judgment. When a trial judge determines on a post-verdict motion what the law correctly is, the judge then determines whether any juror could reasonably have reached—on the evidence presented at trial—the verdict challenged by the post-verdict motion. If the answer is no, the trial judge reverses the jury verdict for failure of proof on the correct legal standard, and denies the loser a second trial on the correct law. That is what happened at trial in Markman, and we affirmed that disposition in banc, 52 F.3d 967, 978, 989.
When we determine on appeal, as a matter of law, that a trial judge has misinterpreted a patent claim, we independently construe the claim to determine its correct meaning, and then determine if the facts presented at trial can support the appealed judgment. If not, we reverse the judgment below without remand for a second trial on the correct law. That is what we did to the bench trial in Laitram Corp. v. Rexnord, Inc., 939 F.2d 1533, 1539 (Fed.Cir.1991), citing as support the very language from the Supreme Court decision in Boyle that we rely upon herein to deny Exxon the second trial that Judge Nies would provide. We ordinarily do the same thing in the appellate review of jury trial cases, typically explaining our duty as follows:
Accordingly, we must determine whether there exists evidence of record upon which a jury might properly have returned a verdict in Litton's favor when the correct legal standard is applied. If there is not, Jamesbury was entitled to have the question removed from the jury and decided as a matter of law.
Jamesbury Corp. v. Litton Indus. Prods., Inc., 756 F.2d 1556, 1560 (Fed.Cir.1985). See also Dana Corp. v. IPC Ltd. Partnership, 860 F.2d 415, 419 (Fed.Cir.1988). Such judicial events are not extraordinary.
On the- facts of this case, we perceive no reason to deviate from, or reject, the settled law that compels reversal. The correct meaning of Exxon's claims is but a slight variance from that urged vigorously and continuously by Lubrizol. That Lubrizol sought to hold Exxon to proof of infringement of product claims hardly comes, or came, out of the blue. Exxon was fully aware that Lubri-zol stood on a claim meaning that would require Exxon to prove the presence of specified amounts of claimed ingredients in some Lubrizol product. In fact, Exxon attempted to prove infringement under the interpretation we give to its claims. We have noted that Exxon chose not to introduce proofs of the contents of Lubrizol's final products. Rather, its proof of the presence of some ashless dispersant, evidence that we credit in testing the denial of the post verdict motion, relates to product in pre-final states. Nothing precluded Exxon from arguing and seeking to prove that a Lubrizol product, at some time after its creation, contained the specified ingredients in the claimed amounts. We have emphasized that Exxon's error was in failure of proof as to the claimed amounts, without which it could not prove infringe ment under Lubrizol's claim meaning. The trial judge did not interpret the claims until all the evidence was in, just before the case was submitted to the jury. Exxon — knowing Lubrizol's defense — knew that it would lose on Lubrizol's claim meaning unless it could show the presence of the claimed ingredients in the claimed amounts in some Lubrizol product. Exxon was free to choose the moment at which it would identify with proof that a Lubrizol product infringed. Thus, Exxon could have argued and sought to prove that ashless dispersant is present in the claimed percentages, along with the other claimed ingredients in their specified amounts, at any time from the moment of creation of Lubrizol's product. Exxon cannot now claim surprise from our variation on Lubrizol's claim meaning and cry foul in not having a second chance to prove what it was free to prove at trial. Consequently, on the facts of this case, we discern no reason to carve an exception into the settled law in order to provide Exxon an opportunity to escape from the flaws in its claim drafting (as described in Judge Plager's concurring opinion) and trial strategy. We therefore disagree with Judge Nies's view that our reversal without remand for a second trial is improper.
VI
Because Lubrizol is entitled to a judgment of noninfringement as a matter of law and thus to vacation of the order awarding Exxon its attorneys' fees and costs and of the in junction entered against Lubrizol, we need not reach the other grounds asserted by Lubrizol for reversal of the judgment of infringement or in the alternative for a new trial. Because there is no basis for a damage award against Lubrizol, we vacate the damage award in appeal No. 94-1309.
No costs.
REVERSED.
APPENDIX
Claim 1 of the '890 patent reads as follows:
1. A lubricating oil composition suitable as a crankcase lubricant in internal combustion engines comprising:
A. a major amount of lubricating oil;
B. a dispersing amount of lubricating oil dispersant selected from the group consisting of:
(1) ashless nitrogen or ester containing dispersant compounds selected from the group consisting of:
(a) oil soluble salts, amides, imides, oxazolines, esters, and mixtures thereof, of long chain hydrocarbon substituted mono- and discarboxylic acids or their anhydrides;
(b) long chain aliphatic hydrocarbons having a polyamine attached directly thereto; and
(e) Mannieh condensation products formed by condensing about a molar proportion of long chain hydrocarbon substituted phenol with from about 1 to 2.5 moles of formaldehyde and from about 0.5 to 2 moles of polyalkylene polyamine; wherein said long chain hydrocarbon group is a polymer of a C2 to C5 monoolefin, said polymer having a molecular weight of from about 700 to about 5000;
(2) nitrogen or ester containing polymeric viscosity index improver disper-sants which are selected from the group consisting of:
(a) polymers comprised of C4 to C24 unsaturated esters of vinyl alcohol or of C3 to Cjo unsaturated mono- or dicarboxylic acid with unsaturated nitrogen containing monomers having 4 to 20 carbons,
(b) copolymers of C2 to C20 olefin with C3 to C10 mono- or dicarboxylic acid neutralized with amine, hydroxy amine or alcohols, and
(c) polymers of ethylene with a C3 to C20 olefin further reacted either by grafting C4 to C2o unsaturated nitrogen containing monomers thereon or by grafting an unsaturated acid onto the polymer backbone and then reacting said carboxylic acid groups with amine, hydroxy amine or alcohol; and
(3)mixtures of (1) and (2); wherein when said lubricating oil dispersant (1) is present, then said dispersing amount of (1) is about 1 to 10 wt. %, and when said lubricating oil dispersant (2) is present, then said dispersing amount of (2) is from about 0.3 to 10 wt. %;
C. from about 0.01 to 5.0 parts by weight of oil soluble zinc dihydroearbyl dithiophosphate wherein the hydroearbyl groups contain from 1 to 18 carbon atoms;
D. an antioxidant effective amount, within the range of from about 5 to about 500 parts per million by weight, of added copper in the form of an oil soluble copper compound; and
E. a lubricating oil detergent additive which comprises at least one magnesium or calcium salt of a material selected from the group consisting of sulfonic acids, alkyl phenols, sulfurized alkyl phenols, alkyl salicylates and naphthenates, wherein said parts by weight are based upon 100 parts by weight of said lubricating composition and said weight % is based on the weight of said lubricating composition.
. The judgment is limited to literal infringement of Exxon's claims. The jury was charged solely with respect to literal infringement, directly or by inducement or contribution, and whether such literal infringement was willful. Although Exxon initially proposed a jury charge on infringement under the doctrine of equivalents, its counsel consented to the deletion of the doctrine of equivalents from the infringement charge given to the jury. Lubrizol's brief notes that "Exxon asserted only literal infringement", and Exxon does not contest that statement. The dissenting opinion raises a question of whether Exxon is now entitled to a jury trial on infringement under the doctrine of equivalents. That issue was not briefed or argued to the panel, and consequently we, unlike Judge Nies, express no view on that question.
. The issue of damages was reserved for trial after the trial on liability. The damage award against Lubrizol entered on February 15, 1994, is appealed in No. 94-1309, oral argument in which was heard on March 8, 1995. We have consolidated the appeal in No. 94-1309 with the appeal in No. 93-1275. In light of our reversal of the liability judgment against Lubrizol, no basis remains for a damage judgment against Lubrizol, and we therefore vacate the damage judgment entered in this case.
. The full text of claim 1 is set forth in the appendix to this opinion. Claim 61 of the '890 patent is drawn to a lubricating oil concentrate composition suitable for use in preparing crankcase lubricants. That claim, like claim 1, has specific quantity limitations for the ingredients, including the ashless dispersant ingredient. However, claim 61 does not require a "major amount" of lubricating oil (it requires "a lubricating oil," without specific amount), and it requires 10 to 60 wt. of ashless dispersant. Both claims were submitted to the juiy.
. If the claim is defined solely by the starting ingredients, a product actually containing all the specified ingredients would seem to escape at least literal infringement if produced by the combination of different ingredients. Such is at odds with the doctrine that a product claim is infringed by any product containing every claim limitation, regardless of how the product is made. See Laitram Corp. v. Rexnord, Inc., 939 F.2d 1533, 1535, 19 USPQ2d 1367, 1369 (Fed.Cir.1991); see also 2 Donald S. Chisum, Patents § 8.05 at 8-79 (1994) (collecting cases). Under Exxon's view, its claims also would seem not to reach a product made with a nonashless dispersant starting ingredient that is somehow rendered ashless during manufacture, if such a rendering is chemically possible.
. On the record before this court, it is not clear that the trial judge meant for the jury to consider the testimony about the nature of the bond between the zinc and the ashless dispersant. In discussions with counsel, the judge stated clearly that he would charge the juiy as Exxon wanted, and under Exxon's view of the claims what "happens in the pot" during or after manufacture of the composition, and Lubrizol's nuclear magnetic resonance evidence, is simply irrelevant. Under the claim interpretation charge given, there was no reason for the jury to consider the evidence of both parties going to whether Lubrizol infringes under its view of the claims. To find infringement as charged, all the jury had to find is that Lubrizol used Exxon's claimed starting ingredients in the amount claimed, an essentially uncontested fact.
. Orthokinetics, Inc. v. Safety Travel Chairs, Inc., 806 F.2d 1565 (Fed.Cir.1986), and Malta v. Schulmerich Carillons, Inc., 952 F.2d 1320 (Fed.Cir.1991), do not stand in the way of our decision. Each case raised the question whether a party seeking to upset a jury verdict on a post verdict motion had failed to preserve the ground for the post verdict motion by failing to specify that ground in earlier directed verdict motions. In Orthokinetics, the specific question was whether a motion for directed verdict of simple non-infringement embraced a later post verdict motion seeking to upset a jury verdict of willful infringement. The trial court had granted the motion, holding the evidence insufficient to support a jury verdict of willful infringement. This court concluded that the movant had failed to preserve the issue of willful infringement for the post verdict motion. 806 F.2d at 1579. This court, however, did not reverse the grant of the post verdict motion for failure to have preserved its ground. Indeed, this court did not conclude that the district court was even required to reject the post verdict motion. We only noted that the "district court might well have refused consideration of willfulness on the motion for JNOV in light of Rule 50(b)." Id. at 1580. Dispositively, this court held the ruling on the post verdict motion ripe for appellate review because the non-movant had not objected to the grounds stated in the post verdict motion.
It is difficult to understand how Orthokinetics in Judge Nies's hands helps the cause she advocates for Exxon. This is so because Orthokinetics teaches that even a legally insufficient post verdict motion may be acted upon by the trial judge with that action preserved for appellate review, if the non-movant has not objected to the content of the post verdict motion. We note, in passing, that Exxon did not object to the content of Lubri-zol's post verdict motion.
Malta sheds interesting light on what can be devined from Orthokinetics. In Malta, the question was whether a barebones motion for directed verdict, at the close of all the evidence, of noninfringement "on the grounds that the evidence is insufficient," 952 F.2d at 1324, was sufficient to support a post verdict motion challenging the verdict of infringement under the doctrine of equivalents for lack of "particularized function/way/result testimony and linking argument." Id. at 1325. This court concluded that the earlier general motion of noninfringement embraced all the particular arguments in support of the post verdict motion. In the light of Malta, we cannot fault the failure of Lubrizol, in its post verdict motion, to have argued that Exxon could prove infringement under Lubrizol's theory by proving not only that Lubrizol's final product infringed, but that any product made by Lubrizol that existed after the moment of creation also could infringe. Indeed, the spread between the general and the specific in Malta is enormous, compared to the distance between the meaning we give Exxon's claims on appeal and that advanced by Lubrizol to the trial judge. Lubrizol's view of the claims is less generous to Exxon than ours. If only Lubrizol's final product could infringe Exxon's claims, Exxon's proofs fail completely since it produced no evidence of the content of any Lubrizol final product. Only under the interpretation we give Exxon's claims does Exxon's evidence of infringement of a product claim have any relevance. This is so because the only evidence Exxon put on to show the presence of ashless dispersant in a Lubrizol product was evidence of the reaction that occurs during the manufacture of the Lubrizol final product. This evidence was offered when Exxon did not know if the trial court would accept its, or Lubrizol's proffered claim interpretation. Exxon thus fo-cussed on a product of Lubrizol that was not its final product, but, as we have noted, Exxon fell short of demonstrating that the ashless dispersant, when present, was present in the claimed amounts.