Opinion ID: 2792853
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: “Rigidly secure”

Text: The district court determined that Fivetech does not infringe claims 1, 6, 8–10, and 14 of the ’012 patent because the accused products do not meet the limitation that the captive screw includes a knob that is rigidly secured to the screw head. ’012 Order, 2013 WL 5298576, at . In rendering its noninfringement judgment, the district court concluded that “rigidly secure” requires displacing knob material. The district court noted the term “rigidly secure” is not defined in the claims or in the specification of the ’012 patent but concluded that “rigidly secure” required displacement because the specification provides that “‘the screw head with the protrusions rigidly secures the screw head to the inner surface of the knob and provides a press-fit of the screw to the inner surface of the knob.’” Id. at  (quoting ’012 patent col. 1 ll. 53– 56). SOUTHCO, INC. v. FIVETECH TECHNOLOGY INC. 13 Figure 4 shows a portion of a captive screw with protrusions (26). ’012 patent col. 2 ll. 33–34. According to the specification, the screw (20) can be rigidly secured to the knob by the protrusions (26), which provide a press-fit whereby material in the knob is displaced by the protrusions. ’012 patent col. 3 ll. 31–38. Exemplary claim 1 recites:
taching the panel to a surface, the surface hav- ing a threaded hole, the captive screw comprising: a) a screw having a head portion and a shaft hav- ing at least a threaded portion, said head por- tion having an outer perimeter and a plurality of protrusions provided on said outer perimeter of said head portion; b) a knob having an inner surface, wherein said protrusions rigidly secure said head portion to said inner surface of said knob; and 14 SOUTHCO, INC. v. FIVETECH TECHNOLOGY INC. c) a ferrule having a first end and a second end through which said shaft extends, said ferrule having a panel attachment means at said first end to secure the captive screw to the panel. ’012 patent col. 6 ll. 14–28 (emphasis added). We hold that the district court improperly limited the claims of the ’012 patent to one method of rigid securement described in the specification. Claim 1 requires “a knob having an inner surface, wherein said protrusions rigidly secure said head portion to said inner surface of said knob.” ’012 patent col. 6 ll. 21–23. Rigidly secure has an ordinary meaning, namely that the component parts are attached such that they do not separate during normal operation. As the district court recognized, “rigidly secure” is not defined in the intrinsic record and nothing in the intrinsic record clearly and unmistakably redefines the term. Fivetech’s argument that the claim is limited by the specification is unavailing. “The standards for finding lexicography and disavowal are exacting.” GE Lighting Solutions, LLC v. AgiLight, Inc., 750 F.3d 1304, 1309 (Fed. Cir. 2014). The abstract simply identifies a specific way of making parts of the captive screw rigidly secure. ’012 patent, Abstract (stating that captive screw has “protrusions integral to the outer perimeter of the head portion of the screw to rigidly secure . . . the screw to the inner surface of the knob . . . where the screw is pressed into the knob from the underside of the knob”). Similarly, the Summary of the Invention does not require displacement for parts to be rigidly secure. Id. col. 1 ll. 41–44, 53– 55 (“The captive screw of the present invention has a unique configuration in the means by which the screw portion of the captive screw is mounted to the knob of the captive screw” and that “the screw head with the protrusions rigidly secures the screw head to the inner surface of the knob and provides a press-fit of the screw to the SOUTHCO, INC. v. FIVETECH TECHNOLOGY INC. 15 inner surface of the knob.”). Finally, the embodiments in the specification regarding the advantages of pressfitting, meaning pushing the screw head into the knob, are inapposite because the claim requires the parts be rigidly secure, not press-fitted. Accordingly, we hold that “rigidly secure” means “the component parts are attached such that they do not separate during normal operation.”