Opinion ID: 984451
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: e., disk drives.

Text: Convolve’s argument that the record evidence from 1992 does not establish that the ’635 patent was not enabling for disk drives in 1988 is illogical. First, if the inventor himself was unable to implement the method in disk drives in 1992, it necessarily means that he would not have been able to implement the method four years earlier. Also, Convolve’s bald assertion that long seeks were not a necessary component of functional disk drives in 1988 is undercut by Dr. Singer’s own attempts to perform long seeks on disk drives. If long seeks were not relevant, it is unlikely Dr. Singer would have testified that his drives were a failure or to set aside the project involving those drives until 1997. Convolve provides no more than attorney argument that long seeks were a mere commercial requirement. Attorney argument alone cannot preclude summary judgment on this issue. Convolve’s reliance on CFMT, Inc. v. Yieldup Intern. Corp., 349 F.3d 1333 (Fed. Cir. 2003) is misplaced. Convolve contends that CFMT compels us to reverse the district court’s finding because long seeks are a commercial embodiment for certain drives, and thus irrelevant to enablement. In CMFT, we found that the fact that a claimed method failed to meet the specific commercial CONVOLVE v. COMPAQ COMPUTER 39 requirements of a client did not mean the patent was nonenabling. Id. at 1339. The record evidence here, however, as demonstrated by Dr. Singer’s own testimony, is that the claimed method required functioning long seeks in the disk drives and these seeks were not simply a preference of a single customer. Again, Dr. Singer conceded that the failure to implement long seeks caused him to put aside attempts to implement the method in disk drives for over five years. That testimony is unrebutted. As such, CMFT does not apply to these facts. By choosing such broad claim language, Convolve put itself “at the peril of losing any claim that cannot be enabled across its full scope of coverage.” Magsil Corp. v. Hitachi Global Storage, Techs., Inc., 687 F.3d 1377, 1381 (Fed. Cir. 2012). Dr. Singer’s testimony that his later advancement allowed him to figure out why the ’635 patent method was not working for disk drives is a strong indication that the patent was not enabling when it was filed. Indeed, “[t]he enablement doctrine’s prevention of over broad claims ensures that the patent system preserves necessary incentives for follow-on or improvement inventions.” Id. at 1384. Here, the inventor himself concedes that he was unable to fully implement the claimed method in disk drives for nine (9) years after the filing date. As such, we affirm the district court’s finding of invalidity regarding claims 1–4 and 7 of the ’635 patent.