Court Opinion

ID: 9495089
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 15:54:02.511358+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:56:48.180994
License: Public Domain

MAYER, Chief Judge,
dissenting.
Because the jury’s finding of prior public use under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) was supported by substantial evidence, I would affirm the district court’s holding that U.S. Patent No. 5,575,405 is invalid.
During trial, Orange Bang attempted to establish that its owner, David Fox, had constructed and publicly used a beverage dispenser that fully anticipated the claimed invention. To that end, it presented the testimony of six witnesses: David Fox, Bruce Burwick, Patrick Goff, Frank Cre-tella, John Massaro, and Richard Stein. The court states that Orange Bang failed to present sufficient evidence that the anticipating device possessed each and every limitation of the claims at issue. Specifically, the court says the evidence was insufficient as to the limitation of claim 6 requiring “positioning a transparent display bowl relative to the dispenser outlet to create the visual impression that said bowl is the reservoir and principal source from which a serving of the beverage is dispensed,” and the limitation of claim 9 that requires that the dispenser be “positioned relative to said outlet to create the visual impression that said container is the reservoir and principal source of said dispensed beverage issuing from said outlet.” Ante, at 738-39. However, I believe the court fails to appreciate the presentation conducted by David Fox. Consequently, it erroneously concludes that no reasonable jury could reach the result that it did.
During trial, Orange Bang brought a Starline pre-mix dispenser (Exhibit 64) into the courtroom. A Starline pre-mix dispenser is common in the marketplace and has a clear plastic bowl positioned above the dispenser outlet. From the counter up, it closely resembles the dispenser depicted in Figure 1 of the '405 patent. Ante, at 731. Counsel then asked Fox to explain to the jury how he converted this pre-mix dispenser to a post-mix dispenser.
Q. BY MR. SCHWAB: Could you explain to the jury using exhibit [64] ... what you did, sir.
A. Yes
What I did was, I took this nozzle off of the dispenser and in the case of dispensers like this it had a spacer.
Now, the reason it had a spacer that was about an inch long, wide or long, was so that this part would come out a little further to accommodate a whipping chamber here so the product could go down.
*747So when I took off the spigot it had a spacer which was screwed into the bolt and that spacer had a little hole in it, about a quarter of an inch.
So when you pulled the handle, the fluid would go through the little hole and come down into the cup.
So I plugged that hole with silicone and so that the liquid in the bowl would not come out.
And below it I put on a valve, a small little valve on the front of it and- then attached two conduits, one for water and one for syrup.
And that was where it would connect to a water line and the bag and box and this little valve had a lever on it.
You pushed the lever, activated the bag and box system and brought the product to the head and with the little funnel into the cup.
The technology and claims at issue are not complex. As Fox was describing to the jury the steps that he undertook to retrofit the Starline dispenser, it could have quite easily determined for itself, as it must have done, that the display bowl was positioned relative to the dispenser outlet to create the visual impression that the bowl is the reservoir and principal source from which a serving of the beverage is dispensed. We were not present for this demonstration and it was not recreated for us at oral argument, nor should it have been. The jury is the ultimate finder of fact and to second guess it in the manner that has been done here substantially invades its province. See Bio-Tech. Gen. Corp. v. Genentech, Inc., 267 F.3d 1325, 1330, 60 USPQ2d 1430, 1434 (Fed.Cir. 2001).
Fox’s testimony was not the only evidence presented on these claim limitations. As the court sets forth in detail, Burwick testified that Fox had described to him what he had done, specifically, converting a pre-mix Starline dispenser to a post-mix dispenser. Ante, at 738-40. Goff testified that he observed and operated the retrofitted dispenser at the Houston distributorship in the spring of 1983 and summer of 1984. Cretella testified that he used the dispenser in April of 1984. Stein testified that he saw Fox working on the retrofitted dispenser in 1984. The jury saw Fox’s demonstration, was aware of what a converted Starline dispenser looked liked, and heard the additional testimony of the other witnesses. It was well within their province to determine that the manner in which the device had been converted would create the visual impression that the bowl is the reservoir and principal source from which a serving of the beverage is dispensed.
The court continues that even if Orange Bang had presented evidence of all of the limitations, the result would have been the same because of a lack of corroboration. I respectfully disagree.
While the six witnesses presented by Orange Bang may have been interested in the outcome to varying degrees, the level of interest is only one of the eight factors set out in In re Reuter, 670 F.2d 1015, 1021 & n. 9, 210 USPQ 249, 255 & n. 9 (CCPA 1981), testimony as to all of which was before the jury. This is not a situation like Finnigan Corp. v. Int’l Trade Comm’n, 180 F.3d 1354, 51 USPQ2d 1001 (Fed.Cir.1999), where only one witness testified, or Washburn & Moen Mfg. Co. v. Beat ‘Em All Barbed-Wire Co., 143 U.S. 275, 12 S.Ct. 443, 36 L.Ed. 154 (1892), where, while 24 witnesses testified, the invention at issue was a subtle improvement over the prior art that would be easily missed by anyone other than a keen observer skilled in the art. At issue here was a drink dispenser, whose claimed elements were easily discernible. Moreover, the witnesses who testified were experi*748enced in the industry and understood the state of the art át the time that Fox retrofitted the Starline dispenser. The jury was aware of all of the detracting factors that might call into question their testimony and it still found the patent invalid. To decide on appeal, without having seen the witnesses, that the. testimony was insufficient as a matter of law is a distortion of our role in the judicial process.