Fisher & Paykel Healthcare Ltd & Anor v ResMed Ltd & Anor

For patent claim scope, the court must first determine the normal meaning of the claim. Only if the variant falls outside that meaning should the Actavis questions on equivalents be considered. A snap-fit does not inherently require sudden recovery, audible or tactile feedback, reversibility, or deflection by a particular component. A snap finger is an identifiable protrusion capable of forming a generally beam-type snap-fit; it need not have particular proportions or be the component that flexes. Interference fits and snap-fits may coexist. For obviousness, a routine workshop choice is not automatically obvious merely because several options are known. The court must assess whether selecting the claimed arrangement would have been uninventive in the relevant technical context.

Fisher & Paykel Healthcare sought revocation of three UK patents concerning CPAP masks and declarations of non-infringement. ResMed counterclaimed for infringement. ResMed consented to revocation of two patents before trial, leaving EP (UK) 2 707 258, concerning a CPAP mask with a shroud, frame collar and snap-fit connection.

The issues were the proper scope of claims 1, 2, 9, 12 and 14; whether the claims lacked novelty or inventive step over the Geist and Lovell patent applications; and whether Fisher & Paykel’s Simplus and Eson masks infringed. The central questions were whether the prior art disclosed the claimed snap-fit and snap fingers, and whether any remaining differences were obvious.

1. The 258 patent was invalid for lack of novelty and inventive step over both Geist and Lovell. The Simplus and Eson masks would have infringed the claims relied upon if the patent had been valid.

2. Following Actavis v Eli Lilly [2017] UKSC 48, the court first determines the normal meaning of the claim and considers equivalents only if the variant falls outside it. The court followed Generics v Yeda [2017] EWHC 2629 (Pat) on purposive construction before equivalents, and its view that anticipation by equivalence is unavailable, though that latter reasoning was obiter.

3. “Snap-fit” covers an arrangement in which a protruding feature is deflected during assembly because of interference and then recovers, wholly or partly, into mating engagement. It does not require sudden recovery, audible or tactile confirmation, reversibility, or deflection by the snap finger itself. Components may remain partly stressed after assembly, and an interference fit may also be a snap-fit.

4. “Snap finger” means an identifiable protrusion capable of forming a generally beam-type snap-fit. It has no prescribed proportions and need not flex independently or at all. The expression excludes some other recognised forms, such as annular and ball-and-socket snap-fits.

5. Geist and Lovell each disclosed shroud-to-collar connections involving temporary interference followed by recovery. Each therefore disclosed both an interference fit and a snap-fit. Geist also anticipated claim 12 on a purposive construction because the collar’s angled lower surface performed the function of a protrusion. Lovell anticipated claim 12 because the shoulder on the collar retained the snap-fit.

6. Under the Pozzoli approach, obviousness remained a fact-sensitive question. A workshop modification or choice may be obvious where it is a common general knowledge option, but a general variety of known snap-fits is insufficient without showing that selecting the claimed snap-finger arrangement would have been uninventive. The relevant claims were nevertheless obvious over Geist and Lovell.