High Court: Patents Court judgments, 2009

Patent claims are construed as the skilled person would understand them. Specific embodiments do not ordinarily add limitations omitted from general claim…

On a summary judgment application, a claim has a realistic prospect of success only where it carries some degree of conviction. The court must avoid a…

For obviousness, the question is whether the claimed invention, considered as claimed, would have been obvious to the skilled person. A product or formulation…

A patent claim must be construed through the eyes of the skilled person, without importing limitations from a preferred embodiment or the drawings. For an…

Patent claims are construed by asking what the skilled person would understand the patentee to mean in context. Where a two-part claim is expressly based on…

An indemnity in an intellectual property licence agreement may protect a licensee against third-party claims that exploitation of the licensed rights infringes…

For anticipation, the prior art must clearly describe, or clearly instruct the skilled person to make, something that would necessarily infringe, and must be…

A patent claim term should ordinarily have a consistent meaning across the claims. A skilled person may understand a claimed device to include a combination of…

Patent claims directed to applying glue to a roll by rolling the roll over a slit require the rolling movement to play an active part in picking up the glue. A…

For Article 3(a) of the Council Regulation 1768/92/EEC, the relevant question is which active ingredients of a combination product are protected by the claims…

Costs in patent litigation are governed by the general discretion under CPR 44.3. The unsuccessful party will usually pay the successful party’s general costs…

A product claim using “for” may be construed as requiring suitability for the stated purpose. The product must be capable of producing a real beneficial effect…

A patent claim defined by functional results must be enabled across its full scope. It is insufficient to identify desirable parameters if the skilled person…

Patent claims are construed purposively through the eyes of the skilled addressee, but deliberate claim limitations remain significant and there is no general…

A patent claim directed to the use of an impurity to control crystal habit is construed according to its substance. “Control” may include monitoring, checking…

A product claim using the word “for” ordinarily claims a product suitable for the stated purpose, rather than a product actually intended for that purpose. A…

In exercising its discretion as to costs, the court must consider all the circumstances, including party conduct, success on individual issues and…

Patent claims must be construed as the skilled person would understand the patentee’s language in context. A stent is radially expandable if it can be…

Patent claims must be construed purposively, by reading the claims in the context of the specification and asking what the skilled person would understand the…

A properly constituted and arguable patent revocation claim is not an abuse merely because the claimant lacks a commercial interest or has been offered a…

Anticipation by inevitable result requires proof that every relevant way of carrying out the prior-art teaching would produce the patented subject matter. A…

Where an earlier judgment has held patent claims excluded because they concern computer implementation, amended dependent claims remain caught by that decision…

A preliminary issue should be ordered only where it is likely to dispose of the proceedings or a substantial aspect of them, materially reduce costs or trial…

The discretion to stay national patent proceedings because parallel EPO or foreign proceedings are pending is wide and must secure the balance of justice in…

The court referred questions concerning the interpretation of the supplementary protection certificate regime to the Court of Justice. Its provisional view was…

In assessing obviousness, the court must identify the skilled person, the relevant common general knowledge, the inventive concept and the differences from the…

For an infringement claim under section 60(1)(b) of the Patents Act 1977, offering a device with user-settable parameters can amount to offering a range of…

The Aerotel four-stage approach remains the governing framework for computer-program and business-method exclusions, although it should not be applied…

Patent claims must be construed from the perspective of the skilled person, having regard to the technical purpose of the claimed elements. A microemulsion…

A patent claim for a fentanyl patch is construed through the eyes of the skilled person and given a practical meaning. A monolithic patch has one functional…

Under section 40(1) of the Patents Act 1977, an employee inventor may obtain compensation where the employer owns the patented invention, the patent has been…

Restoration of a lapsed patent under section 28(3) of the Patents Act 1977 requires the proprietor to show that it took reasonable care to secure payment of…

Case management must balance overlapping issues and the risk of inconsistent evidence against proportionality, equality of arms and the efficient use of…

A patent specification must identify the technical benefit said to support the invention. A general assertion of an unexpectedly beneficial therapeutic effect…

For novelty, prior art must disclose subject matter which would necessarily infringe the claim and must disclose it sufficiently to enable the skilled person…

Unregistered design right protects copying of an embodied design, not an abstract concept or general design idea. Similarity may support an inference of…

On an application for an interim patent injunction, the court must assess whether there is a serious issue to be tried and then consider the adequacy of…

A patent specification need enable the skilled person to construct the claimed device, but need not provide a complete clinical manual for using it. A claim…