{"id":4287,"date":"2024-10-18T14:20:11","date_gmt":"2024-10-18T19:20:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/?p=4287"},"modified":"2024-11-07T09:23:44","modified_gmt":"2024-11-07T15:23:44","slug":"dismissal-of-infringement-claim-reversed-because-additional-analysis-and-proceedings-were-needed-to-arrive-at-a-proper-claim-construction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/?p=4287","title":{"rendered":"Dismissal of Infringement Claim Reversed Because Additional Analysis and Proceedings were Needed to Arrive at a Proper Claim Construction"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In Utto Inc. v. Metrotech Corp.<\/em>, [2023-1435]<\/a>(October 18, 2024), the Federal Circuit we vacated in part the dismissal of Utto\u2019s claim for infringement of U.S. Patent No. 9,086,441, which describes and claims methods for detecting and identifying underground utility lines, and affirmed the dismissal of Utto\u2019s claim for tortious interference with prospective economic advantage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The court construed the claim language \u201cgroup of buried asset data points\u201d in both the \u201creceiving\u201d and \u201cgenerating\u201d limitations of claim 1 to require \u201ctwo or more\u201d buried asset data points for each <\/em>buried asset, adopting that construction as reflecting the \u201cordinary and customary meaning.\u201d The court acknowledged that the specification in two places refers to \u201cone or more buried asset data points\u201d for a given buried asset, but the court said that those references to the singular occur \u201c[o]nly twice\u201d and \u201cneither supports the ordinary reading of the claim language itself.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On appeal, Utto argued that a district court may never engage in claim construction in deciding a motion to dismiss.\u00a0 The Federal Circuit did not agree that claim construction is categorically forbidden at the Rule 12(b)(6) stage of a case. But the Federal Circuit agreed that, in this case, additional analysis and proceedings are needed to arrive at a proper construction.\u00a0 UTTO pointed to several pieces of extrinsic evidence that it sought to present at further proceedings, including encyclopedia articles on \u201cgroup theory\u201d and \u201cgroup,\u201d the testimony of its founder, and the testimony and report of an expert.\u00a0 The Federal Circuit itself saw \u201cseveral issues relevant to a proper claim construction that would significantly benefit from fuller exploration by the parties and the district court.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Federal Circuit noted that the claim language does not appear to be the kind of language that has so \u201cplain\u201d a univocal meaning that to give it a contrary construction would require meeting the high standard of redefinition or clear disclaimer.\u00a0 Relatedly, the Federal Circuit noted, to the extent that \u201cgroup of [plural term]\u201d shares the character of plurals, the proper meaning is presumptive, but only presumptive\u2014the specification not having to rise to the level of redefinition or disclaimer to overcome the presumed \u201ctwo or more\u201d meaning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Federal Circuit vacated the district court\u2019s dismissal of UTTO\u2019s infringement claim and remand for further claim construction proceedings. We do not here decide whether the district court\u2019s claim construction is correct.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In Utto Inc. v. Metrotech Corp., [2023-1435](October 18, 2024), the Federal Circuit we vacated in part the dismissal of Utto\u2019s claim for infringement of U.S. Patent No. 9,086,441, which describes and claims methods for detecting and identifying underground utility lines, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4287","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-claim-constructino"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4287"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4287\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4288,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4287\/revisions\/4288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/patents.harnessip.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}