On-Line Technologies v. Perkin-Elmer (Fed. Cir. 2004).
On-Line sued Perkin-Elmer for infringement of its patent that provides a method of increasing the light-path in a spectrometer with corrected astigmatism and reduced diffusion. (U.S. Patent No. 5,440,143). After construing the claims, the district court granted summary judgment of noninfringement.
On appeal, On-Line argued that the claims were too narrowly construed, and that the allegedly infringing mirrors having a toroidal surface fall within the claim limitation of a substantially spherical surface. Perkins-Elmer disagreed, noting that On-Line specifically omitted toroidal surfaced mirrors from its claims, and thus “that On-Line had dedicated surfaces of that shape to the public.”
The Federal Circuit agreed with On-Line that toroidal surfaces are covered by the claims.
We reach that conclusion because the specification makes clear that the claim language referring to spherical surfaces with cylindrical components includes toroidal surfaces.
The court vacated and remanded this portion of the district court decision, but affirmed the rest.