——(2020) Supreme People’s Court Final Civil Judgment No. 1070

Shenzhen Chuzhidao Environmental Protection Hi-Tech Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Chuzhidao Company) is the patentee of the invention of "Dynamic Physical Shielding Purifier". Chuzhidao Company believed that the product being sued with infringement produced by Shenzhen Zhongtianmei Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Zhongtianmei Company) belongs to the protection scope of claim 1 in the patent in dispute, and sued it to the court, demanding Zhongtianmei Company to stop the infringement and compensate its loss.

Claim 1 of the patent in dispute includes the following technical features:

A. a dynamic physical shielding purifier, which is characterized in covering a central disk and a few circular spokes;

B.one end of the spoke is radially radiated and fixed to the on the center plate;

C. the product multiplied by the diameter and the number of the spokes placed in the same plane is between 46 and 460 (including the both digitals);

D. the diameter of the spokes is in millimeters when calculating, which is bigger than or equal to 0.3mm.

In the trial of second instance, both parties confirmed that the sued infringing technical solution have the same technical features as the above-mentioned technical features A, B and D, and there was only a dispute over technical feature C. The spokes on the sued infringing product formed two parallel planes, and Zhongtianmei Company believed that this feature was obviously different from the "in the same plane" described in claim 1.

The court of first instance believed that the alleged infringing technical solution was equivalent to the claim 1 in dispute in terms of the controversial technical features, so it determined that Zhongtianmei constituted infringement and judged it to compensate Chuzhidao Company with a 500,000 yuan. Zhongtianmei Company refused to accept the original judgment and appealed to the Supreme People's Court. The trial of second instance reckoned that the original court’s incorrectly understood the number "one" in claim 1, and in terms of the technical features in dispute, the alleged infringing technical solution was same as claim 1 involved in the case, instead of being equivalent, so the court identified the infringement to be established, and accordingly rejected the appeal and affirmed the original verdict.

In accordance with the Supreme People’s Court, based on the understanding of technical feature C by those of general skill in the art, who have already read the claims, descriptions and attached drawings of the patent involved in the case, the object defined by the technical feature C is in fact the product value of the diameter and number of spokes in the same plane. The core content of the value is the coordination between the two physical parameters of spoke thickness and arrangement density. The pursuing technical effect is to maximize the purification rate of the dynamic physical shielding purifier, rather than the number of planes composed by spokes. In other words, the “in the one identical plane” mentioned in the technical feature C should be understood as “in the same plane”, and this understanding has no relation to the number of planes formed by the spokes.

Through the trial of this case, the Supreme People’s Court clarified a rule of adjudication, that is, if a patent claim contains the number “one”, it should not be identified as a quantitative limitation, but ensure its specific meaning according to those skilled in the art after reading the documents. This case has certain reference significance for the interpretation of specific numbers in the claims.

From CNIPA

May 11th, 2021