Carter-Wallace, Inc. v. Gillette Co., CARTER-WALLAC

• Citation: 675 F.2d 10
• Decision Date: 07 April 1982
• Docket Number: Nos. 81-1403,CARTER-WALLAC,81-1426,INC,s. 81-1403
• Parties: , Plaintiff-Appellant, v. The GILLETTE COMPANY, Defendant-Appellee., Plaintiff-Appellee, v. The GILLETTE COMPANY, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit

Page 10

675 F.2d 10

214 U.S.P.Q. 497

CARTER-WALLACE, INC., Plaintiff-Appellant, v. The GILLETTE COMPANY, Defendant-Appellee.

CARTER-WALLACE, INC., Plaintiff-Appellee, v. The GILLETTE COMPANY, Defendant-Appellant.

Nos. 81-1403, 81-1426.

United States Court of Appeals First Circuit.

Argued Dec. 11, 1981.

Decided April 7, 1982.

Herbert P. Kenway, with whom George W. Crowley, Edmund R. Pitcher, and Kenway & Jenney, Boston, Mass., were on brief, for Carter-Wallace, Inc.

Robert W. Furlong, with whom Frank P. Porcelli, Gregory A. Madera, and Fish & Richardson, Boston, Mass., were on brief, for The Gillette Co.

Before CAMPBELL and BOWNES, Circuit Judges, WYZANSKI, ^* Senior District Judge.

BOWNES, Circuit Judge.

These appeals arise from a patent infringement action brought by Carter-Wallace, Inc., against The Gillette Company. The patent-in-suit covered the formula for an aerosol antiperspirant underarm spray called ARRID EXTRA DRY (Arrid). After a jury-waived trial, the district court, 531 F.Supp. 840, in a comprehensive well-written opinion found and ruled that Carter-Wallace's patent was invalid for obviousness and lack of criticality. The court specifically rejected Gillette's claim of anticipation. It also ruled that if the patent were valid, Gillette would be liable for infringement. The district court further found that the doctrine of file wrapper estoppel was not applicable. Gillette's motion for attorney's fees pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 285 ¹ was denied. Carter-Wallace appeals from the findings of obviousness and lack of criticality. Gillette cross-appeals the findings on anticipation and infringement.

BACKGROUND

Sometime after man emerged from the primeval state, it became apparent that the odor given off by the human body during and after perspiration was not particularly pleasing and the more civilized humans became, the more offensive became the smell of sweat. We are informed by reliable authority that perspiration itself does not have an unpleasant odor; it is the decomposition by bacteria of organic matter contained in the perspiration that smells. Because of the nature of the beast, the armpits are a particularly strong source of body odor. The use of clothes, which inhibits the free flow of air over the body, compounds the problem. Unfortunately for our olfactory senses, underarm sweating is a natural and necessary function of the human body. Man has striven mightily since time immemorial to reduce or disguise the after odor of body perspiration. For centuries, soap and perfume were the main weapons in man's continuing battle to smell sweet or, at least, avoid smelling too badly. Our era, in line with its general progress in science and technology, has seen the advent of two new weapons in the continuing war against body odor, the deodorant and the antiperspirant. The deodorant reduces odor by covering it up; it acts like and is indeed similar to perfume. The antiperspirant, on the other hand, goes to the root of the problem; it reduces perspiration. At first, deodorants and antiperspirants were applied in the form of creams and lotions. Then came a new breakthrough; the use of an aerosol spray to apply the product. This patent case is but one battle in the continuing struggle by cosmetic companies for access to the armpits of America. The amount of money involved in selling products promising to eliminate or reduce underarm perspiration and odor can be gauged by the fact that the inventors of the patent-in-suit were paid royalties of almost nine million dollars ($8,826,167.41).

Starting in the early sixties there was a concentrated effort by a number of companies to develop an aerosol spray for the effective application of an underarm antiperspirant. One of the problems was that the antiperspirant most commonly used, aluminum chlorohydrate, was a salt which when dissolved in water was corrosive to ordinary metals. The aluminum chlorohydrate also had a tendency to clog the apertures from which the aerosol spray was propelled. These side effects of aluminum chlorohydrate were due to the same thing that made it effective as an antiperspirant, its reaction with water. In order to be effective as an antiperspirant, the particles of aluminum chlorohydrate must be dissolved in water so as to produce aluminum ions which act as an astringent, reducing perspiration. Most of the aerosol sprays contained particles of aluminum chlorohydrate in an aqueous solution so they would be effective antiperspirants. Unfortunately, an aqueous solution of aluminum chlorohydrate also produces an acid which is corrosive to ordinary metals. Another aspect of aluminum chlorohydrate caused the clogging problem. It is hygroscopic; it absorbs moisture from the atmosphere. Clogging results when residual particles of aluminum chlorohydrate in the spray valve orifices absorb water from the atmosphere and crystallize. The corrosion and clogging problems could be reduced by using the antiperspirant in a dry powder form. This, however, resulted in a billowing or powder puff effect when applied. The American public preferred a moist application. The corrosive and clogging actions of aluminum chlorohydrate made it difficult to develop an aerosol antiperspirant spray that could be applied consistently and evenly. ²

In 1965 George Spitzer and Lloyd Osipow, after a year's work, came up with an efficient antiperspirant aerosol spray. It overcame the corrosion and clogging problems and deposited a wet spray containing aluminum chlorohydrate that markedly reduced perspiration consistently and evenly on the armpit. Carter-Wallace learned of the Spitzer-Osipow formula, tested it, obtained the patent rights to it, and in 1967 introduced it commercially as Arrid. Arrid became an overnight success. In 1968 it captured ten percent of the underarm products market with sales of approximately twenty million dollars. By 1972 Arrid had sixteen percent of the market with sales of almost sixty-five million dollars. There must be factored into this sales picture the nearly fifty million dollars in advertising spent by Carter-Wallace between 1967 and 1972.

DESCRIPTION AND CLAIMS OF THE PATENT

The district court accurately stated the objects of the patent:

The stated objects of the patent are to provide an improved anti-perspirant aerosol formulation which: (1) causes minimum internal container difficulties and improved results with respect to corrosion and valve malfunction; (2) is applied to the skin as a wet spray in the form of a liquid suspension of astringent material, the astringent material being activated by the moisture of the air and the body; (3) imparts a feeling of lubrication and reduces the likelihood of inhalation problems; and (4) minimizes valve clogging and leakage.

Although the claims are restricted to aluminum chlorohydrate as the antiperspirant, the patent includes other salts that have antiperspirant qualities. The basic difference between the Spitzer-Osipow formula and the other antiperspirant solutions was that the aluminum chlorohydrate was expelled from the container suspended as a powder in hydrophobic (water repelling) oil. Many of the experts in this arcane field had believed that suspending the particles of aluminum chlorohydrate in oil would inhibit their astringent antiperspirant effect because moisture would be prevented by the oil from activating the particles and forming aluminum ions. For some unexplained reason, this does not happen; the antiperspirant action of the aluminum chlorohydrate is not inhibited by the oil which effectively eliminates the corrosion and clogging problem. We now turn to the specific issues in the case.

OBVIOUSNESS

Our standard of review is clear:

In this circuit, the question of obviousness vel non is essentially one of fact, see ITT v. Raychem Corp., 538 F.2d 453, 456 (1st Cir. 1976) and cases cited; cf. Spound v. Mohasco Industries, Inc., 534 F.2d 404 (1st Cir. 1976), and we will not reverse a district court's applications of the correct legal principles unless we believe them clearly erroneous. See Forbro Design Corp. v. Raytheon Co., 532 F.2d 758, 763 (1st Cir. 1976).

Rosen v. Lawson-Hemphill, Inc., 549 F.2d 205, 209 (1st Cir. 1976). See also Scully Signal Co. v. Electronics Corp. of America, 570 F.2d 355 (1st Cir. 1977), cert. denied, 436 U.S. 945, 98 S.Ct. 2848, 56 L.Ed.2d 787 (1978); Dale Electronics v. R.C.L. Electronics, Inc., 488 F.2d 382 (1st Cir. 1973).

At the outset, we are faced with a serious question as to whether the district court applied the correct legal principles in determining the issue of obviousness. The statute pertaining to obviousness, 35 U.S.C. § 103, contains two sentences:

A patent may not be obtained though the invention is not identically disclosed or described as set forth in section 102 of this title, if the differences between the subject matter sought to be patented and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains. Patentability shall not be negatived by the manner in which the invention was made.

It is the second sentence that concerns us. The Historical and Revision notes state:

The second sentence states that patentability as to this requirement is not to be negatived by the manner in which the invention was made, that is, it is immaterial whether it resulted from long toil and experimentation or from a flash of genius....