Kcj Corp. v. Kinetic Concepts, Inc.
| Decision Date | 13 January 1999 |
| Docket Number | No. 98-2047-KHV.,98-2047-KHV. |
| Citation | 39 F.Supp.2d 1286 |
| Parties | KCJ CORPORATION, Plaintiff, v. KINETIC CONCEPTS, INC., et al., Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Kansas |
Terry W. Schackmann, Therese M. Schuele, Michael F. Saunders, Teresa A. Woody, Spencer, Fane, Britt & Browne, Kansas City, MO, Stacy Y. Daniels, Spencer, Fane, Britt & Browne, Overland Park, KS, for KCJ Corp.
Lawrence A. Rouse, Marcus N. Bozeman, Vivian W. McLeod, Rouse, Hendricks, German, May & Shank, Kansas City, MO, for Kinetic Concepts Inc., KCI Therapeutic Services, Inc., Don P. Lovetere.
KCJ Corporation filed suit against Kinetic Concepts, Inc. and KCI Therapeutic Services, Inc., asserting that they willfully infringed its U.S. Patent No. 4,631,767 (the "'767 patent") by manufacturing and selling certain therapeutic low air loss mattresses. This matter comes before the Court on Plaintiff KCJ's Motion For Summary Judgment As To Infringement (Doc. # 225) and Defendants' Motion [For Partial Claim Construction And] For Summary Judgment Based On That Construction (Doc. # 231), both filed October 21, 1998. For the reasons stated below the Court finds that defendants' motion for summary judgment should be sustained and that plaintiff's motion should be overruled.
Summary judgment is appropriate "if the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law." Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c); accord Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 247, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986). The moving party bears the initial burden of showing that there is an absence of any genuine issue of material fact. Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 323, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 91 L.Ed.2d 265 (1986). Once the moving party meets its burden, the burden shifts to the nonmoving party to "set forth specific facts showing that there is a genuine issue for trial." Anderson, 477 U.S. at 256, 106 S.Ct. 2505. A "genuine" factual dispute requires more than a mere scintilla of evidence. Id. at 252, 106 S.Ct. 2505.
In considering a summary judgment motion the Court must view the evidence in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party. Tom v. First Am. Credit Union, 151 F.3d 1289, 1291 (10th Cir.1998). Summary judgment may be granted, however, if the nonmoving party's evidence is merely colorable or is not significantly probative. Anderson, 477 U.S. at 250-51, 106 S.Ct. 2505. Thus, "`[w]here the record taken as a whole could not lead a rational trier of fact to find for the nonmoving party,' summary judgment in favor of the moving party is proper." Thomas v. IBM, 48 F.3d 478, 484 (10th Cir.1995) (quoting Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574, 587, 106 S.Ct. 1348, 89 L.Ed.2d 538 (1986)).
On December 22, 1998, the Court entered a Memorandum and Order (Doc. # 279) which construed Claim 1 and set forth background facts concerning the patent application and prosecution history. The Court does not repeat its claim construction or factual recitation but incorporates them by reference.
First addressing defendants' motion for summary judgment, the Court finds that the following facts are either uncontroverted or, if controverted, set forth in the light most favorable to plaintiff.
On December 17, 1998, this Court held a Markman hearing and the parties presented argument and evidence concerning the proper construction of disputed terms in Claim 1 of the '767 patent. After considering the evidence produced at that hearing, the Court held that all of the disputed terms had a plain meaning in light of the '767 claims, the '767 specification, and the '767 prosecution history, and it then construed the disputed terms as a matter of law. The Court first addressed Clause (a), which claims "means defining a lower, continuous, inflatable chamber having an air-permeable, flexible upper wall portion." The Court determined that "[a] person of ordinary skill in the art of air bed engineering would read the phrase `continuous' to mean without interruption and the word `a' to mean one." The Court therefore determined as a matter of law that the phrase "a lower, continuous, inflatable chamber" claims one non-interrupted inflatable chamber. Memorandum and Order (Doc. # 279) at 8, 10-11.
The Court next addressed Clause (b), which claims that the upper wall portion is "constructed for substantially uniform airflow therethrough over substantially the entire plan surface area of said upper wall portion," and Clause (d), which claims that the secondary wall means is "constructed for substantially uniform passage of air therethrough over substantially the entire plan surface area of said secondary wall means." The Court held as a matter of law that "[a] person of ordinary skill in the art of air bed engineering would read `substantially uniform airflow' to mean airflow that does not substantially fluctuate over time." The Court therefore concluded that "[w]hen added to the words `over substantially the entire plan surface,' the claim requires that air flow at substantially the same rate at substantially all locations on the surface." Id. at 11, 13.
Finally, the Court construed Clause (c), which claims "air-permeable secondary wall means above said chamber upper wall portion and operably coupled with said chamber-defining means." The Court held that "[a] person of ordinary skill in the art of air bed engineering would read `operably coupled' to mean that two elements work in concert to create an inflatable chamber, e.g. one which is not air tight but can receive and hold air." Therefore the Court concluded that "whatever means is used to operably couple must create an inflatable chamber between the top wall and the secondary wall." Id. at 13, 15.
Kinetic Concepts, Inc. ("Kinetics") is a Texas corporation with its principal place of business in San Antonio, Texas. KCI Therapeutic Services, Inc. ("Therapeutic"), a Delaware corporation, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Kinetics which also has its principal place of business in San Antonio, Texas. At all relevant times, Therapeutic has been engaged in the business of marketing and distributing products made by or at the direction of Kinetics. Kinetics makes, offers for sale, rents and/or sells various low air loss mattresses: First Step, First Step Plus, First Step Select, First Step MRS, First Step Tri-Cell, First Step Advantage, and Home Kair DMS II. These mattresses — the accused devices — are patient support devices that are designed to prevent skin breakdown by reducing the interface pressure between the skin of a bedridden patient and the surface of the support device.1
Each of the accused devices includes an inflatable mattress, an air supply unit, and a removable cover sheet. Each inflatable mattress is a one-piece unit which consists of three separately inflatable sections that correspond to the head, body, and legs of the patient. None of the sections have chambers which are interdigitated.
Except on the First Step device, each of the three sections incorporates at least one panel of high air loss (HAL) Gore-Tex, an air-permeable fabric, on the top (patient support surface) of the mattress. On the First Step, this surface has stitched retainers which permit air to permeate the surface.
When defendants' devices are used in accordance with operating instructions provided by Kinetics, a removable cover sheet of HAL Gore-Tex covers the entire patient support surface of each mattress. The cover sheets are to be attached to the mattress by straps, Velcro strips, elastic bands, or normal hospital bed tucking.
Each of defendants' devices is inflated by a blower unit which maintains positive air pressure throughout the entire mattress by continuously blowing air into each section. Air flows from the mattress, through the HAL Gore-Tex panels in the upper wall of the mattress (in the case of the First Step, through the stitched retainers), and creates positive air pressure in the compartment between the inflatable mattress and the removable cover sheet, thus inflating the compartment between the inflatable mattress and the removable cover sheet. In each of the accused devices, air then flows through the removable mattress cover sheet.
"Literal infringement of a claim exists when every limitation recited in the claim is found in the accused device, i.e., when the properly construed claim reads on the accused device exactly." Engel Indus., Inc. v. Lockformer Co., 96 F.3d 1398, 1405 (Fed.Cir.1996). In this case, the Court's construction of Clause (a) and Clause (b) of Claim 1 prevents a finding of literal infringement as a matter of law.2 Further, because Claims 2, 3, and 4 are dependent on Claim 1, literal infringement of those claims is also impossible.3
Defendants are entitled to summary judgment on plaintiff's claim that they literally infringed Claim 1 of the '767 patent.
An accused device that does not literally infringe a patent claim may infringe under the doctrine of equivalents if "it performs substantially the same function in substantially the same way to obtain the same result." Graver Tank & Mfg. Co. v. Linde Air Prods. Co., 339 U.S. 605, 608, 70 S.Ct. 854, 94 L.Ed. 1097 (1950) (). The Supreme Court recently clarified this doctrine, stating that
Each element contained in a patent claim is deemed material to defining the scope of the patented invention, and thus the doctrine of equivalents must be applied to individual elements of the claim, not to the invention as a whole. It is important to ensure that the application of the doctrine, even as to an individual element, is not...
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KCJ Corp. v. Kinetic Concepts
...Kinetic) did not infringe KCJ Corporation's (KCJ's) U.S. Patent No. 4,631,767 ('767 patent). See KCJ Corp. v. Kinetic Concepts, Inc., 39 F. Supp. 2d 1286 (D. Kan. 1999) (KCJ II). Because the district court correctly concluded as a matter of law that the claims at issue cannot cover the accu......