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You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> England and Wales High Court (Chancery Division) Decisions >> Cunningham v Nokia Corporation [2008] EWHC 1174 (Ch) (09 May 2008) URL: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2008/1174.html Cite as: [2008] EWHC 1174 (Ch) |
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CHANCERY DIVISION
PATENTS COURT
MANCHESTER DISTRICT REGISTRY
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL |
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B e f o r e :
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FRANK CUNNINGHAM |
Appellant |
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- and - |
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NOKIA CORPORATION |
Respondent |
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Miss Lindsay Lane (instructed by The Waterfront Partnership) for the Respondent
Hearing dates: 9 May 2008
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Crown Copyright ©
Mr Justice Patten :
"1) A DEVICE CONSISTING OF A SMALL CAMERA LINKED TO A MOBILE, BUILT INTO A BACK OR FRONT DOOR OF A HOUSE ETC.
2) A TYPE OF 3G DOORBELL/ALARM SYSTEM/SECURITY SYSTEM
3) IT CAN ALSO BE ACTIVATED IF SOMEONE COMES WITHIN FEET OF YOUR HOUSE/BUSINESS/CAR. (PIR) OR BY DOORBELL ITSELF
4) A PERSON RINGS YOUR DOORBELL THIS ACTIVATES A CAMERA & 3G MOBILE SYSTEM WHICH ALERTS YOUR 3G PHONE. YOU CAN THEN TALK TO A PERSON AT YOUR FRONT DOOR WHEN YOU ARE AT WORK.
5) YOU ARE EFFECTIVELY IN WHEN OUT AT ALL TIMES CONTACTABLE EVEN BY PEOPLE WHO DO NOT KNOW YOUR NUMBER (MOBILE)
6) THE SECURITY IMPLICATIONS ARE THAT YOU GIVE THE IMPRESSION TO A POTENTIAL INTRUDER THAT SOMEONE IS AT HOME
7) BUILT IN CAMERA & MOBILE (TO TALK TO PERSON)
8) AT WORK YOU ARE NOTIFIED OF PERSON AT YOUR DOOR & ACT ACCORDINGLY BACK OF HOUSE CAMERA ALERTS YOUR MOBILE 3G OF PERSON CLOSE TO HOUSE/SECURITY.
9) IT ACTS AS BOTH SECURITY DEVICE & ACCESSIBLE DEVICE TO PERSONS WISHING TO BE CONTACTED AT ALL TIMES
10) DEVICE COULD BE CALLED A 3G DOORBELL & WOULD BE CALLED BY THIS NAME"
"1. A security system comprising a camera/cameras built into or above the door of a house or other property, the camera/cameras being linked (wireless/mains) and capable of sending picture information to a mobile phone and being activated both by a person pressing a doorbell and a PIR detector
2. A security system as claimed in claim 1 above which the mobile phone can be a 3G mobile phone"
3. A security system as claimed in either claims 1 or 2 in which the camera can also be linked (wireless/mains) to a mobile phone that can use PIR or other motion detector that can be set to activate within various parameters even inches
4. A security system as in claims 1 to 3 in which cameras can be provided at both front and back doors of a house or set above the doors and or within the grounds of a property
5. A security system as in any one of claims 1 to 3 where the system can be first set to be activated by a front doorbell or PIR detection or both
6. A security system for a vehicle comprising a PIR dectector and cameras, the cameras being activated by the PIR when a person is very close to the outside of the vehicle either to disable the power supply or vandalise and being capable of sending picture information to a mobile telephone"
" .
(a) that the opinion wrongly concluded that the patent was invalid, or was invalid to a limited extent; or
(b) that, by reason of its interpretation of the specification of the patent, the opinion wrongly concluded that a particular act did not or would not constitute an infringement of the patent."
"In the case of an appeal under rule 77K, the decision the subject of the appeal is itself a review of the opinion of the examiner. More specifically, it is a decision by the Hearing Officer as to whether or not the opinion of the examiner was wrong. I believe that a Hearing Officer, on review, and this court, on appeal, should be sensitive to the nature of this starting point. It was only an expression of an opinion, and one almost certainly reached on incomplete information. Upon considering any particular request, two different examiners may quite reasonably have different opinions. So also, there well may be opinions with which a Hearing Officer or a court would not agree but which cannot be characterised as wrong. Such opinions merely represent different views within a range within which reasonable people can differ. For these reasons I believe a Hearing Officer should only decide an opinion was wrong if the examiner has made an error of principle or reached a conclusion that is clearly wrong. Likewise, on appeal, this court should only reverse a decision of a Hearing Officer if he failed to recognise such an error or wrong conclusion in the opinion and so declined to set it aside. Of course this court must give a reasoned decision in relation to the grounds of appeal but I think it is undesirable to go further. It is not the function of this court (nor is it that of the Hearing Officer) to express an opinion on the question the subject of the original request."
"is always what the person skilled in the art would have understood the patentee to be using the language of the claim to mean. And for this purpose, the language he has chosen is usually of critical importance. The conventions of word meaning and syntax enable us to express our meanings with great accuracy and subtlety and the skilled man will ordinarily assume that the patentee has chosen his language accordingly. As a number of judges have pointed out, the specification is a unilateral document in words of the patentee's own choosing. Furthermore, the words will usually have been chosen upon skilled advice. The specification is not a document inter rusticos for which broad allowances must be made. On the other hand, it must be recognised that the patentee is trying to describe something which, at any rate in his opinion, is new; which has not existed before and of which there may be no generally accepted definition. There will be occasions upon which it will be obvious to the skilled man that the patentee must in some respect have departed from conventional use of language or included in his description of the invention some element which he did not mean to be essential. But one would not expect that to happen very often."
"63 .The examiner was of the opinion that the system comprises at least one camera, wherein the at least one camera must be capable of being activated by either a PIR detector or doorbell. This does not mean that the camera, in use, is connected to both a PIR detector and a doorbell, but it must have the 'capability' of being activated by both. The construction given in paragraph 20 is also open to alternative interpretations since it is unclear whether it is the 'system' or the 'camera' that must be capable of being activated in the specified manner, however, having regard to the comments made in paragraph 17, I am satisfied that it is the activation of the camera that is being referred to.
64 In my opinion, this interpretation of "the camera/cameras being activated both by a person pressing a doorbell and a PIR detector" would sit comfortably with a claim to just a single camera system. This would allow the single camera to be sited at the front of a property and linked to a doorbell, or alternatively sited at the rear of the property and linked to a PIR detector.
65 In relation to a claim to a system having more than one camera I can also see benefits in having a single design of camera that can be placed in various locations and connected to the most appropriate source of activation; which might be the doorbell at the front of the house or a PIR detector at the back. Whilst it is of course possible to envisage a system similar to that set out but having different designs of camera for the various locations each being activated only by one source, the simple fact is that that such a system is neither clearly disclosed nor more importantly claimed. I must therefore take the claim at face value and conclude that the examiner's interpretation in this respect is correct."
"67 I turn now to claim 6. The first thing that strikes me is that in claim 1, Mr Cunningham specifically refers to "camera/cameras" and thus clearly contemplates a system having just one camera or a system with more than one camera. He had the opportunity use exactly the same wording in claim 6 but chose to restrict the claim to a system with "cameras". The second thing that strikes me is that with one exception the claim makes linguistic and technical sense, and, significantly, there are two separate references to "cameras". The only part of the claim that is in any way ambiguous in terms of how it might impact on the scope of the claim, is the part that seems to be referring to the intent of the person who is very close to the outside of the vehicle. Mr Cunningham's argument that this part of the claim did not impose any restriction on the claim was accepted by the Opinion examiner. I believe that was correct and I too accept that this part imposes no limitation on the scope of the claim.
68 I can find no further ambiguity in this claim and I find its meaning no different when I look at the supporting description and drawings, which I might add, are noticeably silent on this aspect of the invention. I accept Mr Cunningham's argument that claim 6 is attempting to define something new, namely a security system for a vehicle, but the components within the system and the words used to define those components are quite conventional. Therefore, whilst Lord Hofmann's comments regarding references to things for which there are no known definitions, offer me assistance, I do not find that they lead me to an alternative interpretation of claim 6. It is clear to me that a skilled person who has read the single page description and noted the security system illustrated in the figures, would ultimately take the words of claim 6 at face value, with no alternative meanings being applied. In conclusion, I believe that the examiner correctly construed claim 6. "
"85 Put simply, and considering for example a patent specification, a disclosure is enabling if it is sufficient to enable a skilled person to perform the invention set out in that specification. The difference between disclosure and enablement is more apparent in high technology inventions in for example the field of pharmaceuticals (as in the case referred to above). In the case of low-tech inventions, the simple disclosure of the invention in the patent is often enough to enable the skilled person to perform it. I should stress that in considering the question of enablement, it is the invention in the prior art that needs to be enabled by the disclosure in that prior art and not the invention in the patent against which the prior art may be cited.
86 In the case of WO'242, I have read the whole specification carefully and am satisfied that the disclosure in that application would enable a skilled person to perform the invention set out in that application. WO'242 does provide an enabling disclosure."
"88 So does WO'242 plant a flag on the invention as defined by claim 6? This claim as properly construed requires the following: A security system for a vehicle comprising a PIR detector and cameras, the cameras being activated by the PIR when a person is very close to the outside of the vehicle and being capable of sending picture information to a mobile telephone
89 Mr Cunningham argues that WO'242 does not disclose certain aspects of the system claimed in this claim. In particular it gives no indication that any aspect of the system is wireless nor is the invention in WO'242 suitable for use outdoors. He bases this last assertion on the presence in WO'242 of what he refers to as a "temperature backup" and the absence of any form of outside weather shield. I would add that Mr Cunningham is using the term "wireless" I believe to mean that the device is not mains powered but rather battery powered.
90 I am not persuaded by any of these arguments for the simple reason that none of the features that Mr Cunningham argues is lacking in WO'242, is an essential feature of the invention set out in claim 6. Again Mr Cunningham has misunderstood that it is the invention as actually set out in claim 6 that is being considered. Claim 6 is entirely silent on how the system is powered it is not therefore necessary for anticipation to show a particular mode of powering the system such as by battery. Equally the claim does not explicitly require the system to be waterproof. Whilst Mr Cunningham might only have had in mind a waterproof system; that is not what he has claimed. The wording of the claim, as recognized by the examiner, extends to cover systems that may or may not be waterproof. And for the purpose of anticipation it is necessary only that the prior art plants it flag somewhere within the scope of the claim. It is not necessary for the prior art to disclose everything falling with the claim.
91 I am therefore not persuaded by Mr Cunningham's arguments. I still need however to ensure that WO'242 does actually disclose something falling within the scope of claim 6.
92 WO'242 clearly discloses, in for example, paragraphs [0047] to [0050] a surveillance system that comprises one or more cameras that can be activated by an infra red detector and which according to the description can be located to monitor, for example, a pleasure boat, a car or a garage. Upon activation, picture information is sent from the camera(s) to a portable videophone (multimedia phone). I am therefore satisfied that this document discloses all the features of claim 6 and consequently if put into practice would infringe claim 6. Consequently the disclosure is an anticipating disclosure that destroys the novelty of claim 6 - it does plant a flag on the invention set out in claim 6.
93 I am therefore satisfied that the Opinion was correct to find claim 6 invalid."
Conclusion