Thursday, January 2, 2014

Contention Identifying “Camera Software” as Infringing Feature Not Sufficiently Specific

The court granted in part defendant's motion to strike plaintiff's revised infringement contentions. "Infringement contentions must specifically identify how a plaintiff believes an asserted claim’s limitations are practiced by some feature or process of an accused camera, and cannot merely incorporate blanket accusations against 'camera software' as a whole. Plaintiff is free to identify cameras as a whole as Accused Instrumentalities for patent disclosure purposes, so long as Plaintiff can provide adequate Infringement Contentions with respect to those Accused Instrumentalities. . . . It is not enough, then, to allege that a camera’s 'software' infringes each element of each claim; Plaintiff must demonstrate that each limitation is found 'within' the Accused Instrumentality at some specific place. . . . This does not, as Plaintiff portends, require Plaintiff to provide early in this litigation 'the identification of specific routines and data when the source code is solely in the possession of the defendant.' . . . Plaintiff must allege specific ways in which that limitation exists, with as much specific identifying information as is reasonably available without discovery."

Yama Capital, LLC v. Canon Inc. et al, 1-12-cv-07159 (NYSD December 13, 2013, Order) (Failla, J.)

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