Recently, Shanghai High People's Court made a final judgment on an invention patent dispute between Royal Philips and Ningbo Careline Electric Appliance Company, Yuyao Shanben Electric Appliance Company, Yuyao Defan Trading Company, denying all of claims of Royal Philips.
Royal Philips is the right holder of invention patent which titled “equipment for food preparation and air guiding element for the equipment” (patent in dispute). Defan Company opened a Shanben official flagship store online at Tmall.com at where it was offering for sale of air fryer products carrying SHANBEN brand. Following proper notary protocol, Royal Philips purchased the above-mentioned products including three models SB-006, SB-V008 and SB-V009. After comparison, Royal Philips was convinced the three models fell into the protection scope of Claim 1 and Claim 5 of the patent in dispute. The alleged infringing products were co-manufactured by Shanben Company and Careline Company. Careline Company also offered to sell an appreciable amount of the air fryer products through its official Chinese and English websites and Chinese and English websites at Alibaba. Royal Philips then filed the case to Shanghai IP Court on the ground that the three companies infringed its invention patent right, seeking an injunction against all of the defendants.
The three defendants argued that the accused products did not fall into the protection scope of the claims of the patent in dispute in that the heating structures and principles of the food preparation room were different from that of the patent in dispute. In addition, the damages Royal Philips claimed did not have legal basis. Therefore, its claim did not hold water.
The IP Court held that the accused products did not constitute the infringement of the patent rights of Royal Philips. Accordingly, it denied all of the claims of the Dutch company.
The disgruntled company then brought the case to Shanghai High People's Court. After hearing, Shanghai High held that the accused products do not have the same or equivalent technical features with the patent in dispute, the features of the openings at the top of its fan and food preparation room are different from that of the patent in dispute and the frustum tapered components are not the same as that of the patent in dispute. Therefore, the technical features of the alleged infringing products do not cover all of that of Claim 1 of the patent in dispute, out of the protection scope of Claim 1. Considering that Claim 5 is secondary to Claim 1, the technical features of the accused products do not cover all of that of Claim 5 when out of the protection scope of Claim 1. The accused products did not constitute the infringement of Claim 1 and Claim 5 of the patent in dispute. In this connection, the Court rejected the appeal from Royal Philips and upheld the first-instance judgment.(by Zheng Siliang)
(Editor Dou YiKe)
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