Sycurio Limited v PCI-PAL PLC
[2024] EWCA Civ 606
Supponor Limited & Anor v AIM Sport Development AG
23 April 2024
[2024] EWCA Civ 396
Court of Appeal
A company sued another for infringing a patent on fancy sports ads. The court decided the patent was too broad and covered existing technology, even though the company tried to narrow it down. The judge highlighted the need to carefully word concessions during litigation.
Key Facts
- •Appeal from a patent trial concerning EP (UK) 3 295 663 ('Digitally overlaying an image with another image'), relating to electronic superimposition of advertising in TV broadcasts of sporting events.
- •Claim 12 was the only relevant claim at trial.
- •Supponor (defendant/appellant) appealed on six grounds, challenging claim construction, infringement, obviousness, and the impact of AIM's (patentee/respondent) admission that claim 1 was invalid.
- •The prior art relied upon was Supponor's earlier patent application (Nevatie, WO 2013/186278 A1).
- •The case involved technical issues concerning 'detection image', 'pixel-by-pixel' processing, and the distinction between 'dark-on-light' and 'light-on-dark' methods.
- •AIM's system detects light from the occluding object, while Nevatie detects the absence of light from the board.
- •Supponor's SVB system uses two IR cameras, one for a dark-on-light approach and another for a light-on-dark approach.
- •The 'Promptu point' concerned the impact of AIM's admission that claim 1 was invalid on the validity of claim 12.
Legal Principles
Patents are construed through the eyes of the person skilled in the art, with common general knowledge. Matter not in the patent or common general knowledge is irrelevant to construction.
This judgment
Limitations not present in the claim language are not to be read in by reference to examples in the specification. If claim language is broad, the claim is correspondingly broad.
This judgment
The scope and definition of the invention is determined by the claims, properly construed in accordance with the Protocol on the Interpretation of Art 69 EPC.
This judgment
Admissions in patent cases are no different from admissions in any other sort of civil action. If a party admits a particular fact, that fact can be taken as being the case, and any consequential findings may be made taking that fact as a given.
This judgment
Outcomes
Appeal allowed on Ground 2 (excluding dark-on-light).
The court found that the unamended claim did not exclude Nevatie's dark-on-light approach because the claim language requiring filtering out radiation referred to frequencies emitted by the display board to show a moving image, not necessarily visible light.
Appeal dismissed on all other grounds.
Ground 1 (pixel-by-pixel) was dismissed because the claim's broad language ('image property') encompassed pixel-by-pixel processing. Grounds 3 (infringement), 4 (obviousness), and 6 (amended claims) were dismissed as they either didn't arise after the decision on Ground 2 or were based on incorrect legal reasoning. Ground 5 (Promptu point) was dismissed because AIM's admission that claim 1 was invalid did not logically imply that claim 12 was invalid, as they were different claims.