اليابان

Summary of the judgment (decision)

1. Even in a situation where the scope of patent claims written by a patent applicant did not mention the structure of certain products or processes manufactured or used by another person, which differ in part from the structure stated in the scope of claims, while the applicant was able to easily conceive the structure for the other person’s products or processes at the time of filing the application, the mere fact of such omission in the scope of claims cannot imply that the other person’s products or processes were intentionally excluded from the scope of the patent claims in the course of filing the application for the patented invention or that there are other particular circumstances justifying denial of equivalence in structure between another person’s products or processes and the product or process stated in the scope of the patent claims.

2. In a situation where the scope of patent claims written by a patent applicant did not mention the structure for certain products or processes manufactured or used by another person, which differ in part from the structure stated in the scope of claims, while the applicant was able to easily conceive the structure for the other person’s products or processes at the time of filing the application, if it is objectively and visibly clear that the scope of the patent claims did not mention the structure of the other person’s products or processes even though the applicant recognized that said structure could substitute for the structure stated in the scope of the patent claims, the court will ascertain that the competing products or processes were intentionally excluded from the scope of the patent claims in the course of filing the application for the patented invention or that there are other particular circumstances for justifying denial of the equivalence in structure between the other person’s products or processes and the product or process stated in the scope of the patent claims.