Federal Circuit sends Fujifilm, HP patent case back to district court

A US appeals court has overturned a lower court decision that had ruled that Fujifilm and Hewlett-Packard (HP) did not infringe third-party patents through their use of digital cameras.

The ruling, from the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, was handed down on Monday (February 2).

It reverses a 2013 ruling from the US District Court for the District of Columbia that said Fujifilm and HP, as well as Panasonic and Nikon, did not infringe US patents 6,470,399 (‘399) and 6,895,449 (‘449), held by licensing company Papst Licensing.

The patents cover a device used in a digital camera to improve the speed of transferring files from it to another device, such as a computer.

The Federal Circuit said the district court incorrectly reviewed the construction of five claims in the ‘399 and ‘449 patents, and instead assessed the claims' construction de novo, which means it disregarded the previous analysis.

One of the five claims that the Federal Circuit said had been incorrectly reviewed concerned "interface device", cited in both patents. The district court originally ruled that the "interface device" had to be a distinct object, separate from the digital camera.

Instead, the Federal Circuit argued that the device's definition  is not limited to a distinct object.

A spokesperson for Fujifilm said the company is “reviewing the Federal Circuit’s decision”.

The case will now return to the district court.

WIPR contacted Papst Licensing and HP, but neither company responded to a request for comment.