The court reversed the district court’s claim construction for the term “frangible section” and remanded for further findings relating to infringement. The district court construed “frangible section” to require two score lines. Despite the specification explicitly stating that the frangible section could have a single score line or a pair of score lines, the district court limited “frangible section” to two score lines due to statements made to the Examiner during prosecution to overcome prior art. The court, however, held that there was no statement in the prosecution history to support such a limitation, because the arguments used to overcome the prior art were not directed to the number of score lines in the frangible section.
Inline Plastics Corp. v. EasyPak, LLC, Case No. 2014-1305 (August 27, 2015); Opinion by: Newman, joined by Clevenger and Dyk; Appealed From: District Court for the District of Massachusetts, Hillman, J. Read the full opinion here.
