Date of Judgment: February 24, 1998
Issuing Authority: Supreme Court
Level of the Issuing
Authority: Final
Instance
Type of Procedure: Judicial (Civil)
Subject Matter: Patent(Inventions)
Summary of the
judgment (decision):
Even if,
within the construction as indicated in the claim in the patent specification,
there is a part which is different from the products which are produced by
another person or the manner adopted by this person, if this part is not the
essential part of the patented invention and the purpose of the patented
invention can be achieved by replacing this part with a part in the other
person's product and an identical function and effect can be obtained if a
person who has an average knowledge in the area of technology where this
invention belongs could easily come up with the idea of such replacement at the
time of the production of the said products, if the products are not identical
to the technology in the public domain at the time of the patent application of
the patented invention or could have easily conceived by this person at that
time, and if there were no special circumstances such as the fact that those
products had been intentionally excluded from the scope of the patent claim in
the patent application process, such products should be regarded as identical
with the construction as indicated in the scope of patent claim and fall within
the scope of the technological scope of the patented invention.
(Translated
by Sir Ernest Satow Chair of Japanese Law, University College, University of
London)