As the trial date nears in Stratasys’s patent infringement case against Afinia, many observers are attempting to project how it will pan out. By and large, this case has proceeded in the same fashion as your typical patent infringement case. In November of 2013, Stratasys filed the suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota, near its US headquarters in Eden Prairie. In its initial Complaint Stratasys asserted four patents against Afinia’s H-Series 3D printers. The patents cover: (1) controlling infill; (2) heated build environments; (3) extruders; and (4) seam layer concealment technologies. As is typical in a patent case, Afinia asserted defenses of invalidity and noninfringement. Soon thereafter, Stratasys voluntarily dismissed the controlling infill patent from the case.
In what has become a common strategy to try to invalidate patents, in November of 2014 Afinia filed a petition to start an “inter partes review” (“IPR”) proceeding before the U.S. Patent Office’s Patent Trial and Appeals Board on the three remaining patents. The PTAB was created in 2012 and decides issues of patentability—typically at a lower cost and higher speed than in a District Court. In an IPR, a petitioner (often a party being sued) submits a petition that asserts potentially invalidating prior art and presents what the party believes the scope and meaning of the patent’s claim terms should be.
In its IPR petition, Afinia asserted that Stratasys’s patents are invalid because (1) Stratasys’s own system documentation and U.S. Patent No. 5,340,433 disclosed Stratasys’s heated build environment patent; (2) U.S. Patent No. 5,340,433 also disclosed Stratasys’s extruder patent; and (3) a dissertation by a Stanford student disclosed Stratasys’s seam layer concealment patent.
After reviewing the materials that Afinia submitted as alleged prior art, the PTAB ruled that Afinia did not have a “reasonable likelihood of prevailing,” so it declined to institute a full review of the validity of the three patents. That made the patents stronger.
That was May. Now, the two parties are preparing for what is called claim construction before the District Court in Minnesota. Basically, claim construction is the process by which the court determines the scope and meaning of the patent claims involved in the lawsuit. For example, the PTAB construed terms such as a “build region” to mean a “build environment,” and a “local regional temperature” to mean “the temperature in the region that is in the vicinity of the newly deposited material.”
We know what you are thinking. What’s the big difference? Frequently, the parties in patent cases argue about what may seem to be miniscule or semantic differences, but these differences can result in a company capturing a market, or in the life or death of a patent or even a company.
At the District Court in November, both Afinia and Stratasys will assert meanings of the various claims of the three remaining patents. The associated hearing will be held in December and a court order stating the judge’s interpretation of the claims will follow sometime thereafter. Once claim construction is complete, if the parties do not reach a settlement (settlements often happen at this point in lawsuits), the parties will file various motions to try to end the case without a trial. If none of those motions is granted, trial is currently set for June 1, 2016. Don’t be surprised, however, if the schedule changes or the parties reach a licensing agreement to end this dispute.
This is probably a test case. If Stratasys wins, it will be awarded money damages for Afinia’s sales or an injunction against future sales, or both. It will also have ammunition to seek the same from other manufacturers of basic Material Extrusion machines. As a practical matter, however, a win against Stratasys will probably be pyrrhic. Stratasys will not be able to stop anyone from using basic Material Extrusion technology covered by basic patents that have expired. Also, the three patents Stratasys is asserting against Afinia should all have expired by sometime in 2019. In the long time horizon of 3D printing’s future, that is right around the corner.
Perhaps more importantly, lawsuits may not be the best strategy. Rather than litigating, Stratasys could license its technology, which would result in royalty revenue coming in rather than litigation money going out. And ultimately, Material Extrusion startups, of which there are hundreds scattered all over the world, probably cannot be stopped. Some will fail on their own, but others will not, and it is from the survivors that 3D printing will see innovations that benefit the industry as a whole and help further the adoption of the technology, such as combining 3D printing with traditional manufacturing processes. Stay tuned for more on the Stratasys v. Afinia lawsuit.
