Dans la cause BMC Resouces, Inc. v. Paymentech, L.P. (September 20, 2007), la Cour a statué que le standard pour qu’il y ait contrefaçon “conjointe” (“joint infringment”) d’une revendication par plusieurs parties implique qu’il y ait “control or direction” par le contrefacteur.
Selon le Juge:
Courts faced with a divided infringement theory have also generally refused to find liability where one party did not control or direct each step of the patented process. See BMC Resources, Inc. v. Paymentech, L.P., (N.D. Tex. Feb. 9, 2006) (“No court has ever found direct infringement based on the type of arms-length business transaction presented here.”); Faroudja Labs v. Dwin Elecs., Inc., 1999 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 22987 (N.D. Cal. Feb. 24, 1999); Mobil Oil Corp. v Filtrol Corp., 501 F.2d 282, 291-92 (9th Cir. 1974) (expressing doubt over the possibility of divided infringement liability).
A party cannot avoid infringement, however, simply by contracting out steps of a patented process to another entity. In those cases, the party in control would be liable for direct infringement. It would be unfair indeed for the mastermind in such situations to escape liability. District courts in those cases have held a party liable for infringement. See Shields v. Halliburton Co., 493 F. Supp. 1376, 1389 (W.D. La. 1980).
This court acknowledges that the standard requiring control or direction for a finding of joint infringement may in some circumstances allow parties to enter into arms-length agreements to avoid infringement. Nonetheless, this concern does not outweigh concerns over expanding the rules governing direct infringement. For example, expanding the rules governing direct infringement to reach independent conduct of multiple actors would subvert the statutory scheme for indirect infringement. Direct infringement is a strict-liability offense, but it is limited to those who practice each and every element of the claimed invention. By contrast, indirect liability requires evidence of “specific intent” to induce infringement. Another form of indirect infringement, contributory infringement under § 271(c), also requires a mens rea (knowledge) and is limited to sales of components or materials without
substantial noninfringing uses. Under BMC’s proposed approach, a patentee would
rarely, if ever, need to bring a claim for indirect infringement.The concerns over a party avoiding infringement by arms-length cooperation can usually be offset by proper claim drafting. A patentee can usually structure a claim to capture infringement by a single party. See Mark A. Lemley et al., Divided Infringement Claims, 33 AIPLA Q.J. 255, 272-75 (2005). In this case, for example, BMC could have drafted its claims to focus on one entity. The steps of the claim might have featured references to a single party’s supplying or receiving each element of the claimed process. However, BMC chose instead to have four different parties perform different acts within one claim. BMC correctly notes the difficulty of proving infringement of this claim format. Nonetheless, this court will not unilaterally restructure the claim or the standards for joint infringement to remedy these ill-conceived claims. See Sage Prods. Inc. v. Devon Indus. Inc., 126 F.3d 1420, 1425 (Fed. Cir. 1997) (“[A]s between the patentee who had a clear opportunity to negotiate broader claims but did not do so, and the public at large, it is the patentee who must bear the cost of its failure to seek protection for this foreseeable alteration
of its claimed structure.”)