IP Law Daily, PATENT NEWS: Food processing equipment maker asks Supreme Court to review jury willfulness finding reversal, (Jan 21, 2025)

By Linda O’Brien, J.D., LL.M.

Petition claims Federal Circuit’s willingness to reexamine a jury’s factual findings erodes the applicability of the Seventh Amendment to patent cases.

A petition for writ of certiorari by a food processing equipment manufacturer asks the High Court to provide guidance regarding the extent to which the Federal Circuit may conduct a reassessment of the evidence presented to a jury at trial and overturn the jury’s verdict under either the judgment as a matter of law standard of review under High Court precedent or the Reexamination Clause of the Seventh Amendment (Provisur Technologies, Inc. v. Weber, Inc., No. 24-723 (U.S. Jan. 10, 2025)).

Provisur Technologies, Inc. is a designer and manufacturer of high-speed mechanical slicers and packaging equipment in the food-processing industry. Provisur owns U.S. Patent Nos. 10,625,436 (the ’436 patent), 10,639,812 (the ’812 patent) and 7,065,936 (the ’936 patent). The ’436 and ’812 patents cover high-speed mechanical slicers used to slice and package food products, such as meats and cheeses. The ’936 patent pertains to a conveyor system for loading sliced food into packaging, including an advance-to-fill embodiment that allows the conveyor to fill rows of pockets with food. Like Provisur, Weber, Inc. designs, manufactures, and sells industrial food processing machinery, including slicers and food packing machines.

Provisur filed a lawsuit alleging that Weber’s slicers and SmartLoader products infringed its asserted patents. In October 2022, a jury found Weber willfully infringed claims 9–12 and 16 of the ’436 patent, claims 1, 7, and 8 of the ’812 patent, and claim 14 of the ’936 patent. The district court denied Weber’s post-trial motions for judgment as a matter of law (JMOL) on infringement, willfulness, and damages. Weber appealed.

In October 2024, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed the district court’s findings of infringement for the ’436 and ’812 patents due to Weber's concession that its non-infringement arguments were no longer valid. However, the appellate court reversed the district court’s ruling on infringement of the ’936 patent as Provisur failed to provide sufficient evidence that Weber’s accused product met the advance-to-fill conveyor requirement of the asserted claim. Additionally, the court reversed the district court’s findings of willfulness and ordered a new trial on damages, citing errors in the application of the entire market value rule.

Standard of review. In reversing the district court’s denial of Weber’s motion for JMOL for non-infringement of the ’936 patent, the Federal Circuit found that Provisur’s expert testimony evidence was insufficient to establish that Weber's SmartLoader product satisfied the advance-to-fill limitation of the patent. Provisur argues that the appellate court did not apply the correct standard of review, which requires construing all facts in favor of the non-moving party and giving the non-moving party all favorable inferences that can be drawn pursuant to the Eighth Circuit’s and High Court’s decisions in Holmes v. Slay, 895 F. 3d. 993 (8th Cir. 2018) and Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc. 477 U.S. 242 (1986), respectively. By misapplying the standard of review, the appellate court improperly substituted its judgment for that of the jury regarding the jury’s factual findings of willfulness. Evidence of Weber’s willful infringement was improperly discounted, evidence from outside of the trial record was improperly considered, and evidence of Weber’s concealment was improperly disregarded, Provisur contends.

Seventh Amendment. The petition also presents the question of whether the Seventh Amendment permits the Federal Circuit to reexamine the jury’s factual findings and credibility determinations in reaching its verdict of willful patent infringement. Provisur contends that the appellate court decision erodes the application of the Seventh Amendment to patent cases and violates its rights to a jury trial. Without crediting the jury’s factual findings and without viewing the evidence in a light most favorable to Provisur, the Federal Circuit stepped into the role of the factfinder, undertook its own assessment of the trial evidence, and determined that the substantial evidence did not support the jury willfulness finding based on that assessment, the petition concludes.

The case is No. 24-723.

Attorneys: Craig C. Martin (Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP) for Provisur Technologies, Inc. William Hugh Milliken (Goldstein & Fox, P.L.L.C.) for Weber, Inc.

Companies: Provisur Technologies, Inc.; Weber, Inc.

News: Patent FedCirNews GCNNews