Summary judgment is granted as to infringement and noninfringement
Solvay, S.A. v. Honeywell Specialty Materials LLC, et al, Civ. No. 06-557-SLR, December 9, 2008.
Robinson, J. Plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment for infringement is granted; defendant’s motion for non-infringement of the patent-in-suit is granted in part and denied in part.
At issue are cross motions for summary judgment on the issue of infringement of claim 1 and non-infringement of claim12 of the patent-in-suit. The patent-in-suit discloses a process for the manufacture of HFC-245fa by reacting HCC-240fa with hydrogen fluoride in the presence of a hydroflourination catalyst. HFC-245fa is one of a group of non-ozone depleting hydroflourocarbons that were legislatively mandated to replace ozone depleting chloroflourocarbons and hydrochloroflourocarbons. Defendant produces HFC-245fa by reacting HCC-240fa with hydrogen fluoride in the presence of a hydroflourination catalyst at one of its plants. It argues that the process does not infringe because the process does not isolate from the reaction mixture the HFC-245fa and the HCl as they are being formed as required by the claim. Applying the broad construction of claims (see), the Court concludes that defendant’s process infringes claim 1 but not claim 12 of the patent-in-suit.
