Free Letter - District Court of Delaware - Delaware


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Case 1 :04-cv-01337-JJF Document 329 Filed 08/28/2008 Page 1 of 3 g
Potter
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August 28, 2008 .
BY EAFILE, HAND DELIVERY AND E-MAIL
The Honorable Vincent J. Poppiti
. Blank Rome LLP
Chase Manhattan Centre
1201 Market Street, Suite 800
Wilmington, DE 19801
Re: Honeywell Int’l Inc., et al. v. Apple Computer, Inc., et al.
D. Del., C.A. Nos. 04-»l338~JJF
Honeywell Int’l Inc. et al v. Audiovox Corporation, etal.,
D. Del., C.A. No. 04—1337—~JJF
Optrex America Inc. v. Honeywell Int’l Inc., et al.
D. Del., C.A. No. 04-1536-JJF
Dear Judge l’oppiti:
We write on behalf of Defendants FUJIFILM Corporation and FUJIFILM U.S.A., Inc.,
(collectively "Defenda.nts”), in response to Your H0nor’s August 18, 2008 letter (1).1.1 l59), to
supplement their prior tiling (Di. 1043) regarding potential restructuring ofthe case and the joint
letter tiled by all Manufacturer Defendants on August 27. This further supplement is
necessitated by Honeywell’s letter to Your Honor of August 27 which ignores the likely effect
on the rest of these cases of a ruling on the common issue of validity and enforceability as
directed by Judge Jordan and the basis on which the Manufacturer Defendants have reached this
stage of this case.
The ‘371 Patent issued on January 18, 1994 on an application tiled July 9, 1992. The ‘37l
patent issued with two independent claims, one of which (claim 3) is asserted in this case. Both
independent claims recite a base combination (including a liquid crystal panel, two lens arrays
and a the light source), which was finally rejected by the Examiner. See Ex. l (a slide not used
in the Markman presentation where the language in red represents the added moiré related
limitations and the language in black represents the base combination). Significant issues of
validity surround the ‘37l Patent. During prosecution, Honeywell acquiesced in the Exaininer’s
rejection of the base combination, but pointed to the dependent claims reciting rotation of the

Case 1 :04-cv—01337-JJF Document 329 Filed 08/28/2008 Page 2 of 3
The Honorable Vincent J. Poppiti
August 28, 2008
Page 2
lens array relative to the liquid crystal panel and a prescribed variation in pitch among the lens
arrays and liquid crystal panel as solutions to rnoiré interference not taught in the prior art before
the Examiner. The pitch and rotation limitations were added to the rejected base combination to
produce patent claims l and 3, respectively, and the ‘37l patent issued. See Ex. l. Annexed as
Ex. 2 are the slides comprising the "Background" section of Defendants presentation to Judge
Farnan at the luly l0, 2008 Markman hearing. For Your Honor’s convenience, we have
numbered the slides in Ex. 2.
Moiré interference is an interference pattern created when two periodic structures with
slightly differing pitches (frequencies) are overlaid on one another such that visible artifacts in
the form of iight and dark lines or bands are formed. Ex. 2, Slide 1 1. The moiré phenomenon
occurs for the same reason no matter what the structure causing the inoiré interference.
Voluminous prior art establishes that both rotation and pitch selection were well known solutions
to moiré interference before the alleged invention of the ‘371 patent. For example, as shown in
Defendants’ l\/larkman presentation, the existence of inoiré in direct view LCD modules having a
lens array was taught by IBM (see Ex. 2, Slide 12), the use of rotation to avoid moiré
interference was known in printing and lithography where moiré interference is caused by
overlaying halftone images (see Ex. 2, Slide 13), in cathode ray tube displays (see Ex. 2, Slide
14) and in projection screen displays (see Ex. 2, Slide 15).
As the Supreme Court recently observed in greatly expanding the test for obviousness
beyond the test previously used by the Federal Circuit tKSR lnt’l Co. v. 'feleflex Inc., 127 S.Ct.
1727 (2007)): a) A central principle in the obviousness inquiry is that “a court must ask whether
the improvement is more than the predictable use of prior art elements according to their
established functions? id. at 1740; b) "[w]hen a work is available in one field of endeavor,
design incentives and other market forces can prompt variations of it, either in the same field or a
different one." id. at 1740; and c) "When there is a design need or market pressure to solve a
problem and there are a finite number of identified, predictable solutions, a person of ordinary
skill has good reason to pursue the known options within his or her technical grasp. If this leads
to the anticipated success, it is likely the product not of innovation but of ordinary skill and
common sense. In that instance the fact that a combination was obvious to try might show that it
was obvious under § l03." ld. at 1742. Based on the _I_§@ test, the widely established uses of
rotation to avoid moiré interference, including of lens arrays used in various types of displays,
raises significant issues of invalidity, which should be dealt with at the earliest possible time.
The lack of technical contribution of the *371 patent has been confirmed by Honeywell and
its technical expert. First, Honeywell never practiced the ‘371 patent. Second, Honeywell’s
primary avionics customer for whom the technology was originally developed rejected the use of
the alleged invention. Third, a H0neywell’s expert, Dr. Lewin, surveyed LCD developments in
1993, 1994 and 1997 and took no notice of the ‘37l patent or the inventors’ related article.
Honeywel1’s expert did, however, report in a 1993 paper published by the Society for
information Display (SID), the leading wor1d—wide organization devoted to display technology,
on the use of lens arrays distributed by 3M to increase brightness in LCDs, the purpose of the
base combination ofthe ‘37i Patent. Fourth, notwithstanding the widespread use of 3M’s lens

Case 1:04-cv-01337-JJF Document 329 Filed 08/28/2008 Page 3 of 3
The Honorable Vincent J. Poppiti
August 28, 2008
Page 3
arrays for use in LCD modules (with rotation as a soiution to rnoiré interference), the patent lay
dormant for 10 years——frorn its issuance in 1994 until 2004, when a third party brought it to
Honeywell’s attention and Honeywell initiated these cases. Ex. 2, Slides 2—8.
The enforceability of the ‘37I patent is equally suspect. The named inventor credited with
contributing rotation worked in the area of projection displays, where rotation of lens arrays to
address moiré interference was weil known. The named inventors ofthe ‘371 patent were aware
of a prior art reference that disclosed variation of pitch to address moiré interference before tiling
the application that led to the ‘371 Patent. The prior art reference of which the inventors were
aware ("I~iigh Definition Liquid Crystal Projection TV”, Noda et al., Japan Display 1989, pages
256-59 ("Noda articie”)) discloses the same pitch relationship—»-half integer muitiplesw-was
described and claimed in the ‘37l ?atent. Ex. 2, Slide 16.
The suspect validity and enforceability of i·loneywell’s ‘37l Patent warrants an early trial on
the issues of validity and enforceabiiity likely to bring this case to an early close.
Resp
l ,_.—t»-·-······‘““·
Philip A. Rovner
provner@,potteranderson.com
PAR/mes/880427
cc: Ali Counsel of Record — by CM—ECF