Dec. 4, 2018)) (“The Court agrees with the parties that nothing in the intrinsic record indicates that ‘interface’ is being used in a manner that departs from its ordinary meaning, but finds it necessary to resolve the dispute over the plain meaning.”); Baxter Healthcare Corp. v. Mylan Lab’ys Ltd., 346 F. Supp.
Whatever the nature of the disagreement, it is well settled that “[w]hen the parties present a fundamental dispute regarding the scope of a claim term, it is the court’s duty to resolve it,” as the Federal Circuit ruled in O2 Micro Int’l Ltd. v. Beyond Innovation Tech. Co., Ltd., 521 F.3d 1351, 1362 (Fed. Cir. 2008).
Even if the patent’s description of Figure 14 could be read to imply that the word “surrounding” is “not limited to ‘border[ing] on all sides’” (and there is no basis to do so), that would hardly be enough to meet what Nike describes as the “exacting” standard for “redefining a claim phrase to have a special meaning,” D.I.
Further, “statements made by a patent owner during an IPR proceeding can be considered during claim construction and relied upon to support a finding of prosecution disclaimer.” Aylus Networks, Inc. v. Apple Inc., 856 F.3d 1353, 1360-61 (Fed. Cir. 2017).
Thus, in the claimed upper (assembled from the flat knit component), the parallel ribs depicted below in Figure 10 extend toward the heel seam at the very back of the shoe, not the ankle opening.