In order to limit the otherwise plain meaning of the language of the claims, statements in the specification must particularly describe the language at issue. Merely describing related or exemplary features (e.g., “location information” in contrast to the claimed “addressing information”) is not sufficient to rise to the “exacting” level of lexicography or disavowal.
Background / Facts: The patents on appeal here from rejection at the PTO during reexamination are directed to facilitating real-time communications between users over computer networks. All of the independent claims are directed to establishing communications between two users using “addressing information of the second user’s communication device.” The Board narrowly construed the phrase “addressing information of [the] device” as “the physical location of a communication device,” which avoided the anticipation and obviousness assertions by the third party requester.
Issue(s): Whether the “physical location” requirement unduly narrows the claim term “addressing information of [the] device” from the plain language of the claims in view of the specification.
Holding(s): Yes. While noting that “except for the claims, the patent specifications do not mention the phrase, ‘addressing information of [the] device,’” the court found that, at most, “[t]he patent specifications do describe ‘location information’ of a device that is stored as part of a ‘service record.’ [] These portions of the specifications, however, do not support limiting ‘addressing information of [the] device’ to a ‘physical location.’ They do not describe the disclosed ‘location information’ as ‘addressing information.’ Thus, even if the specification somehow limited the disclosed ‘location information’ to a ‘physical location,’ there is nothing in the specification that requires the claimed ‘addressing information’ to be of identical scope.”