1. An excerpt from the decision
…[T]here were the following three problems…: (i) …when a prepaid card is inserted into a card reader/writer, the prepaid card cannot be seen from the outside, and therefore, after feeding of the oil is finished, the prepaid card is forgotten to have been inserted and likely to be left in the card reader/writer of an oil station… ([0005] ~ [0007])
If… [a storage medium of the Present Invention] is not a storage medium than can assume payment by a combination of “media custody [媒体預かり]” and “later withdrawals [後引落し]”, the three problems may not occur, and thus an effect of solving the problems is not considered to have been produced by the constituent features of the Present Invention. Therefore, any storage media that cannot assume payment by such a combination does not fall under the “storage medium” of the Present Invention.
…[A]n electronic money medium used for the defendant’s oil feeding apparatus does not have the three problems to be solved by the Present Invention, and thus it does not become a subject of the means to solve problems by the Present Invention; therefore, …the electronic money medium used for the defendant’s oil feeding apparatus does not fall under the “storage medium” of the Present Invention.
2. A modicum of consideration on this case
In this case, as the defendant admitted the structure of its product corresponding to Constituent Feature 1C of the Present Invention in the Answer filed in the original case, it cannot be denied, if literally interpreted, that an electronic money medium used for the defendant’s oil feeding apparatus is the so-called “storage medium”.
In this case, the Court interpreted a “storage medium” of Constituent Feature 1C of the Present Invention limitedly, and found that the defendant’s product does not literally satisfy the constituent features of the Present Invention, stating that “if…[a storage medium of the Present Invention] is not a storage medium than can assume payment by a combination of ‘media custody [媒体預かり]’ and ‘later withdrawals [後引落し]’, the three problems may not occur, and thus an effect of solving the problems is not considered to have been produced by the constituent features of the Present Invention; therefore, any storage media that cannot assume payment by such a combination does not fall under the ‘storage medium’ of the Present Invention.”
Writer: Hideki TAKAISHI
Supervising editor: Kazuhiko YOSHIDA
Contact information for inquiries: h_takaishi@nakapat.gr.jp
Hideki TAKAISHI
Attorney at Law & Patent Attorney
Nakamura & Partners
Room No.616, Shin-Tokyo Building,
3-3-1 Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku,
Tokyo 100-8355, JAPAN