Rematec v Europe Forestry (UPC_CFI_340/2023)

• Rematec is the proprietor of patent relating to a mill for use in forestry. It claimed that Europe Forestry infringed its patent with its own grinder. Europe Forestry submitted an invalidity counterclaim.
• The Mannheim LD held that Rematec's patent was invalid for lack of novelty and lack of inventive step over the prior art. The prior art described a mill that included all of the elements claimed in the patent, including a rotor with multiple grinding elements, a grinding chamber with feed and discharge opening, and the specific arrangement of such openings. To the extent these features were not explicitly disclosed in the prior art, the court found that they would be obvious to a person skilled in the art.
• As the patent was declared invalid, the court did not asses the infringement claim.

This analysis is based on a machine translation of a decision not available in English.