Edgewell’s Patent Suit Over Diaper Genie Refill Copycats Revived

Edgewell Personal Care Brands LLC convinced the Federal Circuit to revive its suit alleging competing refills for its Diaper Genie system infringed two of its patents.

The U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ruled that Munchkin Inc. didn’t infringe based on its interpretation of the patent language.

But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in a precedential opinion disagreed with the lower court’s interpretation of one patent and found it improperly applied claim vitiation to bar doctrine of equivalents liability for the other.

The doctrine of equivalents imposes liability for technology that doesn’t literally ...