Federal Court Of Appeal Upholds Invalidity Of Snow Plow Blade Patents For Obviousness

On January 6, 2025, the Federal Court of Appeal (the FCA) issued its decision in Usinage Pro-24 Inc. v Valley Blades Ltd., 2025 FCA 4, dismissing Usinage Pro-24 Inc.’s (Nordik Blades’) appeal of a Federal Court decision that found certain claims in its two snow plow blade patents (the Patents) invalid for obviousness.

The Patents relate to a “blade device and assembly to be attached to the bottom of a snow plow carried on a vehicle.” The Patents address the principal issue of reducing wear on a snow plow’s blades that contact the ground during operation by allowing for vertical and angular movement when they encounter uneven road surfaces. The designs incorporate a resilient bushing that reduces wear on the blades caused by metal-on-metal contact of parts and creates a downward restorative force to return the blade to its original position after being forced upward by any irregularity in the road surface. Nordik Blades alleged, among other things, that the Federal Court erred in its obvious analysis by not considering the centrality of the restorative force to the claimed invention; using hindsight in its analysis; and inadequately explaining why it would be obvious for a person skilled in the art to arrive at the invention defined in the claims.

The FCA reiterated the four-part test for assessing obviousness and emphasized the importance of a claim-by-claim examination without hindsight. The FCA held that, when compared to the prior art, the restorative force was not of central importance to the Patents and the Federal Court did not err by failing to discuss it. Further, the FCA held that there was no evidence of hindsight analysis in the Federal Court’s decision and any examples raised by Nordik Blades amounted to no more than a disagreement with the decision itself. The FCA also did not agree with Nordik Blade’s argument on the inadequacy of the Federal Court’s explanation and, ultimately, found no reviewable errors in the Federal Court’s obviousness analysis, holding that it took a permissible approach.

This led the FCA to uphold the Federal Court’s finding that the claims were invalid due to being obvious.

Summary By: Amy Ariganello