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PTAB.US: Decisions of PTAB Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Friday, January 6, 2017

content extraction, cyberfone, electric power

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AFFIRMED-IN-PART
Tech Center 2400 Networking, Multiplexing, Cable, and Security
2487 Ex Parte Flemming et al 13122437 - (D) WINSOR 103 103 CROWELL & MORING LLP RAHMAN, MOHAMMAD J

Tech Center 2600 Communications
2623 Ex Parte Hammad et al 12258322 - (D) MOHANTY 103 112(2) KILPATRICK TOWNSEND & STOCKTON LLP/VISA MARCUS, LELAND R.

Tech Center 3600 Transportation, Construction, Electronic Commerce, Agriculture, National Security, and License & Review
3646 Ex Parte Eriksson et al 12763049 - (D) DOUGAL 112(2)/103 103 THE SMALL PATENT LAW GROUP LLC BURKE, SEAN P

AFFIRMED
Tech Center 2100 Computer Architecture and Software
2172 Ex Parte Skultety-Betz 12306419 - (D) AMUNDSON 103 Maginot, Moore & Beck LLP GREENE, SABRINA LETICIA

Tech Center 2400 Networking, Multiplexing, Cable, and Security
2447 Ex Parte HARPUR et al 13270422 - (D) BAUMEISTER 103 Cuenot, Forsythe & Kim, LLC LIN, SHERMAN L

Tech Center 2600 Communications
2648 Ex Parte Nannarone et al 13412052 - (D) DIXON 102/103 CHOATE, HALL & STEWART LLP SANDIFORD, DEVAN A

Tech Center 3600 Transportation, Construction, Electronic Commerce, Agriculture, National Security, and License & Review
3625 Ex Parte Singhal 13524067 - (D) MEDLOCK 101/102 41.50 101 Tara Chand Sighal MISIASZEK, MICHAEL

In this regard, the claims are similar to the claims that the Federal Circuit determined were patent ineligible in Content Extraction & Transmission v. Wells Fargo Bank, 776 F.3d 1343 (Fed. Cir. 2014) and Cyberfone Systems, LLC v. CNN Interactive Group, Inc., 558 F.App’x 988 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (non-precedential), and more recently, in Elec. Power Grp. LLC v. Alstom, 830 F.3d 1350 (Fed. Cir. 2016).

In Content Extraction, the Federal Circuit considered the patent eligibility of a method claim for “processing information from a diversity of types of hard copy documents.”  Content Extraction, 776 F.3d at 1345.  Applying step one of the Alice framework, the Federal Circuit determined that the claim was “drawn to the abstract idea of 1) collecting data, 2) recognizing certain data within the collected data set, and 3) storing that recognized data in a memory” — concepts that the court noted were “undisputedly well-known.”  Id. at 1347.


In Cyberfone, the court evaluated a method claim reciting steps that required “obtaining data, ‘exploding’ the data, i.e., separating it into component parts, and sending those parts to different destinations.”  Cyberfone, 558 F.App’x at 990.  The Federal Circuit held that this claim involved an abstract idea, explaining that “using categories to organize, store, and transmit information is well-established,” and that “the well-known concept of categorical data storage, i.e., the idea of collecting information in classified form, then separating and transmitting that information according to its classification, is an abstract idea that is not patent-eligible.”  Id. at 992.  


In Electric Power, the method claims at issue were directed to performing real-time performance monitoring of an electric power grid by collecting data from multiple data sources, analyzing the data, and displaying the results.  Elec. Power Grp., 830 F.3d at 1351–52.  There, the Federal Circuit held that the claims were directed to an abstract idea because “[t]he advance they purport to make is a process of gathering and analyzing information of a specified content, then displaying the results, and not any particular assertedly inventive technology for performing those functions.”  Id. at 1354.  


Similarly here, we find that claims 1, 7, and 13 involve nothing more than collecting data and, in the case of claims 1 and 7, transferring the data from one destination to another — activities squarely within the realm of abstract ideas.


Tech Center 3700 Mechanical Engineering, Manufacturing, and Products & Design
3764 Ex Parte SLAYTON et al 13013931 - (D) PER CURIAM 102 THE PROCTER & GAMBLE COMPANY LEE, JOSHUA S