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An Update on Patent Litigation, the Patent Marketplace, and New Cases
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Monday, December 16, 2024
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Patent Litigation Feature
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Limiting statements made during prosecution can have a pivotal impact on claim scope if a patent is subsequently litigated. Under the doctrine of prosecution disclaimer, a court may bar a patent owner from asserting that a claim covers a particular feature if a statement by the applicant during prosecution amounted to “a clear and unmistakable disavowal of claim scope”. Now, the Federal Circuit has held that changes between a provisional and nonprovisional application may be used to determine claim scope when no such explicit disavowal has been made—based not on the more rigorous prosecution disclaimer standard, but rather on the relatively less demanding approach used for claim construction in district court. That December 9 precedential decision affirmed, as a result, a judgment of noninfringement for Priceline against DDR Holdings LLC.
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Patent Watch
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Patent assignments recently made public by the USPTO reveal a pair of notable transactions, one to a Texas entity that recently filed suit against Samsung in Europe and another to a Texas monetization firm already in possession of three other US “investments” (i.e., portfolios), only one of which it has litigated to date, against Acer, HP, Dell, and TCL. The first transfer raises the question of whether US litigation might be coming from the same patent holder, as well as whether other LLCs from Middle Earth might arrive on these shores, perhaps a Turgon LLC, or a Finrod Felagund LLC, while the second transfer, among other things, stretches everyone’s Artic vocabulary.
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New Patent Litigation
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MyPort Technologies, Inc. has filed a District of Delaware complaint against Apple (1:24-cv-01337), asserting four of the six patents that it received from associated entity and former plaintiff MyPort IP, Inc. MyPort Technologies accuses Apple of infringement through the provision of smartphones and tablets, targeting a wide array of features, ranging from storing recorded audio and images to iMessage security tools. The plaintiff is one of six entities to grant a security interest in patents held in early October 2024 to the same Delaware LLC bearing a name suggestive of the involvement of third-party litigation funding (TPLF).
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OpenTV, Inc. has filed suit in the District of Delaware against Pinterest (1:24-cv-01301), alleging infringement of four patents through the provision of features such as adaptive bitrate streaming and personalized advertisement/content recommendation systems within the Pinterest platform (i.e., mobile app and website), also targeting its “digital advertising manager, ad delivery system, machine learning content distribution technologies, and all related methods of predicting and suggesting content to end users”. The plaintiff’s last case in this campaign, filed against May 2017 against the NFL, ended in June 2018.
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Already in December, Fleet Connect Solutions LLC (FCS), an Empire IP LLC plaintiff, has sued Lenovo (2:24-cv-01047), Moxa (2:24-cv-01050), Olympus and OM Digital Solutions (2:24-cv-01049), Pittasoft (2:24-cv-01029), and Southwest International Trucks (2:24-cv-01024), all in the Eastern District of Texas, as well as Schneider National Carriers (2:24-cv-10435), in the Central District of California. That latter district, like the Northern District of California and the Northern District of Georgia, where Fleet Connect has filed other cases, imposes heightened disclosure requirements on litigants—requirements in response to which FCS, represented in all of these districts by Rozier Hardt McDonough PLLC, has uniformly identified no “persons” having a financial or other interest in the outcome of the case.
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American Express (1:24-cv-05574), Ameris Bank (1:24-cv-05576), Colony Bank (1:24-cv-05578), FirstBank (1:24-cv-05579), PNC Financial Services (RBC Bank) (1:24-cv-05580), Renasant Bank (1:24-cv-05582), ServisFirst Bancshares (1:24-cv-05583), Southstate Bank (1:24-cv-00585), Synovus Financial (Synovus Bank) (1:24-cv-05587), and US Bank (United Community Bank) (1:24-cv-05588) are the latest defendants to be added to the sole litigation campaign of DigitalDoors, Inc., launched in November 2022 with a suit against IBM. In the new Northern District of Georgia complaints, the defendants are targeted over the use of data processing systems compliant with the Sheltered Harbor specification, or those that otherwise “provide substantially equivalent functionality” for “providing data backup of critical customer account data” based on certain content filters, allegedly as claimed in the asserted four patents.
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Granite Vehicle Ventures LLC has filed a complaint in the Western District of Texas accusing Tesla (2:24-cv-01007) of infringing three patents generally related to “controlling a driving mode of a self-driving vehicle”. Targeted is the provision of automobiles that are compatible with its Full Self Driving (Supervised) program. This case is not the first against Tesla from the “Slingshot and Stones” team behind Granite Venture Vehicles.
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Inventor-controlled CardiacSense Ltd (f/k/a Sportracker Ltd.) has expanded its sole litigation campaign—launched with separate May 2024 suits against Anta (Suunto), Coros Wearables, and Garmin—with a case against Alphabet (Google) (1:24-cv-01505) in the Western District of Texas. The plaintiff asserts a single patent generally related to a wearable device that can “measure a training activity” with sensors, with Google accused of infringement through the provision of certain Fitbit- and Google Pixel-series smartwatches. At issue are features related to using sensor data to track a user’s exercise activity.
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In its latest complaints, Texas plaintiff ERR Content IP LLC targets the media casting services of two more defendants, Roku (7:24-cv-00330) in the Western District of Texas; and Spotify (1:24-cv-09530), in the Southern District of New York. The plaintiff here asserts the same patent already in suit in cases filed earlier this fall against Amazon, LG Electronics (LGE), and Comcast, in that order. The patent generally relates to “providing a main content” on a first device (in its complaints, identified as a smartphone), and “extra content” synchronized to the main content on a second device (identified as a television).
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A plaintiff identifying itself as “Optics Innovations, LLC” has launched what appears to be its first litigation, suing Samsung (2:24-cv-01048) over the provision of Galaxy-series smartphones and tablets that support Portrait mode. Asserted in the Eastern District of Texas complaint are two patents broadly directed to capturing images with differing fields of view on a multi-camera system and applying a blurring effect on certain fields of the image. This plaintiff indicates that it was formed in Delaware, but no such entity exists.
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With a December suit against Microsoft (6:24-cv-00622) in the Western District of Texas, VPN Technology Holdings, LLC has expanded the litigation campaign that it began with early October suits against Fortinet and Rubicon Communications. A single patent generally related to “configuring a remote computer to access a network of computers” is asserted against all three defendants. Microsoft is accused of infringement through the provision of the Intune cloud-based endpoint management solution, with features for allowing an “admin to configure a remote computer for a Virtual Private Network (VPN) by deploying VPN profiles” at issue.
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So far in December, InfoGation Corporation has voluntarily dismissed with prejudice the last open case from the prior round of suits, filed against MiTAC in July 2024. It has also fired off a new round of litigation, with separate Eastern District of Texas complaints against GM (2:24-cv-01015), HERE Global (2:24-cv-01005), Hyundai (Kia) (2:24-cv-01019), Mapbox (2:24-cv-01027), Mazda (2:24-cv-01020), Nissan (2:24-cv-01021), Stellantis (2:24-cv-01026), TomTom (2:24-cv-01022), and Zhejiang Geely Holding (Volvo) (2:24-cv-01023). The automakers are targeted over the provision of vehicles that utilize their respective “navigation systems”; and the other defendants, over the provision of navigation systems and apps.
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This fall, Torus Ventures LLC has fired off a barrage of new cases, hitting Directors Investment (Funeral Directors Life Insurance), EP Loya Group (Fred Loya Insurance Agency), First Texas National Bank, Fort Worth Urban Air, Germania General Agency, Golden Bank National, Gringo’s Mexican Kitchen No. 1, Globe Life, Guaranty Bank & Trust, Gulf States Financial Services, Higginbotham Insurance Group, Hotchkiss Insurance Agency, Incline Insurance Group, Insurance Agents Alliance of Texas, Insurvia (La Familia Agency), Interflex Payments, Invited Foundation, Iscential, Kleberg Bank, Landry’s Payroll, Legend Bank, Liberty Life Group Trust (Liberty Bankers Life Insurance), Lone Star National Bank, State Farm (Gainsco Auto Insurance Agency), and Texas National Holdings (First National Title Insurance), all in the Eastern District of Texas. Separate suits from the last Torus Ventures wave, filed in July in the same district—against Amarillo National Bank, American Bank Holding, American Financial & Automotive Services, Azuma Leasing, Brightline Dealer Advisors, Extraco, First National Bank of Sonora, and Industry Bancshares (First National Bank of Bellville)—have since been transferred elsewhere in Texas, the case against Azuma Leasing to the Northern District, where the plaintiff has yet to file a certified list of all parties financially interested in the outcome of the suit.
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