This past August, Eastern District of Texas Judge Sean D. Jordan ruled ineligible one of the three e‑commerce patents that AML IP LLC has been litigating in a campaign that has hit close to 90 defendants since December 2020. The court characterized that patent’s claims as “strikingly similar” to those ruled ineligible in the Alice case itself. AML IP has filed an appeal (apparently in the wrong court), Bath & Body Works has sought a shift of attorney fees, and, its active suits against other defendants now imperiled by the Alice ruling, AML IP, backed by litigation funding, has circled back to file new complaints that assert another patent from the same family, including complaints against existing retail defendants Estee Lauder (Aveda) (7:24-cv-00276), Petco (7:24-cv-00253), Sally Beauty, (7:24-cv-00254), and Sephora (6:24-cv-00546).

AML IP LLC has filed suit in the Western District of Texas against Alphabet (Google) (6:23-cv-00248) over support on its online hardware store for making purchases using PayPal. The single e-commerce patent asserted is subject to multiple pending Alice motions. District Judge Alan D. Albright denied such a motion filed, before Markman, as premature, but a new set of motions has been filed in the wake of that court’s November 2022 claim construction ruling. Meanwhile, cases against three retailers have been stayed in the Eastern District of Texas to await resolution by District Court Sean D. Jordan of parallel Alice motions there. Throughout, the abstract idea to which the claims of the asserted patent are allegedly directed is “facilitating economic transactions between two parties using a third-party intermediary”.

AML IP LLC, a plaintiff associated with patent advisory firm Dynamic IP Deals (d/b/a DynaIP), has filed another round of complaints in its sole litigation campaign, suing Amazon (Amazon.com Services) (6:23-cv-00023), Best Buy (6:23-cv-00024), Costco (6:23-cv-00026), ESL Investments (Transform SR Holding Management) (6:23-cv-00033), Fossil (6:23-cv-00029), Guitar Center (6:23-cv-00030), Home Depot (6:23-cv-00031), Interior Define (6:23-cv-00032), and The Container Store (6:23-cv-00025) in the Western District of Texas and Macy’s (Bloomingdales.com) (3:23-cv-00102) in the Northern District of Texas. The single patent-in-suit generally relates to executing an e-commerce transaction between a user and a vendor using one of several service providers, with that transaction facilitated by an intermediate “bridge computer” that selects from those service providers in exchange for a service fee. The defendants are accused of infringement through provision or support of payment tools and services in their respective e-commerce websites.

Last month, Western District of Texas Judge Alan D. Albright handed down final constructions for disputed terms of one of the three patents that AML IP LLC, a plaintiff associated with monetization firm Dynamic IP Deals (d/b/a DynaIP), has been litigating since December 2020. Those constructions followed the October 2022 denial of a motion, filed by JC Penney, challenging that patent’s claims under Alice. The denial once again lays out Judge Albright’s philosophy with respect to such early patent eligibility motions: they must “overcome both a factual deck stacked against [them] and a heightened burden of proof”, and for multiple reasons are better considered after “a court can spend more time with the patents during claim construction, motions to strike contentions, discovery disputes, and even motions for summary judgment”. AML IP has filed its four most recent cases, one against each of AirBnB (6:22-cv-01262), Block (6:22-cv-01263), Buff Technologies (6:22-cv-01254), and Stripe (6:22-cv-01257) in the Western District of Texas as well; each has again been assigned to Judge Albright.

The final months of 2020 saw the patent monetization firm Dynamic IP Deals, LLC (d/b/a DynaIP) form at least three new NPEs in Texas. One of those NPEs, AML IP LLC, has since hit ten defendants over the provision of various e-commerce platforms and services. Now, after receiving a portfolio of nearly 30 patents from a small software company earlier this month, another DynaIP NPE has launched its inaugural campaign, this one targeting network security software products.

AML IP LLC, an entity associated with Dynamic IP Deals, LLC (d/b/a DynaIP), has expanded the campaign that it launched in December 2020, filing new suits against Activision Blizzard (Blizzard Entertainment) (6:21-cv-00038), ArtCraft Entertainment (6:21-cv-00036), and KingsIsle Entertainment (6:21-cv-00037), all in the Western District of Texas. A single patent, generally related to making e-commerce transactions using “electronic tokens”, is asserted, with infringement allegations targeting the defendants over the provision of in-game virtual currency systems.