“This case is another example that conforms with our flawed precedent.” – Judge Pauline Newman
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) today affirmed a district court’s dismissal of Realtime Data, LLC’s patent infringement claims based on invalidity of the asserted claims under 35 U.S.C. § 101. In a previous ruling, the CAFC sent the case back to the district court asking for a more fleshed out Section 101 analysis. Judge Pauline Newman dissented to today’s judgment, calling current eligibility jurisprudence a “morass” and saying she would have remanded the case for determination of validity under Section 112, or possibly Sections 102 and 103.
Realtime first sued some of the appellees in the present case for infringement of claims of seven patents: U.S. Patent Nos. 9,054,728 (’728 patent), 8,933,825 (’825 patent), 8,717,203 (’203 patent), 9,116,908 (’908 patent), 7,415,530 (’530 patent), 10,019,458 (’458 patent), and 9,667,751 (’751 patent). The patents describe “a system for data compression that looks beyond the file type descriptor, to the underlying data, to complete the desired compression.”
Some of the appellees moved for dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6), arguing the claims were patent ineligible. In an oral hearing, the district court found all of the claims invalid as patent ineligible, and on appeal, the CAFC told the district court it must provide a more detailed Section 101 analysis.
On remand, the district court did so, explaining that the claims were invalid as directed to an abstract idea—specifically, the abstract idea “of manipulating information using compression.” Realtime was allowed to amend its complaints, but the district court ultimately dismissed them again without leave to amend.
Alice Kills Claims
In its discussion, the CAFC said that, under the Alice test for patent eligibility, at step one the claims call “for unparticularized analysis of data and achievement of general goals,” making them abstract. The court explained:
“As the district court explained, none of the claims at issue specifies any particular technique to carry out the compression of data—the particular rules for producing a smaller set of data out of a larger starting set. Rather, they all take the availability of compression techniques as a given and address the threshold matter of choosing to use one or more such available techniques.”
Realtime attempted to liken the claims to those found in Visual Memory LLC v. NVIDIA Corp., 867 F.3d 1253 (Fed. Cir. 2017), but the court said the patents there explained “the how” while Realtime’s patents failed to do so. “The patent did not merely claim this enhancement to the computer memory system; it explained how it worked, appending ‘263 frames of computer code,’” said the court of the Visual Memory claims in Univ. of Fla. Research Found., Inc. v. GE Co., 916 F.3d 1363, 1368 (Fed. Cir. 2019).
At Alice step two, the district court found that the claims “simply apply an abstract idea on generic computers with generic techniques.” Realtime argued that “the disclosed inventions . . . provide specific, unconventional technological solutions that improve computer functionality and overcome problems specifically arising in the realm of compression of digital computer data.” But, quoting American Axle & Manufacturing v. Neapco Holdings, the CAFC said this “amounts to no more than a restatement of the assertion that the desired results are an advance.”
Flawed Eligibility Precedent
In a short but pointed dissent, Judge Pauline Newman, who is currently embroiled in a battle with the CAFC’s Chief Judge over claims that she is unfit to serve on the court, criticized the Federal Circuit’s expansion of the U.S. Supreme Court’s judicial exceptions to patent eligibility. She said the case is “properly an enablement case” and that “§ 101 was never intended to bar categories of invention in this way.” The judicial exceptions are “an unnecessary and confusing creation of the courts” and the current Section 101 law “has diverged from its historical purpose,” Newman added. She quoted herself, Representative Doug Collins (R-GA) and Senators Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Chris Coons (D-DE) to support her view. “This case is another example that conforms with our flawed precedent,” Newman concluded.
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Join the Discussion
13 comments so far.
Anon
August 3, 2023 05:18 pmB,
Absolutely correct – and I would have acknowledged your post had I seen it, but apparently my “buffer” was a bit late in updating.
Anon
August 3, 2023 03:44 pmBrother Anon,
You are not correct — and suffer from a mode of thinking that I have strongly denigrated (the Ends justify the Means).
Please choose a different moniker if you are going to persist in putting forth such uninformed opinions.
B
August 3, 2023 01:23 pm@ “Anon” “101 works great as a sniff test to knock out patent trolls like it did here. Judge Newman can dissent all she wants, but here, the system worked as intended.”
The real Anon would poke his own eyes out before posting this
B
August 3, 2023 11:45 am@ concerned “Is Judge Newman allowed to submit an amicus brief on my petition to SCOTUS?”
As an active sitting judge, I don’t think so – plus the time window has passed for amici.
However, between the S.Ct’s Amgen enablement decision and this monstro-city, I believe we can file a supplemental brief.
I note that Reyna and Taranto state that they are required to analyze claims as a whole, but do not. They ignore the advantages of the claims and reduce the claims to “data transmission”
Anyway, the majority whines that “the claims of the asserted patents are “data manipulation” claims , , , that lack “sufficient recitation of how the purported invention[s]” accomplish the results.” We know for a fact this is a garbage statement given your own 400+ word claims.
Plus, it literally writes out 112(f)
Randall R. Rader
August 3, 2023 11:30 amEligibility is just that: whether the entire category of subject matter deserves patent protection. Under the statute, eligibility is not a test for claim validity, which instead is governed (according to the language of 101 itself) by the “the conditions and requirements of this title,” namely 102, 103 and 112. ALICE and its perverted CAFC progeny depart entirely from the language of the statute. Once again, Judge Newman has it right!
Anon
August 3, 2023 09:39 am101 works great as a sniff test to knock out patent trolls like it did here. Judge Newman can dissent all she wants, but here, the system worked as intended.
James Scott Elmer
August 3, 2023 07:56 amThree cheers for the notorious JPN (Judge Pauling Newman)! When judges make up rules, like exceptions to patentable subject matter that do not exist in the statute, bad things happen.
concerned
August 3, 2023 07:26 amThe judicial exceptions are “an unnecessary and confusing creation of the courts” and the current “Section 101 law “has diverged from its historical purpose,” Newman added. She quoted herself, Representative Doug Collins (R-GA) and Senators Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Chris Coons (D-DE) to support her view. “This case is another example that conforms with our flawed precedent,” Newman concluded.
Is Judge Newman allowed to submit an amicus brief on my petition to SCOTUS?
Night Writer
August 3, 2023 06:15 amLab Jedor >>The Court doesn’t give a hoot what the technical aspect of data compression is. It cites: And “[b]ecause data compression is, without more, simply a form of data analysis, the claims are directed to abstract ideas.” That statement is inherently and per definition wrong. Data compression, is per definition compression: less data comes out than went in.
This is exactly right. This statement by the court is outrageous. Representing “data” requires time, space, and energy. Reducing the time, space, and energy to represent the information (“data”) is inherently technical. In fact —let’s put our thinking caps on–the entire point of complex compression algorithms is to reduce the space, time, and energy need to represent the information.
So, a computer (information processor) can be made smaller or represent more information (and transmit and receive more information).
Data compression in the EU is considered a technical problem for this reason.
Pro Say
August 2, 2023 11:40 pmJudge Newman:
Lady of Logic.
Ruler of Reason.
Queen of Justice.
Model 101
August 2, 2023 07:55 pmTo Judge Newman:
You go girl !!!!
More 101 nonsense.
Keep fighting for us!
Thank you!
Anon
August 2, 2023 04:40 pmAlas,
One should ask, “Why the animus?”
Then ask: exactly who is benefitting from this state of affairs?
Without our collective realization of the driver — yes, I am looking at you, the Efficient Infringement lot — we risk merely fighting the band-aids that the clumsy courts are using while they drunkenly whirl about from the propaganda Kool-Aid flowing so freely about.
Lab Jedor
August 2, 2023 12:52 pm“Data compression is a process of reducing the size of digital data files or streams while preserving as much of the original information as possible. The main goal of data compression is to save storage space, decrease transmission time, and improve overall efficiency in data storage and transmission systems.”
The Court doesn’t give a hoot what the technical aspect of data compression is. It cites: And “[b]ecause data compression is, without more, simply a form of data analysis, the claims are directed to abstract ideas.” That statement is inherently and per definition wrong. Data compression, is per definition compression: less data comes out than went in.
It is tiresome to have to respond to the CAFC nonsense 101 rejections. But we cannot relent on fighting this engineering idiocy. It is getting worse, not better.