DCT

3:22-cv-00624

CM Systems LLC v. TransAct Tech Inc

Log In

I. Executive Summary and Procedural Information

  • Parties & Counsel:
  • Case Identification: 3:22-cv-00624, D. Conn., 10/18/2022
  • Venue Allegations: Venue is asserted based on Defendant having a regular and established place of business and its corporate headquarters within the District of Connecticut.
  • Core Dispute: Plaintiff alleges that Defendant’s BOHA! food safety management system infringes three patents related to automated food safety checklist creation, data collection, and compliance monitoring.
  • Technical Context: The technology concerns digital systems designed to replace paper-based Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) programs in the food service industry, aiming to improve accuracy, accountability, and reporting.
  • Key Procedural History: This action is a supplemented complaint, indicating the case was previously active. Plaintiff alleges it placed Defendant on notice of infringement of the ’788 and ’020 patents via a letter around March 4, 2022. The ’810 patent, which issued on September 20, 2022, was added to the suit via this supplemented complaint, with notice allegedly occurring around September 23, 2022, upon Plaintiff's request to amend.

Case Timeline

Date Event
2009-07-01 Priority Date for ’788, ’020, and ’810 Patents
2017-11-07 U.S. Patent No. 9,811,788 Issues
2021-05-11 U.S. Patent No. 11,004,020 Issues
2022-03-04 Alleged notice of infringement for ’788 and ’020 Patents via letter
2022-09-20 U.S. Patent No. 11,449,810 Issues
2022-09-23 Alleged notice of infringement for ’810 Patent via request to amend
2022-10-18 Supplemented Complaint Filed

II. Technology and Patent(s)-in-Suit Analysis

U.S. Patent No. 9,811,788 - Food Safety Management System (Issued Nov. 7, 2017)

The Invention Explained

  • Problem Addressed: The patent identifies the disadvantages of traditional paper-based HACCP programs, including transcription errors, labor-intensive operations, and difficult, time-consuming record retrieval and reporting (ʼ788 Patent, col. 1:11-23).
  • The Patented Solution: The invention proposes a computerized system to automate food safety compliance. It combines a handheld computing device for checklist completion with a central server for management and reporting ('788 Patent, Abstract). The system is designed to enhance personnel accountability by automatically recording checklist responses and aggregating data from multiple locations for centralized analysis ('788 Patent, col. 2:10-29).
  • Technical Importance: This technology sought to digitize and automate a critical regulatory process in the food service industry, shifting from manual, error-prone paper records to a system of real-time electronic monitoring and centralized oversight ('788 Patent, col. 2:16-29).

Key Claims at a Glance

  • The complaint alleges infringement of "one or more claims" but does not identify specific claims asserted from the ’788 Patent (Compl. ¶15). A representative independent system claim (Claim 1) includes elements such as:
    • At least one computing device with a web portal application.
    • A handheld computing device at each of a plurality of food service establishments.
    • The web portal generating checklists, customizing a subset of them, and sending them to the handhelds.
    • The system obtaining responses to the checklists, including data from a touchscreen, a stationary temperature sensor, and a handheld temperature sensor.
    • Generating a network page summarizing the responses and a report including temperature data.

U.S. Patent No. 11,004,020 - Food Safety Management System (Issued May 11, 2021)

The Invention Explained

  • Problem Addressed: The patent addresses the same challenges of paper-based HACCP systems as its parent patent, focusing on the difficulty of managing compliance across multiple establishments ('020 Patent, col. 1:11-23).
  • The Patented Solution: The invention details a hierarchical system where a "management portal application" on a server allows a management user to create and distribute checklists to multiple food service locations ('020 Patent, col. 7:15-28). The system architecture explicitly enables both corporate-level master checklists and regional or local customizations, with data flowing from handheld devices back to a central server for analysis (ʼ020 Patent, Fig. 4; col. 8:5-54).
  • Technical Importance: The solution provides a framework for scalable and centrally managed food safety protocols, allowing large chains to enforce standards while accommodating local variations, a key operational challenge in the food service sector ('020 Patent, col. 8:39-54).

Key Claims at a Glance

  • The complaint asserts infringement of "one or more claims" but does not specify which (Compl. ¶24). Independent claim 1 is a system claim whose essential elements include:
    • A computing device with a management portal application.
    • A handheld device at each of a plurality of food service establishments.
    • The portal application configured to: identify a management user; receive a customization to a master checklist from that user; apply the customization to generate a checklist for each establishment; and send the checklists to the handheld devices.
    • The system is further configured to: obtain responses from the handhelds (including touchscreen data, stationary sensor temperature data, and handheld temperature sensor data); and generate a network page summarizing the responses.

U.S. Patent No. 11,449,810 - Food Safety Management System (Issued Sep. 20, 2022)

Technology Synopsis

As a continuation of the same patent family, the ’810 patent describes a food safety management system comprising a server-side management portal and handheld computing devices for checklist execution (Compl. ¶34). The invention focuses on automating compliance by obtaining task completion data, temperature readings from various sensors, and verifying that tasks are completed at a specific location via an identifier before sending all data to a server for centralized reporting and analysis ('810 Patent, Abstract).

Asserted Claims

The complaint alleges infringement of "one or more claims" but does not specify which claims are asserted (Compl. ¶37).

Accused Features

The complaint accuses Defendant's entire BOHA! System, including its workstation, terminal, and various software applications, of infringing the ’810 Patent (Compl. ¶12, ¶37).

III. The Accused Instrumentality

Product Identification

The accused instrumentalities are Defendant’s hardware and software products for food safety management, collectively referred to as the "BOHA! System" (Compl. ¶12). This includes the BOHA! Workstation, BOHA! Terminal, BOHA! applications, and related products and services (Compl. ¶12).

Functionality and Market Context

The complaint alleges the BOHA! System is used by food service establishments to implement Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) programs for compliance with food safety regulations (Compl. ¶9). The complaint does not contain detailed technical descriptions of the BOHA! System's operation or architecture; instead, it asserts that the system's functionality infringes the patents-in-suit (Compl. ¶15, ¶24, ¶37). No probative visual evidence provided in complaint.

IV. Analysis of Infringement Allegations

The complaint references preliminary exemplary claim charts as Exhibits C, D, and F, but these exhibits were not filed with the public complaint. The infringement theory is therefore summarized in prose based on the complaint's narrative allegations.

  • ’788 and ’020 Patent Infringement Allegations
    The complaint alleges that Defendant’s BOHA! System directly infringes one or more claims of the ’788 and ’020 patents, either literally or under the doctrine of equivalents (Compl. ¶15, ¶24). The core of the infringement theory appears to be that the BOHA! System constitutes a "food management safety system" that performs the functions recited in the patents' claims. This includes allegations that the BOHA! System provides a central management portal for creating and distributing checklists to remote devices, which in turn are used to collect task completion data, temperature readings, and other compliance information for centralized reporting (Compl. ¶9, ¶12).

  • Identified Points of Contention:

    • Scope Questions: The dispute may turn on the scope of key claim terms. For the ’020 Patent, a question is whether the BOHA! System's method of generating a new checklist or editing a template constitutes a "customization to a master checklist" as required by the claim language.
    • Technical Questions: A primary question will be evidentiary: what proof demonstrates that the BOHA! System’s components perform the specific functions required by the claims? For example, what evidence shows that the system automatically receives temperature data from a "stationary sensor" and wirelessly communicates it to a "handheld computing device" as recited in the claims of the '020 Patent? The complaint makes these allegations but provides no specific supporting documentation.

V. Key Claim Terms for Construction

  • For the ’020 Patent:

    • The Term: "management portal application"

    • Context and Importance: This term defines the central control element of the claimed system. Its construction is critical because it will determine whether Defendant’s server-side BOHA! software meets the claim limitations related to user identification, checklist customization, and distribution. Practitioners may focus on this term because the functionality of the accused server software will be compared directly against this definition.

    • Intrinsic Evidence for Interpretation:

      • Evidence for a Broader Interpretation: The specification describes this component in flexible terms, such as an "administration and monitoring interface" that can be implemented as a "standalone application" or "a plurality of server-side scripts," which may support a broader, more functional definition ('020 Patent, col. 6:49-55).
      • Evidence for a Narrower Interpretation: The patent depicts a specific hierarchical structure with a "corporate management portal 403" and "regional management portals 409" ('020 Patent, Fig. 4). A party could argue the term should be narrowed to systems that embody this hierarchical management capability, as opposed to a single-level portal.

    • The Term: "customization to a master checklist"

    • Context and Importance: This phrase describes the core inventive act performed by the "management user." The infringement analysis will likely hinge on whether the accused BOHA! System’s workflow for creating or modifying checklists falls within the scope of this term.

    • Intrinsic Evidence for Interpretation:

      • Evidence for a Broader Interpretation: The patent describes customization as potentially simple actions, where a "regional management user might decide to change a particular task or configure a temperature reading limit," which could support construing any modification as a "customization" ('020 Patent, col. 8:42-45).
      • Evidence for a Narrower Interpretation: The claim language requires a customization to a master checklist. A defendant might argue that its system, if it builds checklists from a library of tasks rather than modifying a pre-existing "master" template, does not perform this specific claimed step.

VI. Other Allegations

  • Indirect Infringement: The complaint alleges induced infringement for all three patents. The stated basis is that Defendant sells the BOHA! System and provides instructions to customers and end users on how to use the system in a manner that allegedly directly infringes the patents (Compl. ¶17, ¶26, ¶39).
  • Willful Infringement: Willfulness is alleged for all three patents. For the ’788 and ’020 patents, the allegation is based on alleged pre-suit knowledge from a notice letter dated on or about March 4, 2022 (Compl. ¶21, ¶30). For the ’810 patent, the allegation is based on post-suit knowledge, arising from Plaintiff's request to supplement the complaint on or about September 23, 2022, after which Defendant allegedly continued to infringe (Compl. ¶43).

VII. Analyst’s Conclusion: Key Questions for the Case

  1. A central issue will be one of claim construction: can the term "customization to a master checklist," which implies modification of a baseline template, be construed to cover the accused system's method for checklist generation, which may involve building lists from a library of tasks rather than editing a single master document?

  2. A second core issue will be one of evidentiary proof: given the complaint's high-level allegations, can Plaintiff produce sufficient technical evidence to demonstrate that the accused BOHA! System performs every recited step of the asserted claims, particularly regarding the specific data pathways for automated temperature and location verification as described in the patents?