Patent Armory Inc v. Mercury Systems Inc

I. Executive Summary and Procedural Information

• Parties & Counsel:
  • Plaintiff: Patent Armory Inc. (Canada)
  • Defendant: Mercury Systems, Inc. (Massachusetts)
  • Plaintiff’s Counsel: Rabicoff Law LLC
• Case Identification: 1:24-cv-1582, E.D. Va., 09/09/2024
• Venue Allegations: Venue is alleged as proper based on Defendant maintaining an established place of business within the Eastern District of Virginia and having committed alleged acts of infringement in the district.
• Core Dispute: Plaintiff alleges that Defendant’s unidentified products and services infringe five patents related to intelligent call routing and auction-based systems for matching entities.
• Technical Context: The technologies at issue involve sophisticated methods for managing communications in environments like call centers, aiming to optimize routing based on various factors, a critical function for large-scale customer service and sales operations.
• Key Procedural History: The complaint does not identify any prior litigation, licensing history, or administrative proceedings involving the patents-in-suit. The file history of the patents indicates that U.S. Patent No. 10,237,420 is a continuation of the application that matured into U.S. Patent No. 9,456,086, suggesting a shared specification and a potential focus on related technical concepts.

Case Timeline

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

U.S. Patent No. 10,237,420 - Method and system for matching entities in an auction

• Issued: March 19, 2019

The Invention Explained

• Problem Addressed: The patent describes the challenge in call centers of efficiently routing customer contacts to agents. Traditional routing methods, such as first-come-first-served, are described as inefficient, particularly when agents possess varying skill sets, leading to suboptimal use of resources and inconsistent service quality (’420 Patent, col. 2:26-34, col. 3:42-56).
• The Patented Solution: The invention proposes a system for matching a "first entity" (e.g., a caller) with a "second entity" (e.g., an agent) through a multi-factorial optimization. This is achieved by defining data sets for both entities ("inferential targeting parameters" for the caller and "characteristic parameters" for the agent) and then performing an automated optimization that considers not only the "economic surplus" of a potential match but also the "opportunity cost" of making a particular agent unavailable for other potential matches (’420 Patent, Abstract; Fig. 1).
• Technical Importance: This approach advances beyond simple skill-based matching by incorporating economic principles like surplus and opportunity cost, allowing for a more dynamic and globally optimized allocation of resources in a communications environment (’420 Patent, col. 5:10-19).

Key Claims at a Glance

• The complaint asserts "one or more claims," including "exemplary method claims," without specifying claim numbers (Compl. ¶15). Independent claim 1 is a representative method claim.
• Essential elements of independent claim 1 include:
  • Defining a plurality of multivalued scalar data representing inferential targeting parameters for a first entity.
  • Defining a plurality of multivalued scalar data for each of a plurality of second entities, representing their respective characteristic parameters.
  • Performing an automated optimization with respect to an economic surplus of a respective match of the first entity with one of the second entities.
  • The optimization also considers an opportunity cost of the unavailability of that second entity for matching with an alternate first entity.
• The complaint does not explicitly reserve the right to assert dependent claims but refers broadly to "one or more claims" (Compl. ¶15).

U.S. Patent No. 10,491,748 - Intelligent communication routing system and method

• Issued: November 26, 2019

The Invention Explained

• Problem Addressed: The patent identifies the inefficiency of conventional call center routing, where systems fail to account for the nuanced skills of agents or the specific needs of callers, leading to problems like routing calls to under-skilled or over-skilled agents (’748 Patent, col. 4:35-62).
• The Patented Solution: The invention is a communications routing system that makes decisions by "maximizing an aggregate utility." It stores predicted characteristics for both communication "sources" (e.g., callers) and "targets" (e.g., agents), each associated with an "economic utility." A processor then determines the optimal routing by calculating which pairing of sources and targets maximizes the overall utility, considering factors like agent skills, costs, call outcomes, and training opportunities (’748 Patent, Abstract; col. 24:13-24).
• Technical Importance: This technology integrates business-level objectives, such as training value and economic outcomes, directly into the low-level logic of the communications switch, enabling more sophisticated and context-aware routing decisions than traditional systems (’748 Patent, col. 18:8-23).

Key Claims at a Glance

• The complaint asserts "one or more claims" without specifying claim numbers (Compl. ¶21). Independent claim 1 is a representative system claim.
• Essential elements of independent claim 1 include:
  • A communications routing system comprising a memory and a processor.
  • The memory stores predicted characteristics of a plurality of communications sources, each having an economic utility.
  • The memory also stores predicted characteristics of a plurality of communications targets, each having an economic utility.
  • The processor is configured to determine an optimal routing between the sources and targets by maximizing an aggregate utility with respect to their respective predicted characteristics.
• The complaint does not explicitly reserve the right to assert dependent claims.

U.S. Patent No. 7,023,979 - Telephony control system with intelligent call routing

• Issued: April 4, 2006 (Compl. ¶11)
• Technology Synopsis: This patent addresses inefficient call routing by creating a system with a processor that computes an optimal agent selection. The system uses a database of skill weights corresponding to communication classifications and a database of agent skill scores to determine the best match, and then directly controls the routing of the call (’979 Patent, Abstract).
• Asserted Claims: "one or more claims," including "exemplary method claims" (Compl. ¶30).
• Accused Features: The complaint alleges that unidentified "Exemplary Defendant Products" practice the claimed technology (Compl. ¶30).

U.S. Patent No. 7,269,253 - Telephony control system with intelligent call routing

• Issued: September 11, 2007 (Compl. ¶12)
• Technology Synopsis: This technology describes a system for intelligent call routing that determines an optimum agent selection based on a correspondence between a call classification vector and a table of agent characteristic vectors. The system uses a processor to perform this determination and control the call routing accordingly (’253 Patent, Abstract).
• Asserted Claims: "one or more claims," including "exemplary method claims" (Compl. ¶36).
• Accused Features: The complaint alleges that unidentified "Exemplary Defendant Products" practice the claimed technology (Compl. ¶36).

U.S. Patent No. 9,456,086 - Method and system for matching entities in an auction

• Issued: September 27, 2016 (Compl. ¶13)
• Technology Synopsis: This patent, a parent of the ’420 Patent, discloses a method for matching entities by defining their respective parameters (inferential targeting and characteristic parameters) and performing an automated optimization. The optimization considers the economic surplus of a match and the opportunity cost of an agent's unavailability for other potential matches, framing the process within an auction context (’086 Patent, Abstract).
• Asserted Claims: "at least the exemplary claims" (Compl. ¶42).
• Accused Features: The complaint alleges that unidentified "Exemplary Defendant Products" practice the claimed technology (Compl. ¶42).

III. The Accused Instrumentality

Product Identification

• The complaint does not identify any of Defendant’s products or services by name. It refers to the accused instrumentalities only as "Exemplary Defendant Products" (Compl. ¶15).

Functionality and Market Context

• The complaint alleges that the accused products practice the technology claimed by the patents-in-suit but provides no specific details regarding their features, functionality, or operation in the body of the complaint (Compl. ¶¶ 17, 26, 32, 38, 47). Instead, it incorporates by reference external claim chart exhibits which were not filed with the complaint. The complaint offers no allegations regarding the market context or commercial importance of the accused products. No probative visual evidence provided in complaint.

IV. Analysis of Infringement Allegations

The complaint alleges infringement of all five patents-in-suit but incorporates its detailed infringement theories by reference to external exhibits (Exhibits 6-10) that were not provided with the publicly filed complaint (Compl. ¶¶ 18, 27, 33, 39, 48). Therefore, a claim chart summary cannot be constructed. The narrative infringement theory for each patent is that Defendant's unidentified "Exemplary Defendant Products" practice the patented technologies and satisfy all elements of the asserted claims, either literally or under the doctrine of equivalents (Compl. ¶¶ 15, 21, 30, 36, 42).

• Identified Points of Contention: Based on the complaint's allegations and the patent language, the infringement analysis raises several questions.
  • Scope Questions: A central question will be how the abstract, economically-focused terms of the patents, such as "economic surplus" (’420 Patent) and "aggregate utility" (’748 Patent), apply to the actual functions performed by the accused products. The dispute may center on whether the accused products’ routing logic performs a true multi-factorial optimization or a simpler, heuristic-based selection that falls outside the claimed scope.
  • Technical Questions: Without access to the complaint's claim charts or any description of the accused products, a fundamental evidentiary question is what facts support the allegation that the accused products perform the specific functions required by the claims. For example, what evidence suggests the accused products calculate an "opportunity cost" of agent unavailability as required by claim 1 of the ’420 Patent, or perform a global "maximization" of utility across multiple sources and targets as required by claim 1 of the ’748 Patent?

V. Key Claim Terms for Construction

• The Term: "economic surplus" (from claim 1 of the ’420 Patent)

  • Context and Importance: This term is at the core of the optimization step in the ’420 Patent. Its construction will be critical to determining whether the metric used by the accused products to evaluate a match—which may be a non-monetary score—falls within the scope of a claim that appears to require a quantitative, value-based calculation.
  • Intrinsic Evidence for Interpretation:
    • Evidence for a Broader Interpretation: The specification discusses optimizing a "cost-utility function" and considers non-monetary goals like "customer satisfaction," which could support a broader reading beyond strict financial surplus (’420 Patent, col. 24:35-40).
    • Evidence for a Narrower Interpretation: The consistent use of the term "economic" in the claim and abstract, as well as references to optimizing in "economic units," may support a narrower construction limited to financial or quasi-financial calculations (’420 Patent, Abstract; col. 24:35-40).

• The Term: "maximizing an aggregate utility" (from claim 1 of the ’748 Patent)

  • Context and Importance: This phrase defines the central function of the claimed processor. The dispute may turn on whether the accused product's routing logic performs a true "maximization" across a set of potential pairings, as the claim language suggests, or merely selects the best available option in a sequential or otherwise limited manner.
  • Intrinsic Evidence for Interpretation:
    • Evidence for a Broader Interpretation: The specification describes "utility" as encompassing a wide range of factors, including both economic parameters and abstract goals like training opportunities, suggesting a flexible definition of what is being aggregated and maximized (’748 Patent, col. 23:1-24:12).
    • Evidence for a Narrower Interpretation: The claim's language requires "maximizing an aggregate utility" between pluralities of sources and targets, which may imply a global optimization across multiple potential pairings, not merely a localized or greedy algorithm that selects the best agent for a single call in isolation. The specification contemplates selecting an "optimal pairing of respective multiple agents with multiple matters," supporting a construction that requires a system-wide optimization process (’748 Patent, col. 24:63-65).

VI. Other Allegations

• Indirect Infringement: The complaint alleges induced infringement of the ’748 and ’086 Patents. The allegations are based on Defendant's distribution of "product literature and website materials" that allegedly instruct end users on how to use the accused products in a manner that infringes the patents (Compl. ¶¶ 24, 45-46). The complaint references Exhibits 7 and 10 for detailed support, which were not provided.
• Willful Infringement: For the ’748 and ’086 Patents, the complaint alleges "Actual Knowledge of Infringement" based explicitly on "the service of this Complaint, in conjunction with the attached claim charts" (Compl. ¶¶ 23, 44). This frames the allegation as one of post-suit knowledge, which may support a claim for enhanced damages for any post-filing infringement but does not allege pre-suit willfulness.

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

• A primary evidentiary question will be one of technical operation: once details of the accused products are established, does their functionality map onto the specific, multi-step optimization and economic modeling processes required by the patents-in-suit? The complaint's complete reliance on unprovided exhibits for all technical infringement details leaves the factual basis for this mapping entirely open for discovery.
• A core legal issue will be one of definitional scope: can patent terms rooted in complex optimization theory, such as "economic surplus" (’420 Patent) and "maximizing an aggregate utility" (’748 Patent), be construed to cover the potentially simpler, heuristic-based routing logic that may be employed by Defendant’s products? The outcome of claim construction on these terms will likely be dispositive for infringement.