comSCore Inc v. Moat Inc

1. Case Identification

• Case #: CBM2014-00071
• Patent #: 6,963,826
• Filed: February 18, 2014
• Petitioner(s): comScore, Inc.
• Patent Owner(s): Hanaman et al.
• Challenged Claims: 1, 5, 6, 12, 15, 18, and 20

2. Patent Overview

• Title: PERFORMANCE OPTIMIZER SYSTEM AND METHOD
• Brief Description: The ’826 patent is directed to methods for assessing sales force performance by applying statistical analysis to usage and transactional information associated with customer relationship management (CRM) and sales force automation (SFA) systems. The invention involves capturing user interaction data, integrating it into a data warehouse, and performing dimensional modeling to ascertain drivers of sales representative performance.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Anticipation over Tamayo - Claims 1, 12, 15, and 18 are anticipated under 35 U.S.C. §102 by Tamayo.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Tamayo (Application # 2002/0083067).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Tamayo, which describes an "enterprise-wide web data mining system," teaches every limitation of the challenged claims. Tamayo's system obtains "usage information" by monitoring user interactions with web servers through methods like TCP/IP packet sniffing and accessing server logs. It obtains "transactional information" by collecting data on monetary transactions and purchases over the web. Tamayo further discloses "aggregating" this data by acquiring it from multiple sources and transforming it into a common format for analysis. The system then performs "data modeling" by defining schemas and building data tables to store the aggregated information. Finally, Tamayo applies a "statistical methodology" using various data mining models (e.g., Naive Bayes, CART) to generate recommendations, and "presents" this statistical analysis information to users via web portal pages and dynamically generated HTML, thus meeting all limitations of independent claim 1. Dependent claims 12, 15, and 18 were also allegedly taught by Tamayo's disclosure of user systems, web browser-displayable reports, and data collection from a plurality of users.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Nabe in view of Joshi - Claims 1, 5, 6, 12, and 20 are obvious over Nabe in view of Joshi under 35 U.S.C. §103.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Nabe (Application # 2002/0049701) and Joshi (Karuna P. Joshi et al., Warehousing and Mining Web Logs, Proceedings of the 2nd International Workshop on Web Information and Data Management (1999)).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner contended that Nabe teaches a system for modeling customer data from multiple sources (including purchasing activity) to enable efficient customer targeting. Nabe's system applies statistical software tools to compiled data, performs modeling, and presents results to users via a GUI. However, Nabe is general about the source of web-based customer activity data. Petitioner argued that Joshi remedies this by explicitly teaching a system that analyzes "web logs" to extract granular customer activity and usage data, representing a customer's interaction with a web browser and server. The combination teaches obtaining "usage information" from web logs (Joshi) and "transactional information" like purchasing activity (Nabe), aggregating it, and applying statistical analysis to generate targeting data (Nabe).
  • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Joshi's detailed web log analysis with Nabe's broader customer targeting framework to improve its accuracy and precision. Joshi's method provides a rich, granular source of customer interaction data ("usage information") that Nabe's system is designed to analyze. Using Joshi's web log data as an input for Nabe's system would provide a more complete picture of customer behavior, leading directly to the more effective customer targeting that Nabe sought to achieve.
  • Expectation of Success: A POSITA would have a reasonable expectation of success because both references describe systems that process customer data for analysis within a relational database structure. Joshi’s teaching of creating multi-dimensional database structures from web logs would be predictably compatible with Nabe’s system, which also uses such structures.
• Additional Grounds: Petitioner also asserted that claim 5 is unpatentable as indefinite under 35 U.S.C. §112 because it ambiguously refers to "the step of performing data modeling" when parent claim 1 recites two distinct steps of performing data modeling.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

• "Transactional information": Petitioner argued this term should be construed as "information related to conducting business or negotiations." This construction was asserted to be consistent with the specification's examples of sales calls and fulfillment and was broad enough to encompass the purchasing and financial data disclosed in the prior art references like Tamayo and Nabe.
• "Usage information": Petitioner proposed the construction "information about the act or manner of using something." This interpretation was based on the plain meaning of "usage" and supported by the specification's description of monitoring a sales representative's use of a CRM/SFA system. This construction was crucial for mapping the web log and user navigation data from Tamayo and Joshi onto the claim language.
• "Data modeling": Petitioner proposed construing this term as "the process of defining the structure of the data within an information system by defining the entities, the data elements, their formats, and the relationships between them." This construction, which the Board had previously adopted in a related IPR, was argued to be essential for understanding how the prior art's creation of database schemas and tables met this limitation.

5. Relief Requested

• Petitioner requests institution of a Covered Business Method (CBM) review and cancellation of claims 1, 5, 6, 12, 15, 18, and 20 of the ’826 patent as unpatentable.