TIZ Inc v. Smith Jason

1. Case Identification

• Case #: CBM2020-00029
• Patent #: 10,467,585
• Filed: September 15, 2020
• Petitioner(s): TIZ Inc. d/b/a PROVI
• Patent Owner(s): Jason K. Smith d/b/a Dust Bowl
• Challenged Claims: 1-19

2. Patent Overview

• Title: Integrated Computer System for Managing Beverage Inventories
• Brief Description: The ’585 patent discloses systems and methods for managing beverage product inventory and ordering using a centralized content management system (CMS). The invention purports to solve problems of fragmentation and incompatibility between systems used by different actors in a supply chain (e.g., merchants, distributors, suppliers) by creating a streamlined, integrated platform.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Patent-Ineligible Subject Matter - Claims 1-19 are directed to an abstract idea under 35 U.S.C. § 101.

• Core Argument for this Ground: Petitioner argued that all challenged claims are directed to the abstract idea of facilitating the purchase of items by collecting, analyzing, and transmitting information related to inventory, promotions, and sellers. This, Petitioner contended, is a fundamental economic practice that has long been performed manually. The claims allegedly do not integrate this abstract idea into a practical application or provide an inventive concept, instead merely automating a well-known business process using generic, conventional computer technology. The argument followed the two-step framework from Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int'l.

  • Step 1 (Alice): Directed to an Abstract Idea

    • Petitioner asserted that the claims, as a whole, are directed to the abstract concept of intermediated settlement and managing inventory-based ordering, which are long-standing commercial practices. Independent claim 1 recites a method of receiving inventory data (par and on-hand values), determining an order, incorporating promotions, identifying distributors, generating distributor-specific sub-orders, and transmitting them. Petitioner argued these are routine and conventional data-processing steps analogous to manual business methods.
    • The claims were compared to those found abstract in Alice (intermediated settlement), Credit Corp. (processing a financing application), and Mortg. Grader (anonymous loan shopping), arguing there is no meaningful distinction from these fundamental economic practices. Petitioner contended that the steps of claim 6 (registering a merchant, determining location, and transmitting a purchase request) and claim 14 (receiving an order and generating sub-orders) similarly recite this core abstract idea using different functional language.

  • Step 2 (Alice): Lack of an Inventive Concept

    • Petitioner argued that the claims fail to provide an inventive concept sufficient to transform the abstract idea into a patent-eligible application. The claims allegedly recite only a collection of generic and conventional computer components performing their ordinary functions.
    • The hardware elements recited—such as a "first user device," "second user device," "processors," "display," and "distributed network"—were described in the patent's specification as general-purpose computers and networks (e.g., desktops, laptops, the Internet). Petitioner argued these elements are not specialized and provide no improvement to computer functionality itself.
    • The ordered combination of claim elements was argued to be nothing more than the routine and conventional automation of a manual process. Petitioner contended that the functions performed, such as receiving data, determining an order based on simple calculations, applying promotions, identifying distributors based on location, and converting data formats, were all well-understood computer activities.
    • The petition asserted that the claims do not describe how the computer components are specially configured or programmed to achieve the result, but rather claim the desired result itself. Therefore, Petitioner concluded that the claims simply use a generic computer as a tool to perform the abstract business method, which is insufficient to supply an inventive concept. Dependent claims were argued to add only further conventional steps (e.g., sending an alert, processing a credit application) that do not rise to the level of an inventive concept.

4. Relief Requested

• Petitioner requests institution of a Covered Business Method review and cancellation of claims 1-19 of the ’585 patent as patent-ineligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101.