PTAB

IPR2015-00636

CaptionCall LLC v. Ultratec Inc

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Key Events
Petition
petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: System for Text Assisted Telephony
  • Brief Description: The ’822 patent relates to a "two-line" captioned telephone system for assisting hearing-impaired users. The system allows a user to conduct a voice call on a first telephone line while simultaneously establishing a second, separate link to a remote relay service that provides real-time text transcriptions of the other party's speech.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over Liebermann, Engelke ’405, and Mukherji - Claims 1-7 and 10-29 are obvious over Liebermann in view of Engelke ’405 and Mukherji.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Liebermann (Patent 5,982,853), Engelke ’405 (Patent 5,724,405), and Mukherji (Patent 7,117,152).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Liebermann teaches the core two-line system architecture, where a user device connects to a hearing person via a first line and a voice-to-text translation "center" via a second line. Engelke ’405 discloses tailoring relay services for users who are hard-of-hearing (not deaf) by providing both voice and text, and further teaches an "on/off" switch to control captioning. Mukherji teaches invoking this text assistance via a user request, such as a button press, either before or during an active conversation. Petitioner asserted that the combination of these references discloses all limitations of the independent claims, including receiving a request for captioning and providing transcribed text from a remote relay.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Liebermann’s two-line system with the teachings of Engelke ’405 to adapt the device for hard-of-hearing users who require both voice and text, which was a known modification in the art. A POSITA would further incorporate Mukherji’s feature of on-demand, mid-conversation activation to improve the device's functionality and user convenience, representing a simple application of a known technique to improve a similar device.
    • Expectation of Success: The combination involved applying a known technique (on-demand captioning) to a known device architecture (a two-line telephone) to achieve a predictable improvement in usability.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Liebermann, Engelke ’405, Mukherji, and Engelke ’482 - Claims 2, 8-10, and 13-14 are obvious over Liebermann in view of Engelke ’405, Mukherji, and Engelke ’482.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Liebermann (Patent 5,982,853), Engelke ’405 (Patent 5,724,405), Mukherji (Patent 7,117,152), and Engelke ’482 (Patent 5,909,482).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: This ground builds on Ground 1 by adding the teachings of Engelke ’482. Petitioner argued that Engelke ’482 explicitly discloses the methods of "revoicing"—where a call assistant re-speaks words into trained voice recognition software instead of typing—and performing error correction on the resulting transcribed text. These teachings map directly to the limitations of dependent claims 8 and 9, which recite revoicing and error correction steps.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine the revoicing and error correction techniques from Engelke ’482 into the system of Ground 1 to improve the speed and accuracy of the captioning service. This was a known method for enhancing relay system performance and would have been an obvious improvement.
    • Expectation of Success: Integrating a known transcription improvement technique like revoicing into an existing relay service framework would have yielded predictable results in the form of faster and more accurate captions.

Ground 3: Obviousness over McLaughlin, Engelke ’405, and Mukherji - Claims 1-9, 11-17, 19-25, and 27-29 are obvious over McLaughlin in view of Engelke ’405 and Mukherji.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: McLaughlin (Patent 6,181,736), Engelke ’405 (Patent 5,724,405), and Mukherji (Patent 7,117,152).

  • Core Argument for this Ground:

    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner presented McLaughlin as an alternative primary reference that, like Liebermann, discloses a two-line architecture for providing text assistance to hearing-impaired users. The arguments for combining Engelke ’405 (providing both voice/text and an on/off switch) and Mukherji (mid-conversation activation) are identical to those in Ground 1, with McLaughlin providing the foundational two-line system instead of Liebermann.
    • Motivation to Combine: The motivation to enhance McLaughlin’s two-line system with on-demand activation and dual voice/text capability is the same as for the Liebermann-based combination: to improve usability and cater to a wider range of user needs, which were known goals in the art.

  • Additional Grounds: Petitioner asserted an additional obviousness challenge (Ground 4) based on the combination of McLaughlin, Engelke ’405, Mukherji, and Engelke ’482. This ground mirrors the logic of Ground 2 by adding the revoicing and error correction teachings of Engelke ’482 to the alternative McLaughlin-based system.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

  • "Control limitation": Petitioner noted that the Board previously construed the limitation of "operating a control... to initiate a captioning service" in a related inter partes review to include timing, context, and action elements. Petitioner argued the same construction should apply, with the term "control" being synonymous with the ’822 patent's "activator."
  • "a communication link that is completely independent of the telephone line": Petitioner proposed construing this phrase broadly as "any communication session, protocol, link, or path distinguishable from the claimed telephone line." This construction was based on the specification's lack of the exact phrase and its broad description of telephone lines potentially being portions of an ISDN or DSL service.

5. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requests institution of inter partes review and cancellation of claims 1-29 of Patent 8,917,822 as unpatentable.