PTAB

IPR2016-01535

Google Inc v. Makor Issues & Rights Ltd

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Petition
petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: Real Time Vehicle Guidance and Forecasting System Under Jam Conditions
  • Brief Description: The ’783 patent discloses a method for operating a central traffic guidance unit to calculate an optimal vehicle travel route. The system collects GPS data from a fleet of sample vehicles to compute both current and statistical travel times, using this data to forecast traffic and provide routes that avoid congestion.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Claims 12-16, 18, and 19 are obvious over TravTek in view of Roozemond

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: TravTek (U.S. Department of Transportation Publication No. FHWA-RD-94-141 (July 1995)) and Roozemond (Forecasting Travel Times Based on Actuated and Historic Data (1997)).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that TravTek, a large-scale, real-world driver information system tested in the 1990s, disclosed nearly all elements of independent claim 12. TravTek’s system used a central Traffic Management Center (TMC) that collected real-time position and travel time data from a fleet of 100 "probe" vehicles to provide drivers with optimal routes that minimized travel time. This data, which Petitioner argued meets the patent’s construction of "GPS data," was processed, stored in a database subdivided by time of day and day of the week, and used to identify traffic congestion and update vehicle guidance systems.
    • Motivation to Combine: Petitioner contended that the ’783 patent’s central novelty—using current travel times for the near portion of a route and statistical travel times for the distant portion—was described in the patent’s own specification as "obvious" and "logical." Roozemond explicitly taught this exact methodology, describing a model that forecasts near-future travel times based on current data and longer-term times based on historic data. A POSITA would combine TravTek's established navigation system with Roozemond's forecasting model to improve accuracy, as current data is more precise for immediate conditions while historical data better predicts conditions further along a route.
    • Expectation of Success: A POSITA would have had a high expectation of success because combining Roozemond's well-understood forecasting logic with TravTek's existing infrastructure was a predictable way to improve the system's performance. The combination involved applying a known technique to a known system to achieve a predictable improvement in route calculation accuracy.

Ground 2: Claims 12-14 and 18 are obvious over Xu in view of Peterson

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Xu (Patent 6,401,027) and Peterson (Patent 5,845,227).

  • Core Argument for this Ground:

    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner asserted that Xu disclosed a centralized "traffic service center" that uses GPS positions from vehicles to provide real-time traffic conditions and route planning. Xu taught calculating link travel times by determining the difference between when a vehicle was at a source node and a sink node, directly addressing a key feature argued for patentability during the prosecution of the ’783 patent. Xu also disclosed calculating an average travel time for a route comprising continuous links, mapping to the "overall route planning optimization" limitation.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Xu's system with Peterson's teachings to improve route calculation accuracy. Peterson expressly taught a sophisticated weighting system where the "most accurate predictor of elapsed time now is the sensed velocities" (i.e., current data), while for trips with two or more hours remaining, "one hundred percent historical patterns" are the best predictor. Peterson further disclosed weighting the data based on how far in the future it would be used. A POSITA would combine Peterson’s advanced, dynamic weighting logic with Xu's foundational system to enhance its predictive capabilities, a straightforward improvement.
    • Expectation of Success: Applying Peterson’s known data-weighting principles to Xu's navigation system was a predictable modification that would have been expected to yield more accurate travel time forecasts without fundamentally altering the system's operation.

  • Additional Grounds: Petitioner asserted additional obviousness challenges for claims 15, 16, and 19 based on combinations of Xu, Peterson, Roozemond, and TravTek, arguing that adding Roozemond's or TravTek's teachings on intermediate or standard travel times to the Xu/Peterson system was a predictable design choice to further refine route calculation.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

  • "GPS data" (claim 12): Petitioner proposed this term be construed as "data that was determined using signals received from GPS satellites or that is related to use of such signals." This construction was argued to be consistent with the specification and was crucial for demonstrating that prior art systems like TravTek, which used GPS position information (e.g., latitude, longitude) to correct dead-reckoning systems, met this limitation.
  • "standard travel times" (claim 19): Petitioner proposed this term corresponds to the "Theoretical Travel Times" described in the ’783 patent specification. This construction defines the term as travel times generated from road characteristics (e.g., length and speed limit) rather than from actual, measured traffic data. This was important for showing that prior art like TravTek, which used such theoretical times as a fallback for links lacking real-time or historical data, met the claim limitation.

5. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requests institution of an inter partes review and cancellation of claims 12-16, 18, and 19 of the ’783 patent as unpatentable.