PTAB

IPR2017-01231

Samsung Electronics Co Ltd v. Image Processing Technologies LLC

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Petition
petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: Identifying and Tracking a Target Using Histograms
  • Brief Description: The ’015 patent discloses a process for identifying and tracking a target within a sequence of image frames from a video signal. The system forms histograms based on pixel characteristics (domains) to locate the target and adjusts a tracking box around it on a frame-by-frame basis.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over Gerhardt and Bassman - Claims 1-2 and 4-5 are obvious over Gerhardt in view of Bassman.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Gerhardt (Patent 5,481,622) and Bassman (Patent 6,044,166).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Gerhardt, which discloses an eye-tracking system, teaches the core process of claim 1: tracking a target (a pupil) on a frame-by-frame basis using intensity histograms. Gerhardt discloses forming a bounding box around a starting pixel, successively increasing the search area until the target is found, and then adjusting the box center based on the histogram data. Bassman, which tracks vehicles on a roadway, also discloses frame-by-frame tracking using intensity histograms. Both references were argued to inherently disclose system components like a memory, a temporal processing unit, and a spatial processing unit, thus satisfying the limitations of claims 4 and 5.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Gerhardt and Bassman as they address similar problems of target tracking using histograms in video streams. Petitioner asserted that Bassman's method of explicitly linking a target's position in a current frame to its position in a previous frame would have been seen as a way to improve the reliability of Gerhardt's system, especially in cases where the target is temporarily lost (e.g., due to blinking in Gerhardt's eye-tracking context). This combination would reduce false positives and increase processing speed.
    • Expectation of Success: A POSITA would have had a high expectation of success, as the combination involved applying known target-linking techniques from Bassman to the similar histogram-based tracking system of Gerhardt, yielding predictable improvements in reliability.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Gerhardt, Bassman, and Hashima - Claims 3 and 7 are obvious over Gerhardt in view of Bassman and further in view of Hashima.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Gerhardt (Patent 5,481,622), Bassman (Patent 6,044,166), and Hashima (Patent 5,521,843).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: This ground built upon the combination of Gerhardt and Bassman to address the additional limitations of claims 3 and 7, which require calculating a histogram according to a "projection axis" and "calculating an anticipated next frame." Petitioner argued that Hashima explicitly discloses these features. Hashima's system for recognizing a target mark uses X- and Y-projected histograms (histograms calculated along projection axes) to determine the target's location. Hashima then uses this information to anticipate the target's position and adjust the tracking window for the next measurement (frame).
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA, seeking to improve the target tracking systems of Gerhardt and Bassman, would have looked to other similar systems like Hashima. Petitioner contended that Hashima's use of X- and Y-projection histograms provided an explicit and effective method for identifying the minima and maxima of a target, a feature generally taught but not detailed in Gerhardt. Incorporating Hashima's technique for anticipating the next frame would further enhance the robustness and predictive capability of the combined Gerhardt/Bassman system.
    • Expectation of Success: The combination was presented as predictable, as it involved incorporating Hashima’s well-defined projection histogram and frame anticipation techniques into the foundational tracking systems of Gerhardt and Bassman.

Ground 3: Obviousness over Gilbert, Gerhardt, and Schaming - Claims 1-5 and 7 are obvious over Gilbert in view of Gerhardt and further in view of Schaming.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Gilbert (a 1980 IEEE Transactions article), Gerhardt (Patent 5,481,622), and Schaming (a 1982 article on digital image processing).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner asserted that Gilbert, a real-time video tracking system for missiles, discloses the fundamental process of claim 1. Gilbert tracks a target frame-by-frame, places a tracking window around it, and forms intensity histograms of the pixels within that window. Gilbert also discloses calculating X- and Y-projection histograms to determine the target's center and using a "boresight correction signal" to keep the camera centered on the target, satisfying limitations of claims 2, 3, and 7. The combination with Gerhardt and Schaming was argued to supply any remaining details and strengthen the obviousness rationale.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine these references because they are all directed to similar real-time, histogram-based target tracking systems. Gerhardt would be combined with Gilbert to add its "adaptive thresholding technique," which improves robustness across different lighting conditions—a known challenge. Schaming would be combined to expand Gilbert's system beyond a single intensity domain. Schaming teaches using multiple feature domains (e.g., intensity, edge magnitude, spatial frequency) to create N-dimensional histograms, which would provide a higher likelihood of successfully identifying a target compared to Gilbert's intensity-only approach.
    • Expectation of Success: The proposed modifications were argued to be predictable improvements. Applying Gerhardt's adaptive thresholding and Schaming's multi-domain histogram approach to Gilbert's foundational system would have been a straightforward application of known techniques to enhance performance.

4. Arguments Regarding Discretionary Denial

  • Petitioner argued that this petition was not redundant to an earlier-filed IPR (IPR2017-00355) against the same ’015 patent. This second petition was necessitated because the Patent Owner added new claims to its infringement contentions in the parallel district court litigation after the first IPR was filed. This petition addressed those newly-asserted claims and relied on different prior art and arguments not presented in the first petition.

5. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requested institution of an inter partes review and cancellation of claims 1-5 and 7 of the ’015 patent as unpatentable.