Microsoft Corp v. Bradium Technologies LLC

1. Case Identification

• Case #: IPR2017-01818
• Patent #: 9,641,645
• Filed: July 20, 2017
• Petitioner(s): Microsoft Corporation
• Patent Owner(s): Bradium Technologies LLC
• Challenged Claims: 1-36

2. Patent Overview

• Title: Communicating and Displaying Image Data with Low Latency
• Brief Description: The ’645 patent discloses methods and systems for efficiently communicating and displaying large, high-resolution images, such as geographic maps, over a network. The technology involves a server pre-processing a source image into a series of "image parcels" at progressively lower resolutions, which allows a client device to request and render only the necessary parcels based on a user's viewpoint, thereby reducing latency and bandwidth usage.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over Reddy and Woods - Claims 1-7, 9-11, 13-19, 21-23, 25-31, and 33-35 are obvious over Reddy in view of Woods.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Reddy (a Mar./Apr. 1999 IEEE article on the TerraVision II system) and Woods (Patent 5,956,036).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Reddy taught the core of the claimed invention, including a client-server system for browsing large-scale geographic imagery using multi-resolution image pyramids (i.e., "image parcels") that are subdivided into tiles. Reddy discloses processing a source image into a series of images with progressively lower resolution, with each image subdivided into a regular array of parcels. Woods was argued to supply the missing elements of wireless communication and viewpoint-based prioritization. Woods taught methods for improving performance in viewing 3D worlds over a network, including the use of wireless connections for portable devices like laptops (via PCMCIA cards) and prioritizing the download of data assets based on the user's viewpoint.
  • Motivation to Combine: A Person of Ordinary Skill in the Art (POSITA) would combine these references to satisfy a known need for mobile access to advanced mapping systems. Reddy itself described applications like military mission planning and emergency relief where mobility would be a clear advantage. Therefore, a POSITA would be motivated to implement Reddy's mapping system on a portable device using the wireless communication technology taught by Woods.
  • Expectation of Success: Petitioner asserted that combining Reddy’s web-based image server with the well-known wireless technology taught by Woods would have been a simple substitution yielding predictable results, as it involved applying a known communication method to an existing type of server-client system.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Reddy, Woods, and Chiarabini - Claims 8, 20, and 32 are obvious over Reddy and Woods in view of Chiarabini.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Reddy (a Mar./Apr. 1999 IEEE article), Woods (Patent 5,956,036), and Chiarabini (Patent 7,324,228).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: This ground builds on the Reddy and Woods combination. The challenged claims further require determining the number of parallel download requests based on network latency and available system resources. Petitioner argued Chiarabini taught this specific limitation. Chiarabini discloses a system that adjusts the number of parallel download threads for large image segments to optimize performance, explicitly basing this adjustment on measured download speeds (which reflects latency) and capping the number of threads to avoid overloading the connection.
  • Motivation to Combine: While Woods taught a multi-threaded download system, it did not detail how to optimize the number of threads. A POSITA seeking to improve the download efficiency of the combined Reddy/Woods system would have logically looked to complementary art like Chiarabini, which was directed to the specific problem of optimizing parallel downloads over a network.
  • Expectation of Success: Integrating Chiarabini's known network optimization techniques into the multi-threaded download architecture of Woods would be a straightforward enhancement to improve performance with a high expectation of success.

Ground 3: Obviousness over Reddy, Woods, and Fuller - Claims 12, 24, and 36 are obvious over Reddy and Woods in view of Fuller.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Reddy (a Mar./Apr. 1999 IEEE article), Woods (Patent 5,956,036), and Fuller (an IEEE Network article from May/Jun. 1996).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: This ground also builds on the Reddy and Woods combination. The challenged claims further require issuing requests in a priority order based on the resolution of the image parcels. Petitioner argued that Fuller, which described an earlier version of Reddy's TerraVision project, explicitly taught this concept. Fuller discloses assigning higher priority to lower-resolution tiles to achieve a "coarse-to-fine" loading effect, ensuring that a low-resolution version of the entire scene is available quickly.
  • Motivation to Combine: Reddy suggests a "coarse-to-fine" loading approach but does not specify how to prioritize requests to achieve it. A POSITA would be motivated to incorporate Fuller’s explicit resolution-based prioritization scheme into the Reddy/Woods system to effectively implement this desirable feature and optimize bandwidth usage, a shared goal of all three references.
  • Expectation of Success: Since Fuller describes a predecessor to Reddy's system, applying its prioritization logic to the system in Reddy would be a natural and compatible combination with predictable results.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

• “Wireless Portable Device”: Petitioner argued the term required no construction, as its plain meaning is clear. It was noted that the Board, in a related IPR, had rejected the Patent Owner's attempt to import a narrower "mobile device" limitation.
• “Thereby Enabling Efficient Use of Network Bandwidth…”: Petitioner contended this phrase is a non-limiting laudatory statement of an intended result (a "whereby" clause). As such, it should be given no patentable weight because it merely expresses the aim of the preceding functional limitations.
• “Configure[d/s] ... as a server…”: Petitioner argued this phrase should be construed to mean that a local store provides image parcels as needed for display by the client (i.e., functions like a simple cache). It does not require the local store to be a formal HTTP or database server capable of serving other clients over a network.
• “Image Parcel”: Petitioner proposed this term should be given its plain and ordinary meaning: a parcel of image data. It argued against importing limitations from the specification's preferred embodiment, such as requiring identification via a specific X, Y, and resolution index scheme.

5. Arguments Regarding Discretionary Denial

• Petitioner argued that the one-year statutory bar under 35 U.S.C. §315(b) did not apply. The basis for this argument was that the Patent Owner had not served Microsoft with a complaint asserting infringement of the ’645 patent at the time the IPR petition was filed.

6. Relief Requested

• Petitioner requested the institution of an inter partes review and the cancellation of claims 1-36 of the ’645 patent as unpatentable.