PTAB

IPR2019-00232

Comcast Cable Communications LLC v. Rovi Guides Inc

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Key Events
Petition
petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: Interactive Television Systems with Digital Video Recording and Adjustable Reminders
  • Brief Description: The ’741 patent relates to an interactive television system that allows a user to control the playback of a broadcast program already in progress. The system determines if an "archived copy" of the program is available and, if so, displays a notification, allowing the user to retrieve and play the archived copy to, for example, restart the program from the beginning.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Claims 1, 3, 5-8, 10, 12-15, 17, 19-21, 23, and 25-26 are obvious over Brenner in view of Berberet.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Brenner (Patent 8,181,215) and Berberet (WO 2001/056285A1).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Brenner teaches a system that allows a user to "start-over" a program already in progress by downloading a stored copy from the head-end, satisfying most limitations of the independent claims. Petitioner contended that Brenner’s primary deficiency is its failure to explicitly disclose the use of a "database" to determine program availability. Berberet was asserted to cure this deficiency by teaching a system that can "archive and index programs" to create a "searchable database," thereby allowing users to store and access individual copies of programs on a server.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Berberet's known database and server-side archiving techniques with Brenner's similar start-over system. This combination represents the application of a known technique to a known system to yield the predictable result of enabling efficient determination of program availability and allowing users to create personal archives.
    • Expectation of Success: Petitioner asserted that success was expected because both systems address the same problem of restarting in-progress programs. Integrating Berberet’s more sophisticated database management into Brenner's system would have been a straightforward and predictable improvement.

Ground 2: Claims 1, 3, 5-8, 10, 12-15, 17, 19-21, 23, and 25-26 are obvious over Brenner in view of McElhatten.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Brenner (Patent 8,181,215) and McElhatten (Patent 7,073,189).

  • Core Argument for this Ground:

    • Prior Art Mapping: As an alternative to Berberet, Petitioner argued that McElhatten also supplies the missing "database" and narrow "archived copy" limitations. McElhatten describes a restart system that uses cache and library managers—which Petitioner argued a POSITA would understand to function as a database—to control access to stored programs. Furthermore, McElhatten explicitly teaches a feature for users to "archive" a reserved program, creating an actual copy for long-term storage, satisfying even a narrow interpretation of the claims.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would be motivated to incorporate McElhatten's efficient cache and library managers into Brenner’s system to fill in implementation details and improve the speed of accessing stored programs. This combination would apply a known technique (McElhatten's storage managers) to improve a similar system (Brenner's start-over feature) to achieve a predictable result.
    • Expectation of Success: Petitioner contended a POSITA would expect success, as both references relate to allowing users to control programs already in progress. McElhatten provides specific, known solutions (e.g., cache and library managers) for optimizing the type of head-end storage system broadly disclosed by Brenner.

  • Additional Grounds: Petitioner asserted additional obviousness challenges against various dependent claims based on combinations including White (Patent 6,804,825) for its teachings on automatic recording of missed favorite shows, and Bonomi (Patent 6,769,127) for its teachings on password authentication for accessing personal storage areas.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

  • "Archived Copies / Archived Copy": Petitioner dedicated significant argument to this term, proposing its broadest reasonable construction as simply "stored copies." This position was argued to be critical because it allows head-end copies stored in prior art systems like Brenner to satisfy the claim limitation without requiring a discrete, user-initiated "archiving" action. Petitioner noted that this proposed construction was consistent with the Patent Owner's own position in a related International Trade Commission (ITC) investigation, thereby broadening the scope of applicable prior art. The petition also argued that the prior art would render the claims obvious even under the narrower construction adopted in the ITC case ("a real or virtual copy of a program retained by a system").

5. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requests institution of an inter partes review and cancellation of claims 1-26 of Patent 9,369,741 as unpatentable.