PTAB

IPR2019-00235

Axis Communications Ab v. Avigilon Fortress Corp

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Key Events
Petition
petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: Video Surveillance System Employing Video Primitives
  • Brief Description: The ’912 patent discloses a video surveillance system that analyzes video to extract "primitives" or "attributes" of detected objects. The system then determines the occurrence of a defined "event" by analyzing these stored attributes, which avoids the need to reprocess the original video source.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over Kellogg and Flinchbaugh - Claims 1-4 and 6-11 are obvious over Kellogg in view of Flinchbaugh.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Kellogg (“Visual Memory,” a 1993 M.I.T. thesis) and Flinchbaugh (“Autonomous Scene Monitoring System,” a 1995 symposium proceeding).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Kellogg taught the fundamental architecture of the claimed system: an "image processing" module (first processor) that detects object attributes from video and a separate "visual memory" module (second processor) that stores these attributes and allows a user to define and query for events based on combinations of those attributes. Flinchbaugh, whose work was based on Kellogg’s, explicitly disclosed implementing such a system using two separate computers: a "Vision System" (first processor) for attribute detection that transmits data to a "Visual Memory" system (second processor) for storage and event querying.
    • Motivation to Combine: Petitioner contended a POSITA would be motivated to combine these references because Flinchbaugh explicitly stated its Visual Memory was based on Kellogg's work. Furthermore, Flinchbaugh was Kellogg's thesis advisor, and they worked on related projects. A POSITA would have found it obvious and logical to implement Kellogg's modular system using the two-processor configuration taught by Flinchbaugh to efficiently handle the substantial processing requirements for extracting and analyzing video information.
    • Expectation of Success: The direct technical relationship and collaboration between the authors ensured a high expectation of success in combining their teachings to create a functional two-processor video surveillance system.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Kellogg, Flinchbaugh, and Brill - Claims 1-4 and 6-36 are obvious over Kellogg and Flinchbaugh in view of Brill.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Kellogg, Flinchbaugh, and Brill (“Event Recognition and Reliability Improvements for the Autonomous Video Surveillance System,” a 1998 workshop proceeding).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: This ground asserted that the base combination of Kellogg and Flinchbaugh could be modified with the teachings of Brill to arrive at all challenged claims. Brill disclosed a distributed Autonomous Video System (AVS) with "smart cameras" (first processors) that detect and stream attributes over a network to a central Video Surveillance Shell (VSS) (second processor) for event detection. Petitioner argued Brill taught analyzing a stream of attributes in real-time to detect complex events (e.g., "theft" or "loiter") and provided advanced techniques for handling issues like object occlusion, which were necessary to meet the limitations of the broader set of challenged claims.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would have been motivated to incorporate Brill's teachings to enhance the Kellogg/Flinchbaugh system. Specifically, Brill’s smart camera technology could be used as the first processor, its real-time stream analysis would improve upon Kellogg’s database polling method, and its advanced object tracking would solve known problems in the art. The petition highlighted that all three references related to AVS systems developed by Texas Instruments, demonstrating a clear line of technical development that would have made the combination obvious.
    • Expectation of Success: Combining these highly related technologies to improve system performance and add features like real-time stream analysis and enhanced object tracking would have been a predictable and successful endeavor for a POSITA.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

  • "Independence-based limitations" (e.g., attributes determined "independent of a selection of the...event"): Petitioner argued this phrase means the attribute detection process is not altered by the subsequent event detection process. This construction was positioned against the Patent Owner's prior, more restrictive arguments that the limitation requires detecting attributes "without regard to or knowledge of a predefined...list of events." Petitioner contended that as long as the second processor can define an event using an arbitrary combination of the collected attributes without changing the collection process itself, the limitation is met.
  • "filtering": Petitioner asserted that "filtering" should be given its plain meaning of "to select, process, and/or analyze." This was in response to the Patent Owner's arguments during reexamination that the term implies a more specific technique for processing "unlimited/unbounded/infinite data streams," a limitation Petitioner argued is not supported by the specification.
  • "stream": Petitioner argued that a "stream" of attributes simply requires a flow of data to be transmitted. It does not require any particular type of streaming technology or prohibit the attributes from being stored upon receipt before analysis by the second processor.

5. Arguments Regarding Discretionary Denial

  • Petitioner argued that the Board should not exercise its discretion to deny the petition because it raised new issues of patentability. The petition emphasized that the primary prior art references—Kellogg, Flinchbaugh, and Brill—were never cited in a ground of rejection during the original prosecution or subsequent reexaminations of the ’912 patent. It further noted that in a related IPR, the Board had already found that Kellogg and Brill presented patentability issues not substantially the same as art previously considered against the patent family.

6. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requested the institution of an inter partes review and the cancellation of claims 1-4 and 6-36 of the ’912 patent as unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. §103.