PTAB

IPR2020-01146

Amazon.com Inc v. Freshub Ltd

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Petition
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1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR SCANNING INFORMATION FROM STORAGE AREA CONTENTS
  • Brief Description: The ’408 patent specification describes a networked refrigeration or food storage system that scans items to manage inventory. However, the challenged claims are directed to a voice processing system and method for e-commerce, which were added late in prosecution.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over Calderone, Ogasawara, and Sanchez - Claims 1, 14, 15, 17-20, and 28-30 are obvious over [Calderone](https://ai-lab.exparte.com/case/ptab/IPR2020-01146/doc/1003) in combination with [Ogasawara](https://ai-lab.exparte.com/case/ptab/IPR2020-01146/doc/1004) and [Sanchez](https://ai-lab.exparte.com/case/ptab/IPR2020-01146/doc/1005).

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Calderone (Application # 2001/0056350), Ogasawara (Patent 6,543,052), and Sanchez (Application # 2002/0194604).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that the combination of these references teaches all limitations of the independent claims (1, 20, 30). Calderone disclosed a speech recognition system for interactive television that provides services including on-line shopping, teaching the core system architecture of receiving a digitized spoken order from a remote user system (e.g., remote control and set-top box) for processing at a central server. Ogasawara supplemented Calderone's general e-commerce disclosure with specific details, such as matching a user's voice command to item descriptions and unique product identifiers (SKUs) in a product database. Sanchez taught adding the common e-commerce feature of a "virtual shopping cart" to an interactive television system, which allows users to add identified items to a "set of items" and display that set for review and purchase.
    • Motivation to Combine: A Person of Ordinary Skill in the Art (POSITA) would combine these references because they addressed the same field of speech-based e-commerce using similar remote control and set-top box architectures. A POSITA would have been motivated to refine Calderone's system with the specific e-commerce database and product identifier teachings of Ogasawara and to add the well-known "virtual shopping cart" feature from Sanchez to meet user expectations and provide a complete e-commerce experience.
    • Expectation of Success: A POSITA would have had a reasonable expectation of success in combining these elements, as it involved applying known e-commerce features (product databases, SKUs, shopping carts) to a known speech-recognition system architecture to achieve the predictable result of a more functional voice-controlled shopping system.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Calderone/Ogasawara/Sanchez and Partovi - Claims 2-4, 7-9, 11-13, 21, 22, and 25-27 are obvious over Calderone, Ogasawara, and Sanchez, further in view of [Partovi](https://ai-lab.exparte.com/case/ptab/IPR2020-01146/doc/1006).

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Calderone (Application # 2001/0056350), Ogasawara (Patent 6,543,052), Sanchez (Application # 2002/0194604), and Partovi (Patent 7,376,586).

  • Core Argument for this Ground:

    • Prior Art Mapping: This ground built upon the base combination in Ground 1, adding Partovi to teach the limitations of various dependent claims. Partovi disclosed a "voice portal" for telephone-to-web commerce that used personalization techniques to improve user interactions. Specifically, Partovi taught identifying items based on user-specific information such as location (claim 2), preferences (claim 3), and purchase history (claim 4). Partovi also disclosed providing audible "voice receipts" of transactions to a user via telephone or a website (claims 7-9) and providing alternative product suggestions (e.g., different airports for a flight) for a user to choose from (claims 11-12).
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would have been motivated to incorporate the teachings of Partovi into the base system of Calderone/Ogasawara/Sanchez to enhance its functionality. Partovi shared the common goal of facilitating voice-based e-commerce. Adding Partovi's disclosed personalization and user-feedback techniques would have been a predictable way to improve the user experience and increase the likelihood of a successful transaction.
    • Expectation of Success: Incorporating Partovi's known personalization and output features into the combined system would have been a straightforward application of conventional e-commerce strategies, leading to the predictable result of a more robust and user-friendly system.

  • Additional Grounds: Petitioner asserted additional obviousness challenges based on the core combination of Calderone, Ogasawara, and Sanchez, further in view of:

    • Kuhn (Patent 6,553,345) for claims 5 and 23, arguing Kuhn taught increasing recognition accuracy by weighting words related to types of items being purchased.
    • Sichelman (Application # 2003/0235282) for claims 6 and 24, arguing Sichelman taught increasing accuracy by weighting words based on the user's purchase history.
    • Cooper (Patent 6,757,362) for claims 10 and 16, arguing Cooper taught providing information via Short Messaging Service (SMS) and using separate digital files for user utterances.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

  • Petitioner requested the Board adopt the construction for "increase recognition accuracy" (claims 5 and 6) agreed upon in a related district court case: "improve the likelihood of correctly identifying the item."
  • For all other challenged terms, Petitioner asserted that they should be given their plain and ordinary meaning.

5. Arguments Regarding Discretionary Denial

  • Petitioner argued that discretionary denial under §314(a) or §325(d) would be inappropriate. The petition was the first filed against the patent, was timely, and was based on prior art and arguments not previously considered by the USPTO. Petitioner also contended that its invalidity grounds did not duplicate those in the parallel district court litigation, as key references like Sanchez were not being used in that forum.

6. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requests institution of an inter partes review and cancellation of claims 1-30 of the '408 patent as unpatentable.