PTAB

IPR2023-00763

Ford Motor Co v. Neo Wireless LLC

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Key Events
Petition
petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: Method And System For Multi-Carrier Packet Communication With Reduced Overhead
  • Brief Description: The ’450 patent discloses a method for reducing control information overhead in wireless communication systems based on the IEEE 802.16 standard. The technology involves dividing the available time-frequency resource into "time-frequency resource units," grouping them into "segments," and then describing a segment using a one-dimensional "starting time-frequency coordinate" and a number (N) of constituent resource units.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over Park in view of IEEE 802.16-2004 - Claims 7 and 11 are obvious over Park in view of the IEEE 802.16-2004 standard.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Park (Application # 2006/0039274) and the IEEE 802.16-2004 standard (“802.16-2004”).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that the combination of Park and 802.16-2004 discloses every limitation of the challenged claims. Park, an asserted improvement on the 802.16-2004 standard, teaches reducing overhead in an OFDMA system by dividing the time-frequency resource into smaller "allocation units." Park then describes how to define a "resource allocation region" (the claimed "segment") by using two pieces of information: a "start allocation unit index" and the "total number of allocation units." Petitioner contended that Park's "start allocation unit index" is a single, one-dimensional integer that directly corresponds to the claimed "starting time-frequency coordinate." Park further discloses examples where the total number of allocation units (N) is 2 and 8, expressly meeting the limitations of claim 7 that require N=2, 4, or 8. For dependent claim 11, Petitioner argued that Park incorporates the modular coding schemes (e.g., QPSK, 16QAM) specified in the underlying 802.16-2004 standard, which are applied to the resource units within the allocated segment.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine the references because Park explicitly presents itself as an improvement to systems based on the 802.16-2004 standard. Park directs a POSITA to implement its teachings to reduce overhead and improve flexibility by modifying elements of the existing 802.16-2004 framework, such as the Downlink Map Information Element (DL-MAP IE). Therefore, implementing Park’s improvements would have necessarily involved using the foundational teachings of the 802.16-2004 standard.
    • Expectation of Success: A POSITA would have had a reasonable expectation of success because Park provides specific, detailed instructions for implementing its resource allocation scheme within an 802.16-2004 system. By providing exemplary modifications to the DL-MAP IE format, Park laid out a clear and predictable path for integrating its overhead-reduction technique into the existing standard.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

  • "time-frequency coordinate": Petitioner adopted the construction agreed upon in district court litigation: "one-dimensional time-frequency coordinate." This construction was central to the petition's arguments, as Petitioner contended that prior unsuccessful IPRs against the ’450 patent failed because their prior art disclosed two-dimensional coordinates (e.g., separate time and frequency offsets) rather than the required singular, one-dimensional coordinate taught by Park.
  • "time-frequency resource unit": For the purposes of the IPR, Petitioner adopted the Patent Owner's proposed plain meaning construction for this term to preempt disputes. The petition argued that Park’s "allocation units" meet this limitation under either a plain meaning or a narrower construction.

5. Arguments Regarding Discretionary Denial

  • Petitioner argued that discretionary denial under 35 U.S.C. §325(d) or General Plastic was unwarranted because this petition presents art and arguments never before considered by the Patent Office.
  • The core argument was that previous IPRs filed by Dell (IPR2021-01486) and Volkswagen (IPR2022-01567) failed to present prior art teaching the key limitation of a "one-dimensional time-frequency coordinate." This petition, in contrast, relies primarily on Park, which allegedly cures this deficiency by explicitly teaching an indexed, one-dimensional coordinate system for resource allocation.
  • Petitioner further contended that the General Plastic factors weigh against denial because Ford is a different and unrelated entity to the prior petitioners. It argued there is no "significant relationship" between Ford and Dell or VW that would justify treating their petitions as a series.
  • Regarding potential denial under Fintiv, Petitioner asserted that the factors do not support denial because there was no scheduled trial date in the parallel district court litigation.