Apple Inc v. ALD Social LLC

1. Case Identification

• Case #: IPR2023-01398
• Patent #: 9,198,054
• Filed: September 8, 2023
• Petitioner(s): Apple Inc.
• Patent Owner(s): ALD Social, LLC
• Challenged Claims: 1-14

2. Patent Overview

• Title: Aggregate Location Dynometer
• Brief Description: The ’054 patent describes a system, referred to as an Aggregate Location Dynometer (ALD), which is an analytical server that uses location-based services (LBS) to monitor the position and movement of wireless devices. The system aims to predict public safety risks, such as riots or flashmobs, by analyzing crowd data and providing alerts to emergency personnel.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Claims 1-2 are obvious over Wolfe in view of Pfeffer.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Wolfe (Application # US2011/0040603) and Pfeffer (Application # US2009/0284348).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Wolfe taught the core system claimed in the ’054 patent: a server-based system that monitors the location of wireless devices to determine crowd characteristics (size, location, movement) and informs a police force about changes in crowd activity. This system included a network monitor, a location aggregator, and a crowd risk determinant. Petitioner asserted that Pfeffer taught the missing element of a detailed "alert module" by disclosing a first responder dispatch system for crowd control. Pfeffer’s system received incident information, determined a "level of alert," and if a threshold was exceeded, sent requests for first responders, thereby teaching the initiation of an alert message related to a public safety risk. For claim 2, Petitioner argued Wolfe’s disclosure of a memory device storing historical crowd information, combined with Pfeffer's teaching of using a database in a dispatch system, rendered the claimed historical database obvious.
  • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Wolfe with Pfeffer because both are analogous art addressing crowd safety. Wolfe provided a system for gathering crowd data but lacked detail on alerting first responders. A POSITA would have been motivated to incorporate Pfeffer's established methods for analyzing incident risk, setting alert thresholds, and dispatching responders to improve the functionality and effectiveness of Wolfe’s system.
  • Expectation of Success: A POSITA would have a reasonable expectation of success because both systems were server-based and designed to analyze crowd data for safety risks. Integrating Pfeffer's known incident response techniques into Wolfe's crowd detection framework was a predictable combination of known elements to improve a similar system.

Ground 2: Claims 3-6 are obvious over Wolfe in view of Pfeffer and further in view of Hua.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Wolfe, Pfeffer, and Hua (Application # US2009/0222388).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: This ground built upon the Wolfe/Pfeffer combination by adding Hua to address the limitations in dependent claims 3-6, which related to storing and analyzing "crowd shapes." Petitioner argued that Wolfe taught creating a population density map from aggregated device locations. Hua explicitly taught that crowd features, including a crowd's shape, could be easily extracted from such a density map to detect behaviors like crowd formation or dispersal. Pfeffer's teaching of using a threshold to determine if a situation is "acceptable" or "unacceptable" was applied to the crowd shapes taught by Hua. Therefore, storing a plurality of "acceptable" and "non-acceptable" crowd shapes (claims 3-4), using a configurable parameter to define a threshold for when a shape becomes unacceptable (claim 5), and storing crowd shape trends (claim 6) were obvious additions.
  • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would be motivated to add Hua's teachings to the Wolfe/Pfeffer system to enhance its risk analysis capabilities. Since Wolfe already generated density maps, using Hua's known technique to analyze crowd shapes from those maps was a logical next step to gain a more nuanced understanding of crowd behavior and potential risks.
  • Expectation of Success: Success was expected because implementing Hua's shape analysis on the density maps already created by Wolfe was a straightforward application of a known technique to a known type of data to achieve a predictable improvement in risk assessment.

Ground 3: Claims 7-14 are obvious over Wolfe in view of Hua.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Wolfe and Hua.
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: This ground challenged method claims 7-14. Petitioner contended that Wolfe taught the basic method of monitoring wireless traffic for a "forming viral event" by tracking crowd locations and movement to inform police. To this base method, Petitioner added Hua's teachings on shape analysis. Petitioner argued it would have been obvious to enhance Wolfe’s method by "forming a crowd shape" from the aggregated location data (as taught by Hua) and then "determining a crowd risk...based on said crowd shape" (claims 7-8). The remaining dependent claims, such as comparing traffic parameters to historical data (claim 9) or logging snapshot formations (claim 11), were argued to be disclosed within Wolfe's teachings of using historical data and taking periodic "snapshots" of group locations.
  • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Wolfe and Hua to improve the crowd risk analysis method taught by Wolfe. By incorporating Hua's technique of determining crowd shapes from a density map, the system could analyze crowds more effectively and make better-informed decisions about potential public safety risks.
  • Expectation of Success: There was a high expectation of success as the combination involved applying Hua's known analytical technique (shape detection) to the data already being generated by Wolfe's method (density maps from device locations) to improve the overall method in a predictable manner.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

• "indication of a viral event" / "a forming viral event": Petitioner asserted that, based on the specification, a POSITA would not limit these terms to a specific definition. Instead, they would be understood broadly as general indicators of a crowd's activity. Petitioner argued these indicators could include the crowd's size, density, movement, rate of change, or other collective characteristics derived from the monitored wireless devices.

5. Arguments Regarding Discretionary Denial

• Petitioner argued that discretionary denial under Fintiv would be inappropriate because the parallel district court proceeding was in a very early stage. The original complaint had been dismissed, and an amended complaint was filed less than a month before the IPR petition. Petitioner asserted that no trial date was set and that, based on median time-to-trial statistics, the IPR would reach a Final Written Decision long before any potential trial. Petitioner also argued that denial under 35 U.S.C. §325(d) was not warranted because the primary reference, Wolfe, was not considered during prosecution. Furthermore, Petitioner contended the Examiner erred by allowing the claims after only a week of review following the submission of an IDS listing over 380 references.

6. Relief Requested

• Petitioner requested institution of an inter partes review and cancellation of claims 1-14 of the ’054 patent as unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. §103.