Nearmap US Inc v. Eagle View Technologies Inc

1. Case Identification

• Case #: IPR2024-00716
• Patent #: 10,671,648
• Filed: March 23, 2024
• Petitioner(s): Nearmap US, Inc.
• Patent Owner(s): Eagle View Technologies, Inc.
• Challenged Claims: 1-2, 4-6, 9-13, 15

2. Patent Overview

• Title: Aggregating and Querying Geo-Temporal Data
• Brief Description: The ’648 patent discloses methods and systems for aggregating information associated with geographic locations and time into a centralized database. The system is designed to capture data from distributed sources, associate it with geographic and time identifiers, and allow a user to query the database to retrieve a time history of data for a particular geographic point on earth.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Anticipation by Harris - Claims 1-2, 4-6, 9, 12-13, and 15 are anticipated by Harris.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Harris (Patent 9,501,507).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Harris discloses every element of the challenged claims. Harris teaches a system for "indexing and searching geo-temporal data" that is obtained from "multiple disparate data sources" and stored in a central "data repository." The system explicitly handles data with both a "geospatial component" (e.g., longitude and latitude) and a "temporal component" (a point or range of time). Petitioner asserted that Harris’s system allows a data analyst to specify "geo-temporal queries," retrieves matching data items based on both location and time, and "provides as output a set of search results," thereby teaching all limitations of the independent claims.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Harris and Florance - Claims 9-10, 12-13, and 15 are obvious over Harris in view of Florance.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Harris (Patent 9,501,507), Florance (Application # 2009/0132316).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner contended that Harris provides the foundational system for aggregating and querying geo-temporal data from various sources. Florance was cited to supply the specific teachings of an "integrated centralized property database" containing detailed real estate information. Florance discloses a "comprehensive database" for commercial real estate transactions that aggregates data from numerous proprietary databases, including specific "property" information such as "parcel number," "assessor parcel number," and other data linked to geographic locations. This combination, Petitioner argued, renders obvious the claims requiring a "property database" and the retrieval of "parcel information."
  • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Harris’s flexible geo-temporal search system with Florance’s specific real estate data to create a more powerful and commercially valuable tool. Harris’s system is designed to ingest data from disparate sources, and incorporating Florance’s property-specific data would be a logical enhancement to provide more granular, user-relevant search results. Florance itself highlights the value of an "integrated database" for real estate, providing a clear reason to add its specific data types to Harris's general framework.
  • Expectation of Success: Given that Harris’s system is expressly designed to handle diverse data types from multiple sources, a POSITA would have had a high expectation of success in integrating the property and parcel data taught by Florance into Harris’s database architecture. The combination represented a predictable application of known data integration techniques.

Ground 3: Obviousness over Harris, Florance, and Salvagio - Claim 11 is obvious over Harris in view of Florance and Salvagio.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Harris (Patent 9,501,507), Florance (Application # 2009/0132316), Salvagio (Patent 8,401,877).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: This ground builds upon the Harris and Florance combination to argue the patentability of claim 11, which adds limitations related to retrieving and comparing insurance policy information. Petitioner asserted that Salvagio teaches these missing elements. Salvagio discloses a system for insurance claim processing that uses a "property database" to store and retrieve "insurance policy information," such as the insurance carrier, policy number, effective date, and expiration date, all associated with a specific property identified by its address.
  • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would have been motivated to add the insurance data taught by Salvagio to the combined Harris/Florance property database to create an even more comprehensive information tool. For users analyzing properties, having associated insurance data is a logical and valuable extension for applications like risk assessment, asset management, or claims investigation. Salvagio addresses the inefficiency of siloed information, which would motivate a POSITA to consolidate its insurance data into the powerful, centralized geo-temporal system taught by Harris.
  • Expectation of Success: Integrating Salvagio’s well-defined insurance data fields into the Harris/Florance database would have been a routine task. A POSITA would have understood that using standard database operations, such as a "join," could easily compare parcel location data with insurance policy data to determine which policies are associated with which properties, with a predictable and successful outcome.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

• "data aggregation system" (claims 1, 2, 5, 6): Petitioner proposed this term be construed as a "system that aggregates data from multiple distributed external data sources into a centralized database."
• This construction was argued to be consistent with the ’648 patent’s own description and essential for establishing that prior art systems like Harris, which pull data from "multiple disparate data sources" into a "data repository," meet the claim limitations.

5. Arguments Regarding Discretionary Denial

• Petitioner argued that discretionary denial under 35 U.S.C. § 314(a) based on Fintiv factors would be inappropriate. It was noted that no trial date has been set in the parallel litigation in the District of Utah. Based on the median time-to-trial in that district, a trial would not occur until approximately May 2026, which is well after the statutory deadline for a Final Written Decision in this inter partes review (IPR) proceeding.

6. Relief Requested

• Petitioner requests the institution of an IPR and the cancellation of claims 1-2, 4-6, 9-13, and 15 of the ’648 patent as unpatentable.