PTAB

IPR2025-00235

HighLevel Inc v. Etison LLC

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Petition
petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: Method, System, and Computer Readable Medium for Creating a Customized Website
  • Brief Description: The ’047 patent discloses a website creation platform that allows users to first select a "website type" (e.g., based on industry or purpose) and then provides a corresponding series of "directional webpages" and templates designed to guide an end-user through a specific interaction, such as a sales funnel.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over Coursol and Karidi - Claims 1-4, 9, 10, and 14-20 are obvious over Coursol in view of Karidi.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Coursol (Patent 9,147,004) and Karidi (Application # 2007/0061412).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Coursol teaches a website building application where a user selects a "template category" based on a business type (e.g., "spa") to generate a website with a default set of pages (e.g., Products, Gallery, Contact). This meets the limitations of selecting a "website type" and receiving corresponding "website templates." Karidi was alleged to supply the teaching of a "series of directional webpages." Karidi described a typical e-commerce user flow on a retail website, where a user is guided sequentially from a product page, to an "add to cart" action, to a shopping cart page, and finally to a checkout and receipt page. This sequential, goal-oriented flow was argued to be what the ’047 patent termed "directional webpages." Dependent claims related to editing webpages (claims 2, 20), using a graphical user interface with tabs (claims 3, 15, 19), and user browsing sessions (claims 9, 10) were also alleged to be disclosed or suggested by the combination.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Coursol’s website builder with Karidi’s e-commerce flow to provide a more functional and effective website creation tool. Integrating a standard, well-understood sales funnel (as taught by Karidi) into a template-based website builder (Coursol) was presented as a predictable step to enhance the commercial viability of the websites created, thereby improving user conversion rates and customer satisfaction.
    • Expectation of Success: The combination involved applying a known e-commerce structure to a conventional website builder, using routine web development technologies. A POSITA would have been familiar with incorporating multi-page functions like shopping carts into websites and would expect success.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Coursol, Karidi, and Sayed - Claims 1-4, 9, 10, and 12-20 are obvious over Coursol in view of Karidi and Sayed.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Coursol (Patent 9,147,004), Karidi (’412 application), and Sayed (Patent 7,610,219).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: This ground builds on the Coursol-Karidi combination by adding Sayed to provide further detail on implementing sequential webpages and to address claims 12-13. Petitioner argued Sayed explicitly teaches creating a directional flow of webpages through a "parent-child relationship," where one page logically presumes the existence of the prior page (e.g., a checkout page presumes a cart page). This provided a specific technical underpinning for the sequential webpages of the independent claims. Furthermore, Sayed disclosed that its check-out process could "elicit billing and shipping information" including an email address, which is then used by an "e-mail marketing center." This was argued to teach the limitations of claims 12 and 13, which require encouraging a user to provide an email address and then receiving and using that address.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA, seeking to implement the directional e-commerce flow from Karidi into Coursol's builder, would look to a reference like Sayed for a known method of linking webpages sequentially. Sayed’s parent-child relationship concept provided an explicit and predictable way to ensure the proper directional flow of the sales funnel. Including email capture during checkout, as taught by Sayed, was a standard business practice for e-commerce sites to build marketing lists.
    • Expectation of Success: Sayed provided explicit details on how to structure webpages sequentially using an "inheritance flag," making the implementation predictable and demonstrating a clear path to success for a POSITA.

Ground 3: Obviousness over Coursol, Karidi, Sayed, and Lyon - Claims 5-8 are obvious over Coursol-Karidi-Sayed in view of Lyon.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Coursol (Patent 9,147,004), Karidi (’412 application), Sayed (Patent 7,610,219), and Lyon (Application # 2014/0282049).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: This ground specifically targets claims 5-8, which relate to "split test" (A/B testing) functionality. Petitioner asserted that the base combination of Coursol-Karidi-Sayed taught a customizable e-commerce website builder. Lyon was added to teach the claimed split-testing features. Lyon explicitly discloses "[m]ultivariate testing (otherwise known as 'split testing' or 'A/B testing')" as a common method for evaluating changes to website design. Lyon described creating two or more versions of a webpage, displaying them to different groups of visitors, and specifying the percentage of participants who see each version, directly mapping to the limitations of claims 5-7. Lyon also disclosed using "slider controls" as a known user interface element for input, which Petitioner argued taught the "sliding selectable element" of claim 8.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would combine Lyon’s well-known A/B testing methods with the e-commerce website builder of the primary combination to improve its effectiveness. A/B testing was a standard tool for optimizing website performance and increasing sales conversions, which was a primary goal of creating a sales-funnel-type website.
    • Expectation of Success: A/B testing was a widely used, predictable software-based marketing technique. Integrating this functionality into a website editor was a routine task for a POSITA, who would have had a high expectation of success.
  • Additional Grounds: Petitioner asserted a challenge to claims 10 and 11 as obvious over the Coursol-Karidi-Sayed combination in view of Thomas (Application # 2011/0288924), which taught sending a user an email with a link to a customized website to encourage a return visit during a subsequent browsing session.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

  • Petitioner argued that no express claim constructions were necessary. However, it contended that the term "series of directional webpages configured to cause an end user interaction with a website" should be understood in the context of the examples provided in the ’047 patent’s specification. These examples include common e-commerce actions like "add an item to a cart" and "complete a purchase," which Petitioner argued were well-known features in the prior art.

5. Arguments Regarding Discretionary Denial

  • Petitioner argued that discretionary denial under Fintiv would be inappropriate. It asserted that at the time of filing the petition, the parallel district court litigation had not yet set a trial date, meaning the concerns about inefficiency and duplicative efforts that animate the Fintiv factors were not present.

6. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requests institution of an inter partes review (IPR) and cancellation of claims 1-20 of the ’047 patent as unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. §103.