WebGroup Czech Republic As v. DISH Technologies LLC

1. Case Identification

• Case #: IPR2025-00347
• Patent #: 9,407,564
• Filed: December 20, 2024
• Petitioner(s): WebGroup Czech Republic, As., NKL Associates, SRO.
• Patent Owner(s): DISH Technologies LLC.
• Challenged Claims: 1-16

2. Patent Overview

• Title: Adaptive-Rate Shifting of Streaming Content
• Brief Description: The ’564 patent discloses a system for adaptive bitrate streaming where a client device requests content from a server that stores multiple copies of the video at different quality levels. The client repeatedly generates a performance "factor" based on network conditions to determine and switch to the highest quality stream that can be sustained for continuous playback.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over Leaning - Claims 1-16 are obvious over Leaning.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Leaning (International Publication No. WO 2002/049343).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Leaning taught all limitations of the challenged claims. Leaning described a client-server system for delivering video over the internet where a server stored multiple versions of a recording at different compression rates. The video was partitioned into a sequence of "sub-files," and the client terminal’s player program requested these files sequentially and could switch between the different rate versions. Petitioner contended that Leaning’s method of repeatedly assessing network characteristics—specifically, by generating a "measured rate" (actual data rate received) and a "Buffer Low Percentage"—and comparing them to thresholds to decide whether to shift up or down in quality met the claim limitation of "repeatedly generating a factor indicative of the current ability to sustain the streaming." Leaning’s system was designed to select the highest sustainable data rate to ensure continuous playback, mapping directly to the core functionality of independent claims 1 and 8.
  • Motivation to Combine: This ground relied on a single reference.
  • Expectation of Success: This ground relied on a single reference.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Leaning and Gamble - Claims 9 and 11 are obvious over Leaning in view of Gamble.

• Prior Art Relied Upon: Leaning (WO 2002/049343) and Gamble (Application # 2004/0093420).
• Core Argument for this Ground:
  • Prior Art Mapping: This ground asserted that Leaning taught the foundational adaptive streaming system, as detailed in Ground 1. Gamble was introduced to supply the limitations in claims 9 and 11 related to using a plurality of TCP connections to request and reassemble sub-parts of files. Petitioner asserted that Gamble explicitly disclosed a client application that receives multiple sub-parts of stream files over a plurality of parallel TCP connections from a server and then reassembles the received segments into a data file. This teaching, when added to Leaning's system, rendered claims 9 and 11 obvious.
  • Motivation to Combine: Petitioner argued a person of ordinary skill in the art (POSITA) would combine Gamble’s multi-connection file transfer method with Leaning’s adaptive streaming system to improve performance. Using multiple connections to retrieve sub-parts of a file would increase reliability, as the failure of one connection would not halt the download, and enhance throughput by parallelizing the retrieval process to better utilize available bandwidth and overcome bottlenecks associated with a single TCP connection.
  • Expectation of Success: Petitioner contended a POSITA would have had a high expectation of success, as the TCP protocol was well-known to support multiple connections. The technique of using parallel connections to retrieve parts of a single file, as taught by Gamble, was a known method for improving data transfer speed and reliability.

4. Key Claim Construction Positions

• Petitioner submitted that no specific constructions were necessary for institution but addressed constructions adopted in a related ITC investigation to demonstrate unpatentability even under the Patent Owner's preferred interpretations.
• The term "a factor indicative of the current ability to sustain the streaming ... wherein the set of one or more factors relate to the performance of the network" was construed in the ITC proceeding with its plain and ordinary meaning. Petitioner argued that Leaning’s "measured rate" and "Buffer Low Percentage," which are based on network performance, squarely met this limitation under that construction.

5. Arguments Regarding Discretionary Denial

• Petitioner argued that discretionary denial under Fintiv was inappropriate because no trial date was scheduled in the related district court litigation.
• Petitioner further argued that discretionary denial under §314(a) based on General Plastic factors was unwarranted. The petition asserted that: (1) it was the first IPR filed by these Petitioners against the ’564 patent; (2) Petitioners were previously unaware of the Leaning reference; and (3) the petition did not use any prior Board decision or Patent Owner response as a "roadmap."
• Regarding denial under §325(d), Petitioner argued under the Advanced Bionics framework that the Leaning reference constituted new, non-cumulative prior art that was not considered during the original prosecution. Although a different publication by the same inventor was cited in an Information Disclosure Statement (IDS), it was part of a list of over 300 references and was never substantively discussed or applied by the Examiner. The asserted Leaning reference teaches the key adaptive streaming limitations not present in the cited publication.

6. Relief Requested

• Petitioner requests institution of an inter partes review and cancellation of claims 1-16 of Patent 9,407,564 as unpatentable.