PTAB

IPR2025-00744

Meta Platforms Inc v. Mullen Industries LLC

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Petition
petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: Augmented Reality Video Game Systems
  • Brief Description: The ’791 patent discloses augmented reality (AR) video game systems. The technology involves using a head-mounted display (HMD) equipped with a camera to detect physical surfaces in a user's environment, such as floors and walls, allowing virtual objects within the game to interact realistically with the real-world surroundings.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over Fager and Martins - Claims 21, 23, 37, 41, and 42 are obvious over Fager in view of Martins.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Fager (Application # 2004/0104934) and Martins (Application # 2003/0179218).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that Fager, the primary reference, discloses the core elements of an AR gaming system similar to the ’791 patent. Fager teaches an HMD with a camera ("obtaining means"), a handheld controller, and an AR tennis game where virtual objects (e.g., a tennis ball) interact with physical objects in the user's environment (e.g., a lamp or the floor). While Fager describes detecting physical objects, Petitioner contended that Martins supplies the explicit teaching of using images from a camera to detect specific surfaces like floors, ceilings, and walls to create a 3D model of the environment. Fager also discloses a handheld controller providing three-dimensional position and orientation signals to move virtual objects, meeting the limitations for a "first" and "second" three-dimensional control signal during ongoing gameplay. The combination was argued to render the limitations of dependent claims obvious, as Martins’s teaching of identifying floors and walls satisfies the "physical object type" limitation (claim 37), and Martins’s disclosure of a "video camera" would have been an obvious implementation for Fager’s camera (claim 42).
    • Motivation to Combine: A Person of Ordinary Skill in the Art (POSITA) implementing Fager's AR system, which is intended for indoor use and already incorporates interactions with the physical environment, would have been motivated to improve its environmental detection capabilities. Petitioner asserted that a POSITA would combine Martins’s well-understood method for camera-based surface detection (floors, walls) to make Fager's game more robust and realistic, which was a predictable improvement.
    • Expectation of Success: A POSITA would have had a high expectation of success because the combination involved applying a known surface detection technique (Martins) to an existing AR system (Fager) to achieve a predictable result. The integration would use the camera already present in Fager's HMD for its intended purpose of observing the environment.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Fager, Martins, and Maguire - Claim 31 is obvious over the Ground 1 prior art in further view of Maguire.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Fager (Application # 2004/0104934), Martins (Application # 2003/0179218), and Maguire (Patent 6,411,266).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that claim 31, which adds a "second camera and a third camera" with overlapping views to the system of claim 21, is rendered obvious by the addition of Maguire. The combination of Fager and Martins already established a multi-player AR system where each player uses an HMD with at least one camera. Maguire explicitly teaches using a pair of cameras on an HMD to provide stereoscopic images to a user, a known technique for enhancing depth perception and realism in virtual and augmented reality displays.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA seeking to improve the user experience of the AR game taught by Fager and Martins would be motivated to incorporate Maguire's teachings. Enhanced realism and depth perception are significant advantages in gaming, particularly for a game like tennis described in Fager that relies on judging distance and position. Since Fager already disclosed separate displays for each eye, implementing Maguire's stereoscopic camera system would be a natural and logical improvement.
    • Expectation of Success: The combination would have been successful because adding a second camera to an HMD to create a stereoscopic, 3D view was a known and established technique at the time, as demonstrated by Maguire. The outcome—improved depth perception—was highly predictable.

4. Arguments Regarding Discretionary Denial

  • Petitioner argued that discretionary denial under §314(a) based on Fintiv factors is not warranted. The parallel district court litigation is in a very early stage, with a trial date scheduled more than 18 months in the future. Petitioner stated its intent to file a motion to stay the litigation pending the outcome of the IPR and stipulated that it would not pursue in litigation any invalidity defense that was or could have been raised in the IPR.
  • Petitioner also contended that denial under §325(d) is inappropriate because none of the prior art references relied upon in the petition were cited or considered during the original prosecution of the ’791 patent.

5. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requests institution of an inter partes review (IPR) and cancellation of claims 21, 23, 31, 37, 41, and 42 of the ’791 patent as unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. §103.