PTAB

IPR2025-01428

Apple Inc v. MessageLoud Inc

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Petition
petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: System for Hands-Free Message Reading
  • Brief Description: The ’728 patent relates to systems that automatically queue and audibly present various message types (e.g., email, text, messenger) to a user engaged in an activity like driving. The system announces a sender's identity and provides a period for user input to stop the message before automatically reading the full message body.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Obviousness over Boelter and Gruber - Claims 1-25 are obvious over Boelter in view of Gruber under 35 U.S.C. §103.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Boelter (Application # 2014/0303842) and Gruber (Application # 2013/0275138).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued the combination of Boelter and Gruber disclosed all limitations of the challenged claims. Boelter was asserted to teach an in-vehicle system that receives different message types (e.g., email, text) and places them in a single notification queue, organized chronologically, for display after a critical driving situation has passed. Gruber was asserted to teach a virtual assistant that reads lists of messages aloud to a user, sorts them by time, announces a sender’s identity, provides a pause for user interruption (e.g., to stop playback), and then proceeds to read the message body aloud if no interruption occurs. The arguments for independent claims 24 (a mobile phone) and 25 (a system) were presented as analogous to those for method claim 1.
    • Motivation to Combine: Petitioner argued a person of ordinary skill in the art (POSITA) would combine Gruber’s audio read-aloud functionality with Boelter’s notification queuing system to advance Boelter’s stated goal of reducing driver distraction. Modifying Boelter’s visual notification system with Gruber’s well-known audio-based method was presented as a predictable improvement to enhance safety. Reading Boelter's mixed-message queue aloud would also simplify message review for the user by preventing the need to toggle between multiple applications.
    • Expectation of Success: Petitioner asserted a POSITA would have had a reasonable expectation of success because text-to-speech technology for virtual assistants was well-known and commercially available. The hardware components disclosed in Boelter (e.g., processor, memory, speakers in a vehicle or smartphone) were sufficient to implement Gruber’s functionality, meaning the combination would only require routine software modification rather than invention of new technology.

Ground 2: Obviousness over Boelter, Gruber, and Polak - Claims 1-25 are obvious over Boelter in view of Gruber and Polak under §103.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Boelter (Application # 2014/0303842), Gruber (Application # 2013/0275138), and Polak (Application # 2015/0350400).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: This ground built upon the combination of Boelter and Gruber, with Polak cited as additional prior art. Petitioner argued that to the extent the primary combination was found deficient, Polak provided further teachings that render the claims obvious. Specifically, Polak was asserted to disclose a system that enables drivers to hear messages vocally and automatically announces sender details (e.g., name or phone number) upon a message's arrival, without requiring any user input to initiate the audible notification.
    • Motivation to Combine: A POSITA would be motivated to incorporate Polak's teachings of automatic, input-free audible notifications into the Boelter/Gruber system. This would further enhance driver safety by removing a potential user interaction step (i.e., selecting a message to be read), which would reduce driver distraction and cognitive load. This modification was argued to be a simple design choice to make the system more hands-free.
    • Expectation of Success: Petitioner argued a POSITA would have expected success in this combination because implementing Polak’s automatic playback functionality involved simple and routine programming changes that were compatible with the system proposed by combining Boelter and Gruber.

4. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requests institution of an inter partes review and cancellation of claims 1-25 of the ’728 patent as unpatentable.