throbber
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
`SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS
`HOUSTON DIVISION
`
`WESTERNGECO LLC,
`
`PLAINTIFF,
`
`VS.
`
`ION GEOPHYSICAL
`
`CORPORATION, FUGRO GEOTEAM,
`INC. , ET AL,
`
`DEFENDANTS
`
`.
`
`I
`
`4:09—CV-01827
`HOUSTON, TEXAS
`
`JULY 24, 2012
`7:37 A.M.
`
`TRANSCRIPT OF JURY TRIAL
`BEFORE THE HONORABLE KEITH P. ELLISON
`UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
`
`A P P E A R A N C E S:
`
`FOR THE PLAINTIFF:
`
`Lee K. Kaplan
`SMYSER KAPLAN & VESELKA LLP
`Bank of America Center
`
`700 Louisiana, Suite 2300
`Houston, Texas
`77002
`
`Gregg F. LoCasciO
`KIRKLAND & ELLIS LLP
`655 Fifteenth Street Northwest
`
`Washington, DC 20005
`
`Sarah Tsou
`
`Timothy K. Gilman
`KIRKLAND & ELLIS LLP
`
`Citigroup Center
`153 East 53rd Street
`
`New York, New York
`
`10022
`
`Mayra Malone, CSR, RMR, CRR
`mayramalone@comcast.not
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 1
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`ARPEARANCES - CONTINUED
`
`FOR THE DEFENDANT:
`
`David L. Burgert
`Susan Kopecky Hellinger
`Jonathan M. Pierce
`
`Jonna N. Stallings
`Ray T. Torgerson
`Eric D. Wade
`PORTER & HEDGES LLP
`
`Reliant Energy Plaza
`1000 Main Street, 36th Floor
`Houston, Texas
`77002
`
`FOR FUGRO GEOTEAM,
`
`INC.:
`
`Gordon T. Arnold
`Jason A. Saunders
`ARNOLD KNOBLOCH LLP
`
`4900 Woodway Drive
`Suite 900
`
`Houston, Texas
`
`77056
`
`James M. Thompson
`Christine Raborn
`Michael E. Streich
`ROYSTON RAYZOR VICKERY & WILLIAMS LLP
`Pennzoil Place
`
`711 Louisiana Street, Suite 500
`Houston, Texas
`77002
`
`Mayra Malone, CSR, RMR, CRR
`mayramalone@comcast.neL
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 2
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`APPEARANCES - CONTINUED
`
`OFFICIAL COURT REPORTER:
`
`Mayra Malone, CSR, RMR, CRR
`U.S. Courthouse
`
`515 Rusk, Room 8016
`Houston, Texas
`77002
`
`Proceedings recorded by mechanical stenography. Transcript
`produced by computer-aided transcription.
`
`Mayra Malone, CSR, RMR, CRR
`mayrama1one@comcast.net
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 3
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`THOMAS SCOUL:OS
`
`COHtiDJ€d Direct Examination by THOMAS SCOULZ
`
`Cross—Examination by Mr. Burgert
`
`Cross—Examination by Mr. Thompson
`
`Mayra Malone, CSR, RMR, CRR
`mayramalone@comcast.net
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 4
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
`SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS
`HOUSTON DIVISION
`
`WESTERNGECO LLC
`
`VS.
`
`ION GEOPHYSICAL
`
`CORPORATION, FUGRO
`GEOTEAM,
`INC., ET AL
`
`O9—CV—1827
`
`Houston, Texas
`
`12:11 p.m.
`
`July 24, 2012
`
`JURY TRIAL
`
`Volume 2
`Afternoon Session
`
`BEFORE THE HONORABLE KEITH P. ELLISON
`UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
`
`APPEARANCES:
`
`10
`
`11
`
`12
`
`13
`
`14
`
`15
`
`FOR THE PLAINTIFF:
`
`16
`
`17
`
`18
`
`19
`
`20
`
`21
`
`22
`
`23
`
`24
`
`25
`
`Lee L. Kaplan
`SMYSER, KAPLAN & VESELKA, LLP
`700 Louisiana, Suite 2300
`Houston, Texas 77002
`713.221.2300
`
`Gregg F. Locascio
`KIRKLAN & ELLIS LLP
`655 Fifteenth Street Northwest
`
`Washington, DC 20005
`202.879.5290
`
`Sarah Tsou
`
`Timothy K. Gilman
`KIRKIAND & ELLIS LLP
`
`Citigroup Center
`153 East 53rd Street
`
`New York, New York 10022
`212.446.6435
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtrcportor@a0l.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 5
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`CD$3CO~JCDLPJ>LUDJF4
`
`F4
`
`MR. LOCASCIO: We will. Under the Rule, he's
`
`outside so if I may go outside and ——
`
`THE COURT: Yes. Please retrieve him or her.
`
`THE WITNESS: Can I bring all this down?
`
`THE COURT: Yes, you may take all that. Thank
`
`you very much.
`
`THE WTTNESSI Thank you, Your Honor.
`
`THE COURT: May this witness remain in the
`
`courtroom, or is he still subject to the Rule.
`
`MR. LOCASCIO: He may. He's the corporate
`
`representative, so he will.
`
`Thank you, Your Honor.
`
`THE COURT: Sir, if you Could make your way up
`
`this way.
`
`MR. LOCASCIO:
`
`Thank you, Your Honor.
`
`THE COURT: We're going to have you in the seat
`
`nearest me right here.
`
`Before you take your seat, sir, Mrs. Loewe
`
`will administer the oath, if you would raise your right
`
`hand, please.
`
`CASE MANAGER:
`
`Do you solemnly swear that the
`
`testimony you are about to give in the matter now before
`
`the Court will be the truth,
`
`the whole truth and nothing
`
`but the truth?
`
`THE WITNESS:
`
`I do.
`
`THE COURT: Try to make yourself comfortable in
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR ~ jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 6
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`that chair.
`
`it's not the most comfortable.
`
`M. LOCASCIO: Your Honor --
`
`THE COURT: Try to speak directly into the
`
`MR. LOCASCIO:
`
`-— my colleague, Mr. Mr. Gilman
`
`will be examining t his witness.
`
`THE COURT: Very well.
`
`THE COURT: You may proceed.
`
`MR. GILMAN: May it please the Court,
`
`ladies
`
`OO\IO\U7nJ>LL)l\.)!—‘
`
`KO
`
`l0 and gentlemen. My name is Timothy Mr. Gilman, and I'm here
`
`ll also representing WesternGeco. And as our next witness, we
`
`l2 are calling Dr. Simon Bittleston. Dr. Bittleston is the
`
`l3 head of all research for WesternGeco and for Schlumberger
`
`l4 as well. He's also the inventor of three —— or one of the
`
`l5 inventors of three out of the four patents that we're
`
`l6 talking about today,
`
`the patents that we often refer to as
`
`l7 the Bittleston patents, and he's here with us today to
`
`L8 testify about what those patents are and the technology
`
`L9 they cover and also the work he did that led up to those
`
`20 patents.
`
`21
`
`22
`
`23
`
`24
`
`25
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 7
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Dircct—Bittlcston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`SIMON BITTLESTON,
`
`after having been first cautioned and duly sworn, testified
`
`as follows:
`
`BY M- GILMAN :
`
`DIRECT EXAMINATION
`
`Q.
`
`Good morning, Dr. Bittleston.
`
`A.
`
`Good morning.
`
`O0~JChLN¢>b)R)F4
`
`Q.
`
`Could you please introduce yourself to the jury.
`
`A.
`
`My name is Simon Bittleston.
`
`I work for Schlumberger
`
`I've worked for Schlumberger for 26 years. And for nine
`
`of those years,
`
`from l990s,
`
`I worked for ~— I worked for
`
`WesternGeco —— it was called Geco—Prakla at that tim
`
`in Norway. And while I was in Norway,
`
`I was working on
`
`all the sorts of systems.
`
`Q. What is your position today, Dr. Bittleston?
`
`A.
`
`I'm vice—presiden: of research for Schlumberger,
`
`which also includes research for WesternGeco.
`
`Q.
`
`And what types of research do you oversee?
`
`A.
`
`So the research covers all of Schlumberger's
`
`activities.
`
`Schlumberger is a very large organization.
`
`We have 16 different business units, of which one is
`
`WesternGeco. And so,
`
`the research covers all of those
`
`different activities.
`
`In fact, Schlumberger spends on research
`
`and productive elements about a $1 billion a year, and the
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 8
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Dire-ct—Bittleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`(D\1O\U‘|4>(A)i\3|--‘
`
`research portion of that is about 140 million, so that's
`
`what I cover.
`
`Q.
`
`A.
`
`And where do you conduct all this research?
`
`So the research is covered in about six main research
`
`centers.
`
`The largest of those is in Boston, next to MIT,
`
`where we have about 140 scientists.
`
`The next sized one is
`
`in Cambridge in England, where we have about l2O
`
`scientists.
`
`And then the others are based in Moscow,
`
`Stavanger, Rio and some other places.
`
`Q.
`
`How many total scientists do you have working
`
`underneath you?
`
`A.
`
`About 400 in the research organization.
`
`Q. What is your role in charge of overseeing all these
`
`scientists?
`
`A.
`
`So the lab directors report to me, and I'm
`
`responsible for making sure that the right work is being
`
`done in the right research labs and also to interact with
`
`the business units a lot to make sure that we are
`
`addressing their needs.
`
`Q. What is your connection to WesternGeco?
`
`I think you
`
`started to describe this earlier.
`
`A.
`
`So I went to Norway —— I was invited to go to Norway,
`
`moved from.Cambridge to Norway in 1993.
`
`So I started
`
`working for what was Geco-Prakla as it was then, but
`
`WesternGeco now,
`
`in 1993. And I worked all the way
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 9
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Di'rect—Bi t tleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`through to 1999 when " left Norway.
`
`So in that period,
`
`I
`
`was working for WesternGeco.
`
`Q. What is your specific connection to this case?
`
`A.
`
`So in this case,
`
`the number of patents I did,
`
`the
`
`three of them I have my name on.
`
`I'm a joint inventor
`
`with a chap called Oyvind Hillesund that I worked with,
`
`and those patents have been asserted.
`
`Q.
`
`A.
`
`How many total patents are you an inventor on?
`
`So U.S. patents, a bit less than 20. And then for
`
`the rest of the world, probably another 30.
`
`So that's my
`
`total.
`
`Q. What types of inventions do your patents cover?
`
`A. Well,
`
`the first patent I ever made was for -- in
`
`fact, it was for King Oil Wells, using multiphase flows,
`
`in that water in there. And then a lot of the patents,
`
`quite a few of the patents are associated with the systems
`
`we're going to talk about now. And then I have some
`
`others associated with sampling of down hole fluids,
`
`that's getting samples of oil and gas in the bottom of the
`
`well when you're drilling.
`
`Q.
`
`Let's turn to the three patents of yours that are at
`
`issue today.
`
`A.
`
`Yes.
`
`Q. What technology do those patents cover?
`
`A.
`
`So those patents cover really looking after handling
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR ~ jcscourtreporter@aol.Co1n
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 10
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Direct -131‘ t tleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`00\JOWLNJ>U)DOF4
`
`the whole of a streamer and a spread on how you control
`
`all of the cables in the water. And it might be useful
`
`just to first look at the scale of the problem, which
`
`is —— tried to illustrate it here a little bit.
`
`Q.
`
`I think this is Bittleston Demonstrative l that's
`
`next to you.
`
`A.
`
`Q.
`
`A.
`
`Okay.
`
`Can you describe, yeah, what this is showing?
`
`So this is showing such a streamers being today
`
`behind the vessel, and these streamers are about four and
`
`a half miles long.
`
`In fact, you can have systems of
`
`streamers which go up to about six miles long.
`
`So this
`
`isn't the longest possible.
`
`And just to give you a sense of scale,
`
`down at the bottom.there, you can hardly see it,
`
`is a
`
`Boeing 747, which is about 231 feet long.
`
`Then there's
`
`the JPMorgan Chase Tower, which is the biggest tower in
`
`Houston which is next to it, a thousand.feet high. And
`
`then this is the Guadalupe Peak, which is tallest peak in
`
`Texas, which is 8,700 feet.
`
`So you can see the system is very huge,
`
`and the task here is to try and control all of these
`
`cables at the same time.
`
`So it's really a huge task.
`
`So
`
`the patents cover different aspects of controlling that.
`
`In order to control this, it's not enough
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR ~ jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 11
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Di'rect~Bittleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`00\JOWLN¢>0050F4
`
`just to maneuver the boat or the cable at the top of the
`
`headers, streamers, all at the tail, for that matter. But
`
`you have to actually put some loads and forces distributed
`
`over the different cables.
`
`So these cables —— I don't
`
`know if it's been described to you —— they're about two
`
`inches in diameter. They have a lot of electronics in
`
`them, and they're basically neutrally buoyant in water.
`
`So over this spread, you may have a couple
`
`of hundred of these birds, as they're called, streamer
`
`steering devices, which allow you to move the streamers
`
`sideways and vertically. At each points they're placed
`
`along the streamer, and they're placed uniformly spaced on
`
`the streamers.
`
`So the patents cover how you go about
`
`doing that.
`
`If you've got more than 200 airplanes to fly
`
`at the same time, you're not going to do it manually by
`
`giving instructions to each of the planes, and so, one of
`
`the patents is associated with how you can get give high
`
`level commands in order to tell all of these airplanes
`
`what to do at the same time and get them in the right
`
`position.
`
`So those are different strategies either
`
`keeping the cables parallel to each other, certain
`
`separation, or keeping them at a certain angle to the
`
`direction of the boat, or also, you can give them other
`
`commands in order to make sure that they don't tangle and
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 12
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`D1'rect—B_1'ttleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`things like this.
`
`Cb\JO\U1nJ>U)l\JI-4
`
`So in addition,
`
`the problem here is that
`
`each of the birds doesn't know where everything else is.
`
`The only place where you know where everything in water
`
`is,
`
`is on the vessel where you've got the navigation data
`
`and all the information about where all the cables are.
`
`So on the vessel, you need a controller, and in each of
`
`the birds, there's a little computer so they're quite
`
`intelligent in that way, and so, you can send comands
`
`from the boat to each of the birds to tell them what to
`
`do.
`
`So that means that you need split the control system
`
`between a global control system, which is the one on the
`
`boat that has all the navigation data, and the local
`
`control system, which at the birds.
`
`And there's one other aspect of the
`
`patents which is very important, which is that,
`
`in order
`
`to work out where everything is in the water, we have to
`
`actually take a set of what's called acoustic ranges.
`
`What we do is we make a little sound on one of the cables,
`
`we receive it on another cable, and that gives us the
`
`distance between two cables by the time it took the sound
`
`get from one cable to the other cable. And we do about
`
`800, up to 800 of those ranges, and we do it every lO
`
`seconds.
`
`And that's a lot o:
`
`information to process.
`
`So
`
`it takes a bit of time before we actually work out where
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@ao1.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 13
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Diroct—Bittlest:on/By Mr. Gilman
`
`all the cables were in the water because we have to
`
`process all this information.
`
`And in that time, everything‘s been
`
`moving. This is very dynamic. Everything is moving. And
`
`so, what we have to do we have to predict forward during
`
`period where we're doing the calculations what —- how --
`
`where the cables now are.
`
`So one of the patents is about
`
`predicting forward so that you know where the cables are
`
`so you can give it the right commands to do what you need
`
`to do next.
`
`So those are basically what it covers.
`
`Q.
`
`So I think it makes sense to take a look at these
`
`specific patents.
`
`A.
`
`Yes.
`
`M. GILMAN: Your Honor, may I approach the
`
`witness?
`
`THE COURT: You may. You can approach your own
`
`witnesses without asking.
`
`MR. GILMAN:
`
`Thank you, Your Honor.
`
`BY M- GILMAN:
`
`Q.
`
`I'm handing you a collection of exhibits for today.
`
`M. GILMAN: And I believe that the jury has
`
`the copies of your patents as Patent Numbers 1 through 3 in
`
`their notebooks as well.
`
`BY MR. GIHWNN:
`
`Q.
`
`Dr. Bittleston, could you turn to Plaintiff's
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 14
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Direct—Bi t ties ton/By Mr . Gilman
`
`Exhibit 1?
`
`THE COURT: Dr. Bittleston, where are you
`
`located now? Cambridge or Boston or --
`
`THE WITNESS: Cambridge in England, yes.
`
`THE COURT: Could you briefly trace your
`
`education for me.
`
`THE WITNESS: Yes, Your Honor.
`
`So I was
`
`educated in England,
`
`I went to university at Imperial
`
`College in London, which is like the MIT,
`
`I guess, of the
`
`10 UK. And then so,
`
`I did my bachelor's there, and I did my
`
`11 Ph.D.
`
`in Bristol, which is the west coast of the UK.
`
`I did
`
`12 that Ph.D.
`
`in fluid_mechanics, which is working out the
`
`13 flow of fluids over various objects.
`
`14
`
`In fact, my Ph.D. was on flows past groups
`
`15 of cylinders.
`
`The application was dialysis machines to try
`
`16 and make better ways to remove waste products from the
`
`17 blood.
`
`18
`
`And after I done my Ph.D.,
`
`I moved to
`
`19 Schlumberger Cambridge Research, which is in Cambridge,
`
`20 which is actually where I am now based again, and I started
`
`21 working as a scientists in Cambridge.
`
`22
`
`THE COURT: What is your degree in as an
`
`23 undergrad?
`
`24
`
`25
`
`THE WITNESS: Mathematics.
`
`THE COURT:
`
`Thank you.
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@a<:rl.co1n
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 15
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Direcl, —Bi 1; Lleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`1
`
`THE WITNESS: All right.
`
`2 BY MR. GILMAN:
`
`Q.
`
`I'd like to hear before the story that led to your
`
`inventions too.
`
`Before we jump into how your research took
`
`you there, maybe we can start with a high level
`
`description of your patents.
`
`A.
`
`Q.
`
`Okay.
`
`If you could turn to Plaintiff's Exhibit 1, which
`
`should be behind?
`
`A.
`
`Yes,
`
`I'm there.
`
`Q. Which —— what document is Plaintiff's Exhibit 1?
`
`A.
`
`So this is the '52O patent, which is a patent which
`
`is associated with controlling all of these cables.
`
`And
`
`this particular patent is mainly concerned with the
`
`different control modes that you can have.
`
`M. GILMAN: Pull up Exhibit 1, please.
`
`3 4
`
`8 9
`
`10
`
`L1
`
`12
`
`13
`
`14
`
`15
`
`16
`
`17
`
`18
`
`BY MR. GILMAN:
`
`19
`
`Q.
`
`Let's take a look at cover of the patent to begin
`
`20
`
`with.
`
`21
`
`22
`
`23
`
`24
`
`25
`
`How do you know that this is one of your
`
`patents?
`
`A.
`
`So it's on the —— this page here, if I can put it up
`'1
`Oyvind Hi_lesund, Simon
`
`like this, it says, "Inventors:
`
`Hastings Bittleston, so that's me.
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 16
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Direct~Bi'ttleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`BY MR. GILMAN:
`
`Q.
`
`So who is Mr. Hillesund?
`
`A.
`
`So Oyvind worked with please in Norway. He was part
`
`of the streamer team,
`
`so he was one o: my staf:.
`
`Q.
`
`If you look under the list of both of your names as
`
`inventors, it says "Assignee, WesternGeco"?
`
`A.
`
`Yes.
`
`Q. What does that mean?
`
`A.
`
`It means that WesternGeco has taken the device of
`
`these patents because, when I joined the company, when
`
`Oyvind joined the company, we signed something saying that
`
`any inventions we made were going to be owned by the
`
`company, not by us, so they're the owners.
`
`Q.
`
`If we move up a little bit, there's the title of a
`
`patent.
`
`What does that refer to?
`
`A.
`
`So the title here is just a summary title of the
`
`patent.
`
`It's "Control System for Positioning of a Marine
`
`Seismic Streamer."
`
`Q.
`
`And if we see in the upper right-hand corner, we know
`
`that this is your '52O patent that we've talked about
`
`today.
`
`A.
`
`Yes.
`
`Q.
`
`A.
`
`When did this patent issue from the U.S. Government?
`
`It says just below it, it's 13th of November, 2007.
`
`Johnny C, Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@ao1.com
`
`1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
`
`1O
`
`11
`
`12
`
`13
`
`14
`
`15
`
`16
`
`17
`
`18
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 17
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Direct—Bittleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`G)‘JCHLNJ5L0B0F4
`
`Q.
`
`On the left side towards the bottom,
`
`there's a
`
`section titled "References cited."
`
`What does that mean?
`
`A.
`
`So these are other documents of the patents where —-
`
`have some relevance to this patent which the U.S.
`
`examiners will have looked at in order to see if this
`
`patent is unique or not.
`
`Q.
`
`If we look at this list on that page and onto the
`
`following page, how many references were considered by the
`
`U.S. Patent Office?
`
`A.
`
`I'm sorry.
`
`I didn't add up the total here, but I
`
`guess it's more than 20 or so, yeah.
`
`Q.
`
`If we turn one page further in to the patent
`
`document, we get to Figure l of your patent.
`
`A.
`
`Yeah.
`
`Q.
`
`Could you describe what's being shown here in
`
`Figure l?
`
`A.
`
`So in Figure 1, we've got a set of streamers in the
`
`water, and we've got a few items which are marked on them.
`
`The items marked 18 are the positions where the birds are
`
`going to be.
`
`The items marked 16 are something called
`
`monowings. Monowings are the big wings in the front of
`
`the extreme which pull the front,
`
`these front cables
`
`sideways.
`
`They need to be quite a bit bigger because
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@ao1.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 18
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Direct Bittleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`you've got a lot of force there.
`
`The Item.Number 14 is actually the
`
`airguns.
`
`So that's where we make a bang —— sound bang
`
`every lO seconds. That sound propagates through the earth
`
`and comes back reflected from underneath the earth and
`
`actually hits all the streamers, that sound wave, and we
`
`7 measure it with microphones, hydrophones, on all of these
`
`8
`
`streamers. And that's the whole purpose is to actually
`
`9 make an image of the subsurface.
`
`lO is the boat and 20 is the tail buoy, and
`
`12 is the streamers in between.
`
`Q.
`
`How big is this spread of streamers that's shown in
`
`Figure l?
`
`A. Well, this is just eight streamers wide, so it would
`
`probably be less than half a mile wide. And this length
`
`here,
`
`I guess, is quite short compared to that length that
`
`we've got up there.
`
`Q.
`
`A.
`
`How long can these streamers arrays get to be?
`
`They go up to —- up to six miles today. There are
`
`plans to go even further. There are reasons we want
`
`them
`
`to be even longer.
`
`Q.
`
`Figure l is the overall streamer array.
`
`What are you showing in Figure 2 of your
`
`patents on the next page?
`
`A.
`
`So Figure 2 is the particular birds’ embodiment that
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtrcporter@ao1.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 19
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`D1'roct~Bittlcston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`we chose to make. This is a two-wing bird. You can see
`
`the two wings there marked 28, and they're attached to a
`
`stiff center body by some wing routes, 32, and then
`
`there's some motor drivers, one for each wing, 34. That
`
`means the wings act actually independently of each other.
`
`And then at the heads and tail, you have some bits of
`
`streamer,
`
`in fact,
`
`some short sections of flexible.
`
`That's flexible parts.
`
`So it's just the center part
`
`that's stiff. And.there are other components in that
`
`CD~JCfi(NJ5(UDOF4
`
`9
`
`10
`
`streamer,
`
`things like spaces.
`
`11
`
`And the point about this bird is how it
`
`12 works, which I think, as you can get a bit feel from here,
`
`13 is that if you're just flying horizontally, you just move
`
`14 the wings up and down together; but if you want to suddenly
`
`15 go vertically, move the streamers sideways, what you do is
`
`16 you just put them slightly at a different angle. That's
`
`17 called a splay angle. And that rotates the whole thing.
`
`18 So it start to go like that.
`
`It's like an airplane banking
`
`19 around the corner. And then you put them in the right
`
`20 position and then they'll pull the streamers sideways. And
`
`21 by doing something in between, you can control both the
`
`22 sideways movement and the depth movement at the same time.
`
`23 So it's really quite like a plane in terms of the way in
`
`24 which it moves.
`
`25 Q.
`
`How many of these planes would be on a given streamer
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 20
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Di'recL—Bi ttleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`array?
`
`A.
`
`So a couple of hundred is a very typical number.
`
`can be more or less than that.
`
`Q.
`
`If we look,
`
`then, down at Figure 3, what are you
`
`showing here in Figure 3?
`
`6
`
`A.
`
`In Figure 3, what we have here is an explanation of
`
`how this thing is going to respond to a command. What
`
`we've got is a bird.
`
`The bird wings are now marked 28
`
`again, you can see, with a center body 30.
`
`So that
`
`corresponds to the numbers above.
`
`So you can see it's at
`
`an angle.
`
`The streamers are actually going out of the
`
`page here. You're looking end on to it. And what's being
`
`asked for from the vessel is that it says,
`
`I want to move
`
`a horizontal force, which is marked by the horizontal
`
`arrow marked Number 42, and the vertical force which is
`
`marked by the vertical arrow 44.
`
`So you can actually add that force up, and
`
`you get -- the total force that's needed is the force
`
`marked 46.
`
`So that's the angle.
`
`So that's how much we're
`
`going to have to push in that direction.
`
`Now,
`
`the bird as it's sitting isn't quite
`
`pointing in this case direction.
`
`It's pointing along the
`
`long Line marked along 52. And so, what we do is we start
`
`to push along that line marked 52, but then we put a
`
`little bit difference in the angles of the wings, and we
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 21
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Direct—Bittleston/By Mr.
`
`G1’ Jman
`
`realign the birds so that this line matches up with the
`
`Line 46.
`
`So it starts just turning a little bit,
`
`in this
`
`case, so that it's lined up with 46, and we change
`
`actually the total force so it matches the arrow 46.
`
`So
`
`it's explaining how to go from one position to another.
`
`Q.
`
`Dr. Bittleston, did you invent the idea of trying to
`
`put a lateral force on a cable?
`
`A.
`
`No,
`
`I did not. There are many devices.
`
`I mentioned
`
`the monowing, which was before this, and other people had
`
`thought of trying to move cable sideways.
`
`Q.
`
`Did you invent the idea of trying to use a device to
`
`move one of these streamers?
`
`A.
`
`I invented a particular embodiment, a particular
`
`device,
`
`to move streamers sideways, which was a tooling in
`
`a natural bird which had independent wings.
`
`Q.
`
`Is that the subject matter of these patents in suit?
`
`A.
`
`No, this is actually not the subject at all, although
`
`there's a patent about it.
`
`The subject matter is about
`
`not any particular device, I've shown you one particular
`
`device.
`
`It's actually about how the move the whole thing
`
`together.
`
`It's irrelevant respective of which device is
`
`on the cables. These patents have nothing to say about
`
`which device is on the cable,
`
`just that there are devices
`
`that can move them, and they explain how to go about
`
`managing a couple of hundred of these birds at the same
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreportcr@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 22
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Direct—Bittleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`time. That's what the whole point is really.
`
`Q.
`
`If you turn to Figure 4, what aspect of your
`
`invention is this showing?
`
`A.
`
`So in Figure 4, we've got a block diagram.
`
`It shows
`
`you the main parts o: a local controller.
`
`So I mentioned
`
`before that part of the patents is to have some
`
`intelligence on the boat,
`
`some brains on the boat for
`
`the —— where everything is in the water; and each of the
`
`birds, it has it's own little computer. And here you can
`
`actually see it. And the little computer in the bird,
`
`it's called a processor unit, which is marked 54. But
`
`importantly, we're going to need to move two wings, and
`
`so, you can see marked 34 a motor left wing and a motor
`
`right wing. And in order for those motors to do the right
`
`thing,
`
`they have a motor driver each.
`
`So you can see
`
`that's how the two wings are driven.
`
`And we need to know where they are.
`
`So
`
`after we've moved them, we have a position indicator
`
`marked 64. And so, that gives feedback so that we can
`
`actually know what to do next.
`
`There are a few other measurements here.
`
`There's a pressure sensor.
`
`So as you go deeper in the
`
`water,
`
`the pressure goes up. You get that when you go
`
`swimming, your ears pop. And so, if you have pressure
`
`sensors, you can work out approximately how deep you are,
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourLrepo1*ter@aol.com
`
`1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
`
`1O
`
`11
`
`12
`
`13
`
`14
`
`15
`
`16
`
`17
`
`18
`
`19
`
`20
`
`21
`
`22
`
`23
`
`24
`
`25
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 23
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Direct-Bi ttles ton/By Mr. Gilman
`
`CO-dO\LNdbLuDOF4
`
`approximately. And then there is a -- on the top right
`
`marked 17, you've got a vertical accelerometer, horizontal
`
`accelerometer at 10 percent.
`
`So --
`
`THE COURT:
`
`I'm going to ask you to slow down
`
`just a little bit.
`
`TEE W:TNESS:
`
`Okay. Sorry.
`
`And those
`
`accelerometers actually allow you to know what the angle of
`
`the bird is, how much rotation you have on it.
`
`The -- to the left-hand side of this is a
`
`box marked 76, and that is a comunications -- a method of
`
`comunications.
`
`It has a particular name, 485.
`
`There are
`
`other ways you could do the communications. And that's
`
`going to communicate information to and from the rest of
`
`the system and particularly up to the boat.
`
`BY MR. GILMAN:
`
`Q.
`
`So in front of you, you have the three different
`
`patents of yours that are in this case --
`
`A.
`
`Yes.
`
`Q.
`
`-- Exhibits 1, 2 and 3.
`
`What do the different patents cover in
`
`terms of your invention and what you were thinking about?
`
`A.
`
`Okay.
`
`So one of the patents covers the overall
`
`strategies for controlling the cables,
`
`that includes how
`
`you might turn the cables,
`
`turn mode, how you might keep
`
`the cables separated at a fixing distance, and how you
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 24
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Dil"eCt‘Bi ttleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`might keep the cables at a fixed angle that are parallel
`
`to the direction. Maybe we have something I can show you
`
`that.
`
`Q.
`
`Yeah,
`
`I think -- are there some slides that we have
`
`that you think would help illustrate these features?
`
`A.
`
`Yes, I think so.
`
`Okay.
`
`So I'm.going to start illustrating
`
`this by having no steering, so I hope you can see this
`
`little diagram here with cables wondering about in the
`
`water.
`
`This is a situation you would have if the
`
`cables didn't have any steering on them. And what you can
`
`notice in particular is that on some of the cables that
`
`get closer together, and some get further apart, so you
`
`get things where they're too close and too far apart.
`
`That's not good for a lot of reasons. One
`
`of the reasons is, you're trying to take a picture of the
`
`subsurface, and you want to take a uniform picture and
`
`you'd like all of these to be uniform to get a good
`
`picture.
`
`So maybe we can go on to the next slide.
`
`So if they get too close this is what
`
`happens,
`
`they cross,
`
`they tangle, and they make the most
`
`huge mess you can ever imagine. You tangle all those
`
`4 mile,
`
`6 mile cables together, you're ending up taking all
`
`this back to port.
`
`It's a massive mountain of cables at
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RI‘/JR, CRR ~ jcscourtrcportcr@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 25
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Direct~Bi L Lleston/By Mr. Gilman
`
`0)~JO\LN#5L050F4
`
`the side of the port. You're going to have to untangle
`
`them with cranes and take them apart.
`
`The whole system is
`
`down for weeks.
`
`This is a catastrophe.
`
`It doesn't happen
`
`all the time.
`
`It happens rarely, but when it does happen,
`
`it's a lot of money down the strain.
`
`Q.
`
`A.
`
`How expensive are each of these cables?
`
`They are millions of dollars each cable.
`
`I can give
`
`you precise number, you know, 10 to $20 million of
`
`equipment in the water is not unusual.
`
`Q.
`
`So that's what happens if the cables get too close
`
`together?
`
`A.
`
`Yeah.
`
`Q. What happens if they get too far apart?
`
`A.
`
`I don't know if we have an example of that.
`
`So if
`
`they get too far apart,
`
`then what happens is you get an
`
`area in between cables where you're not taking the data,
`
`and the contracts we have with our clients say that we
`
`have to get certain amount of data everywhere across the
`
`area we're covering.
`
`And this example you can now see. There's
`
`a hole that's been made in the data.
`
`So now the only
`
`choice here is to come back later and go over the same
`
`territory again.
`
`I think yesterday it was explained in
`
`the introduction about mowing the lawn and going over the
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourtreporter@aol.com
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 26
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`Di're<:l;~Bi I; Lies Lon/By Mr. Gilman
`
`patches again.
`
`The difference really here is that you
`
`have to take all this boat and cables away,
`
`turn it all
`
`around and bring it all back, and that takes a long time
`
`to do.
`
`And so that's a lot of wasted effort and
`
`time.
`
`So you know you can spend 10 to 15 percent of the
`
`time of the whole operation just dealing with this
`
`problem. And so, if you can steer the cables, of course,
`
`you don't end up with any of this infill as it's called to
`
`do, it's going to go back over the same territory.
`
`Q.
`
`If we go to the next slide, please.
`
`How do your
`
`inventions address these problems?
`
`A.
`
`Okay.
`
`So in these patents here, what we've got ——
`
`one of the modes that's in this first patent here is
`
`streamer separation, and.what we do is we tell the
`
`streamers that we want to keep the uniform separation
`
`between each of the streamers. And that means they can
`
`stay apart,
`
`they're not going to tangle,
`
`they're kept at a
`
`separate distance. And also, we're not going to have the
`
`infill problem that we had before.
`
`So extreme separation
`
`avoids those two problems.
`
`Q.
`
`If we can turn to the next slide. Can you describe
`
`how streamer separation mode works?
`
`A. Well,
`
`the way it works here is we have these birds.
`
`I've just drawn one of them here. And we're going to send
`
`Johnny C. Sanchez, RMR, CRR — jcscourLreporter@aol.co1n
`
`WESTERNGECO Exhibit 2106, pg. 27
`PGS v. WESTERNGECO
`IPR2014-00689
`
`

`
`¢>DJNJF4
`
`Direct»Bi'

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