`
`
`
`
`UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
`______________
`
`BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
`______________
`
`SUPERCELL OY,
`Petitioner,
`
`v.
`
`GREE, INC.,
`Patent Owner.
`______________
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`______________
`
`Record of Oral Hearing
`Held: November 28, 2018
`______________
`
`
`
`
`Before MICHAEL W. KIM, TIMOTHY J. GOODSON, and
`AMANDA F. WIEKER, Administrative Patent Judges.
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`APPEARANCES:
`
`ON BEHALF OF THE PETITIONER:
`
`
`JENNIFER BUSH, ESQ.
`MICHAEL SACKSTEDER, ESQ.
`GEOFF MILLER, ESQ.
`Fenwick & West, LLP
`Silicon Valley Center
`801 California Street
`Mountain View, CA 94041
`650-335-7213 (Bush)
`415-875-2450 (Sacksteder)
`650-335-7943 (Miller)
`jbush@fenwick.com
`msacksteder@fenwick.com
`gmiller@fenwick.com
`
`
`
`ON BEHALF OF THE PATENT OWNER:
`
`
`JOHN C. ALEMANNI, ESQ.
`ANDREW RINEHART, ESQ.
`Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton, LLP
`4208 Six Forks Road
`Suite 1400
`Raleigh, NC 27609
`919-420-1724 (Alemanni)
`jalemanni@kilpatricktownsend.com
`arinehart@kilpatricktownsend.com
`
`
`
`
`The above-entitled matter came on for hearing on Wednesday,
`
`November 28, 2018, commencing at 1:00 p.m. at the U.S. Patent and
`Trademark Office, 600 Dulany Street, Alexandria, Virginia.
`2
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`
`P R O C E E D I N G S
`- - - - -
`JUDGE KIM: So, welcome. This is an oral hearing for PGR-
`2018-00008, U.S. Patent Number 9,597,594, Supercell Oy, Petitioner versus
`GREE, Incorporated. My name is Michael Kim. To my left I have Judge
`Amanda Wieker, and on the screen we have Judge Tim Goodson, out in our
`Silicon Valley office.
`So, with that, can we start with appearances, starting with Petitioner,
`please?
`MS. BUSH: Thank you, Your Honors. Jennifer Bush, lead
`counsel for Petitioner Supercell Oy. I'm joined by our backup counsel of
`record, Michael Sacksteder and Geoffrey Miller. And Mr. Sacksteder will
`be arguing today.
`JUDGE KIM: Great. Thanks.
`For the Patent Owner?
`MR. ALEMANNI: Thank you, Your Honor. Good afternoon.
`My name is John Alemanni. I'm here on behalf of Patent Owner GREE.
`With me today are backup counsel, Andy Rinehart, Steve Moore, and Ms.
`Arneita Gray will be helping us with the monitor today. Thank you.
`JUDGE KIM: All right. So a few housekeeping things. I
`believe 60 -- each side gets 60 minutes. The order is going to be Petitioner,
`Patent Owner, Petitioner, Patent Owner, with the last two sessions being
`reserved for rebuttal. As we know, rebuttal sessions really need to respond
`
`3
`
`
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`to something said previously. Nothing new really should be brought up at
`that time.
`As far as in and out, if people need to do it, we ask that you restrict it
`to when the speakers are changing, to be as minimally disruptive as possible.
`And of course, because Judge Goodson is remote, he does have the slides in
`front of him, so if you could please refer to the slides or any exhibits or
`papers, he can readily find them, if necessary.
`So with that, Mr. Sacksteder, how much time would you like to
`reserve for rebuttal, approximately?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Your Honor, I'd like to reserve 15 minutes,
`
`please.
`
`JUDGE KIM: Okay. And Mr. Alemanni, about how much time
`for sur-rebuttal?
`MR. ALEMANNI: I would guess it's probably 15 to 20 minutes for
`sur-rebuttal.
`JUDGE KIM: Okay. We'll say 15. All right. So Mr.
`Sacksteder, you can begin when you're ready.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Thank you, Your Honor. And I initially
`have to begin with an apology. I picked up a cold on the airplane --
`JUDGE KIM: Oh yes?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: -- on the way out, and so I sound pretty
`terrible right now. So I hope that what I say is both substantively and
`audibly understandable today.
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`
`4
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`
`The Board got it right on its institution decision in this case. The
`Board determined that the claims are directed to creating and applying a
`template, that that's an abstract idea, that there was nothing additional in the
`claims that would make those claims patentable.
`I'd like to briefly, since this came up on the call, address the, what
`the claims are directed to, issue for a moment, and then it's addressed
`throughout our slides.
`The point that I'd like to raise initially is that there's an argument in
`Patent Owner's sur-reply that says, quote, all of the claims of the ‘594 patent
`are directed to the movement of game contents from first positions to second
`positions, and the claim template is how those results are achieved. That's
`at Page 21 of the Patent Owner's sur-reply.
`And I would like to point out that that is a completely new position.
`It's a new argument that was raised for the first time in the sur-reply. I
`would have handled the deposition of Patent Owner's expert differently had I
`known that this was a position they were going to take. I think obviously,
`first of all I would ask whether moving game pieces from one place to
`another on a board is a, is something other than an abstract idea. So I think
`that, that argument and the positions that are based on it should be
`disregarded in this situation.
`JUDGE KIM: Okay. I get your point there.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Sure.
`JUDGE KIM: But I do think Patent Owner has argued that they
`want to limit this to in-game environment, and perhaps they did not say that
`
`5
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`as explicitly as they said in the sur-reply, but one thing they did say is, you
`know, your position has been, well there's no video game, there's no city-
`building in the claim, and they're saying well, game contents, that's what it
`means. And so I don't think it's too much of a stretch to say what they're
`saying is well, we're creating and applying templates, but in a game space.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: And we have, and we'll address it as we go
`through, I think we've addressed that argument with, you know, games such
`as the bingo and Planet Bingo, with games such as correspondence chess,
`augmented by the shatranj predecessor to both live and correspondence
`chess, and that those are in a game environment. We will address sort of
`the other portions of what we view as the specification being imported into
`the claims in a sort of an ill-defined way as we go along.
`Can we go to Slide 2, please Geoff?
`Just briefly, to recap the Board's decision, which I'm sure you're well
`aware of, the Board determined that the claims are directed to an abstract
`idea.
`
`Slide 3, please.
`That there was no additional inventive concept on top of the abstract
`idea of creating and applying templates.
`Slide 4.
`That Claim 12 is representative. We'll get into that a little bit more,
`but I think that what Patent Owner does now is just re-raise the argument
`that was already rejected by the Board and the decision-granting institution.
`Slide 5.
`
`6
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`
`And this is that argument. The Patent Owner based its argument in
`its preliminary Patent Owner's response on language from Claim 11, which
`the Patent Owner argued added something beyond representative. Claim
`12, the Board determined that that wasn't the case, that that was included in
`the limitation of applying a template in Claim 12.
`And so Patent Owner raised the argument again but they raised it
`with Claims 1 and 10. But if you look at the language of Claims 1 and 10,
`they are virtually identical -- and it's shown in Slide 5. They're virtually
`identical to the language that the Board rejected reliance on in Claim 11
`during the institution decision.
`JUDGE KIM: Okay, hold on for a second. What is a template?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: I beg your pardon?
`JUDGE KIM: What is a template?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: What is a template?
`JUDGE KIM: Yes.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: It is -- I actually have not proposed a claim
`construction except as in our petition. I'd actually have to refresh my
`recollection about that, but it is -- in layperson's terms, it's something that
`you, where you save information to be applied later on in a computer
`context.
`The example that Mr. Crane, Patent Owner's expert, gave in the
`deposition that we took, was that, something like it was something that you
`could use to format a memo, or a letter in Microsoft Word. And it
`establishes, as do the templates in this claim, in the claims of this patent, it
`
`7
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`establishes where something goes on the computer screen. And it is
`applied after it's created. So you create it, and then you apply it to show
`where things are going to be in the future on the screen.
`JUDGE KIM: Are templates limited to computer areas?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: I don't think so. I think that templates can
`be used in -- you know, they -- obviously, the use of the word predated the
`use of the word in computer technology. And as we will discuss, there are
`templates in the postcards that computer chess players send back and forth.
`There are templates in the bingo technology of Planet Bingo. There are
`templates -- and I'll explain this as well -- in the tabi’at, the battle positions
`of the chess predecessor, shatranj.
`Slide 6.
`Just again, and I'm not going to belabor this, a number of the
`arguments that are raised by Patent Owner in its response and in its sur-reply
`have already been rejected by the Board in the institution decision.
`Slide 7.
`JUDGE GOODSON: Mr. Sacksteder, can I take you back to your
`Slide 4, about the representative claim?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Yes, sir.
`JUDGE GOODSON: Is there any guidance from the federal circuit
`on how one chooses which claim will be analyzed as representative in the
`Section 101 context?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Okay. We will find that during our -- and
`bring it up in our sur-reply, if that's acceptable.
`
`8
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`
`JUDGE KIM: Sure.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: It has been --
`JUDGE GOODSON: Okay. Can you also --
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Sure.
`JUDGE GOODSON: Can you just let me know how the Petitioner
`chose Claim 12? Apart from the legal standard, why did Petitioner select
`Claim 12 to be the representative claim?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: I think it's largely because it was the clearest
`claim, and it was one that we thought encompassed the whole thing, and was
`one that we could demonstrate our arguments regarding them in a way that
`would be meaningful to the Board.
`JUDGE GOODSON: Thanks.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Slide 6, please. Slide 7, I apologize.
`Okay. Just -- there are new arguments that have come up since the
`institution decision that are relied on by Patent Owner. The problem is that
`the -- as Judge Rich said long ago, the name of the game is the claim. And
`these are not included or recited in the claims, and that's the problem with
`their attempt to rely on these arguments.
`Slide 8, please.
`Just, here's the representative claim, just for reference purposes,
`focusing on the abstract idea of creating and applying a template.
`Slide 9.
`It's abstract for several reasons. It consists of mental steps that
`could be carried out by a human being, either mentally, or with pen and
`
`9
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`paper, or with real-world game pieces. It automates a manually achievable
`process, as the Patent Owner's expert conceded in his deposition. And it
`does nothing to improve computer technology.
`Slide 10.
`Okay. First, the mental steps or manual process -- and looking at
`correspondence chess, the illustration on the right, which is from our exhibit,
`I forget if it's 1003 or 1004, but it shows the beginning position before a
`template is applied by a correspondence chess player.
`In correspondence chess, you aren't necessarily limited to a move-
`by-move exchange with the other side. You can submit multiple moves if
`the individual moves are forced, as they say in chess, or you can submit
`if/then moves. There might be an opening sequences, for instance, the
`Sicilian Defense is pawn to king four, pawn to queen bishop four, knight to
`king bishop three, pawn to queen three, pawn to queen four, pawn takes
`pawn, knight takes pawn.
`You might do that all as one sequence, saying if you do this, I do
`this. And you end up at the template that is the position after you have had
`those, what would be individual moves that you are skipping. You just go
`straight to that position. That's what happened, and it happened
`erroneously, it turned out, in the example that's given in the exhibit, that one
`side got it wrong, thought the moves were forced and they weren't, and -- but
`were held to the template that they had applied to have a position be set later
`on in the game.
`
`10
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`
`JUDGE KIM: Mr. Sacksteder, is it enough that we have an
`example of humans doing something? I mean, is that all really, we really
`need to have something be an abstract idea? I mean, isn't there sort of a
`point of absurdity where, you know, I could do, I could write a spreadsheet
`with 10,000 digits on it, and in theory, perform all those calculations, pen
`and paper, however I'm not so sure that that's an abstract idea.
`(Simultaneous speaking.)
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Well I think that automating the manual
`process, or the mental steps -- in this case, the player is performing the
`mental steps to get to that separate template position that is later in the game.
`JUDGE KIM: No, I understand your position.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: And not -- yes.
`JUDGE KIM: I guess I'm thinking more philosophically because, I
`mean, the whole point of judicial exception is we're doing basic building
`blocks of ingenuity, human thought, et cetera. I mean here, arguably, you
`had to go all the way to correspondence chess, which I'll be frank, I didn't
`know about this until this case started. I mean, is that really a building
`block of human ingenuity, when we have to -- not even chess, but go to
`correspondence chess to say well, humans can do this?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: There's no reason you couldn't do this in
`regular chess, by the way. You could be -- for instance, there are players
`who play blindfold, and don't view the board. And they could be again
`offering the same sort of position in the future and saying, if you do this,
`let's go to this position and save some time. But it isn't the only thing.
`
`11
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`You know, we're going to talk about Planet Bingo in a minute, which
`actually does it on a computer.
`But the idea here is that computers just naturally can speed up certain
`processes. And just doing that, taking this concept that exists in the real
`world, and just taking a computer, because it just thinks faster, making the
`application of that concept faster, I think, is an abstract idea.
`JUDGE KIM: So your position is, I mean, pretty much anything a
`human can do is abstract?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: I don't know that I would go that far, but I
`would say that this falls on that side of the line. And I'd say that if it is
`something that is sort of a common thing for humans to do, and because a
`computer can do it using the, different use of the term, basic building blocks
`of a computer to do it faster, I think, at a certain extent, that is not something
`that is patent-eligible and is an abstract idea.
`JUDGE KIM: So your view is, correspondence chess is common
`enough to be considered an abstract idea?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Yes. I think it's something that's existed
`for centuries.
`JUDGE KIM: Okay.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Claim 11.
`That's just the same thing, the same diagram. This is not -- again,
`the argument that was made was that it is, correspondence chess is iterative.
`The example there shows that it is not always iterative, and that you can use
`a template to change the position of the game.
`
`12
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`
`And by the way, regarding your previous question, one thing is, this
`is -- you know, had to go to correspondence chess because this is a game.
`You know, there's an argument that this doesn't exist in the world of games.
`It does. And so that's one reason why we're talking about chess.
`There's also an argument that all the pieces start from the exact same
`beginning board positions. That doesn't matter. The template is later on
`in the game, when you are doing the if/then or the forced moves, and you
`end up at a certain position, which is the template that you have set up.
`Claim 12 -- Claim 12. Not Claim 12. Slide 12.
`Slide 12, this is from one of the exhibits regarding shatranj.
`Shatranj is a very, couple of millennia old game. And this was how you
`did it. You said, I want -- you have this template in mind, one of these
`positions or many others, these sort of battle arrays. And each player just
`sets his pieces up there at the beginning of the game.
`There is an anecdote where a regular chess player and a shatranj
`player are playing each other. The shatranj player moves all his pieces
`really fast to get into his battle array, and the regular chess player moves one
`piece. And the regular chess player says, why are you moving all your
`pieces at once? The shatranj player says, why aren't you moving all your
`pieces at once? But the idea is that the shatranj player has a template in
`mind, and goes to it in one step.
`JUDGE KIM: So obviously, I don't know if you were going to get
`to this, but Patent Owner challenges this in their motion to exclude. And --
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Understood. Yes.
`
`13
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`
`JUDGE KIM: -- that, you know, it's a website, it's hearsay, there's
`no authentication. And I guess this sort of also gets to that point, right, is
`two things. So in Alice and in Bilski, the federal circuit relied on treatises
`to show something was old, well-known, for fundamental economic
`concepts. Here -- I mean, you're saying it's old, but it's on a website. It's
`like, well if it's old, couldn't we find something better?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: It's older than -- significantly older than the
`patent filing date itself, in any event.
`JUDGE KIM: Is that enough?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: And it's talking about it being old in that,
`you know, about being predecessor to chess in this case. And that's in --
`JUDGE KIM: And how much weight should we give a website?
`I mean, the bar to putting up a website's pretty low, isn't it? And I -- so if I
`put something on a website and say, this is old, that's enough?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: It shows what was known at the time, and
`the dates on the comments to one of the websites are in 2008. So it shows
`that people knew that this existed. People knew that this was something
`that had existed for a long time, at that point. It shows the mental state of
`the people on the -- you know, who were familiar with this area.
`JUDGE KIM: Well the comments are even worse, though, aren't
`
`they?
`
`MR. SACKSTEDER: That's just -- well the comments show the
`date, you know, because they're automatically stamped with the date. So
`you know that the website at least existed at that point.
`
`14
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`
`JUDGE KIM: Right, but I mean, how much weight should we give
`just a comment on a website? Again, I mean, it's not like it went to peer
`review. It's not like there's publishers who edited this. I mean, it's just
`someone putting their opinion on a website.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Well, I understand what you're saying. I
`think that in this case it is a number of people who are talking about a well-
`established game, and talking about how it was well-established at the time.
`JUDGE KIM: Okay.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Slide 13, briefly, there's reference to the
`SimCity and Clash of Clans games, which are admitted to permit movement
`of one piece at a time. As we'll discuss later on, that's part of, that's --
`according to the language of the claim, if you use a template to do that, you
`have practiced the claim in the view of the Patent Owner.
`And then finally, patent -- Planet Bingo, which the Board relied on
`as well in its institution decision. Just, you know, considered that the set of
`preferred bingo numbers, which are then applied to the actual numbers that
`are drawn, probably electronically drawn, are considered a template. And
`they are something that you could easily write out on a piece of paper. It's
`a manner of organizing human activity. It's a mental process that is
`performed electronically in this case. That's the same as what is happening
`here.
`
`Slide 15.
`So some arguments about why Planet Bingo shouldn't apply,
`according to Patent Owner. First, the claims aren't limited to city-building
`
`15
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`games. There's nothing in the claims -- and I'm going to come back to it
`over and over. There's -- a lot of the arguments the Patent Owner relies on
`have nothing to do with what's in the claims, and try to rely on materials
`from the specification. But in cases like two-way media, the court says, the
`federal circuit says, you don't do that. You know, you have to look at
`what's in the claims.
`Slide 16.
`And by the way, Slide 15 just had an admission from Patent Owner's
`expert that city-building games are not in the claims.
`Same thing with --
`JUDGE GOODSON: What about if we were to agree with Patent
`Owner that the claims are, whether it's Claim 12 or another claim in the
`patent, is limited to the context of competitive games or computer games,
`would that remove it from the ambit of an abstract idea?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: I don't think it would, because for one thing,
`chess is a competitive game. Planet Bingo is a competitive game that is
`performed on a computer. But in any event, their expert admits that that
`isn't the case. You know, their expert says, there's nothing in there that
`says this is limited to a competitive game. There's nothing in there that is
`limited to a city-building game. Again, the testimony is on Slide 16 there,
`and Slide 15 previously.
`Next slide, Slide 17.
`JUDGE KIM: I'm sorry. I did have a question regarding that
`point. So Claim 5 says, when the number of game contents arranged within
`
`16
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`a game space is smaller than the number of game contents for which a
`second positions are defined by the template, the computer moves the game
`contents arranged at the first position within a game space to the second
`position in the game context defined by the template to which the moving
`direction is the smallest. Doesn't that provide more meat to the bone of
`what you do?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: I don't think so. I think that describes the
`function of the template, rather than the manner in which the template
`operates. And --
`JUDGE KIM: What's the difference between the two? I mean --
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Well it describes what the template
`accomplishes. It's the result, or the function as opposed to how it actually
`works. This is again something that Patent Owner's expert said, when I
`asked him -- I went through, and we'll see it later on, I asked him, anything
`in any of these claims about how you apply a template, about how the
`template is created? He said no, there's nothing there. So he didn't view it
`that way here.
`JUDGE KIM: Well be that as it may, though, but it does tell you,
`right, that basically if you have conflicting pieces, it tells you what to do.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: It does explain what happens when the
`template is applied. I think that is still functional language regarding what
`happens when the template is applied and the result that comes out of it, as
`opposed to the how question that Patent Owner's expert conceded.
`
`17
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`
`JUDGE KIM: So I understand that it doesn't say exactly -- well it
`does say how it's done though, that when you have a conflict, this is what
`you do. And it is expressed claim language. I mean, I think it's
`something that needed to be supported in the -- accounted for in the analysis
`one way or the other.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: It's something also that I don't believe Patent
`Owner has ever raised, except it is addressed in our petition. And Patent
`Owner said that we didn't sufficiently address it, but the Board determined
`that we had.
`JUDGE KIM: Well for the purposes of institution, when we're only
`talking about one claim for trial.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Understood. Understood.
`The next slide, Slide 17, there's a lot of discussion by Patent Owner
`about how this is a user interface patent. There's nothing about user
`interfaces in the patent itself. And the -- actually, I think the cases that are
`relied on, particularly the Data Engine case is a very helpful case, very sort
`of instructive case, because Data Engine has sort of a claim that shows,
`here's what -- you know, here's the structure, you know, the structural user
`interface on the screen. Here's, you know, here's where this tab goes, here's
`what happens with this tab, here's how you show this on the screen.
`And then there's the other patent that was found not patent-eligible,
`that is more like the patent in this case, which is, you know, sort of directed
`toward the general, I think the counsel in that case described it as being more
`generally claimed or something like that, where here is something that just
`
`18
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`24
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`allows you to split cells in a spreadsheet. And I think that case is a very
`helpful matter.
`Again, Trading Technologies talks about the requirement for a
`specific structured graphical user interface that's paired with a prescribed
`functionality. And that does not appear in the claims of the ‘594 patent.
`JUDGE KIM: Well I think Patent Owner would argue that you
`have first position, then second positions on the screen. I mean, that's --
`MR. SACKSTEDER: Well, that --
`JUDGE KIM: Is it really that different from two different display
`regions?
`MR. SACKSTEDER: That moves something from one place on
`the screen to another --
`JUDGE KIM: Sure.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: -- as they argued in, at the end of their sur-
`reply which, you know, again had we had the opportunity, I think we would
`have said that's a very abstract idea, and that's something that has existed
`since the dawn of computers. And that's just a function that occurs, as the
`Board said in its institution decision, that's sort of a function that, or result
`that occurs when you apply this template. And it's part of applying the
`template.
`Slide 18, please. So that's more of the same. Let's go to Slide 19.
`The future use of templates, I already mentioned. And Patent
`Owner's expert said yes, of course you -- I mean, what reason you create a
`template is to use it in the future. And Slide 20, there is nothing specific,
`
`19
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`there -- I think in the sur-reply there is also mentioned Claim 20, which
`recites a table. For one thing, tables are not anything that haven't existed
`for a long time. Had that appeared in the sur-reply, maybe I would have
`asked the Patent Owner's expert about that.
`But just saying there's a table does not reflect what I think I
`understand Patent Owner to be saying, you know, is sort of the additional
`information or the non-abstract portion, it's a little hard to tell sometimes, of
`what is in the claims.
`Slide 21.
`Again, Patent Owner's expert admitted that the templates of the
`claims automate a manually achievable process. I gave a hypothetical
`about, I'm going to move some things manually, you're going to use a
`template to move them. They end up in the same place. Slide 22 just
`shows the -- sorry. Go to Slide 23, please.
`The other thing is, they rely on simultaneous movement of the game
`pieces. That's not a requirement of the claims. Every claim has the
`movement of the positions of one or more of the game contents. So you
`can practice this claim according to its terms by just moving one of the game
`contents.
`Let's go to 24.
`Patent Owner's expert said that would be -- if you only moved one,
`that would be within the scope of the claims.
`Twenty-five.
`
`20
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`
`There is illustration from the specification that shows that in Figure
`9, Slide 26. Again, that's more of the same. That's another example from
`the same figure.
`Slide 27.
`And then Patent Owner's expert said yes, the -- if you just move one
`thing, that's not simultaneous. So their basis for saying that this is not an
`abstract idea based on simultaneous movement is not, it's not required by the
`claims.
`Slide 28.
`JUDGE KIM: Well they -- I mean, yes. So they preface it on,
`based on a command. And sure, so okay, I see the scenario where if there's
`one, it happens. But I guess you could also read it that, you know, all the
`pieces, however many they are, we want them moved based on a command,
`and that happens simultaneously. So if there's one, okay there's one. But
`it sort of needs a capability to do all of them at the same time.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: But you can practice the claim according to
`the language of the claim. You can practice that claim all day by moving
`one. And so that is not a requirement of the claims, which I think is
`something that has to be taken into account in determining whether this is an
`abstract idea.
`No improvement in computer technology. The Board correctly, in
`its decision-granting institution, pointed out that solving a monotony of
`game play is a mental or a business problem, and not a technical one.
`
`21
`
`
`
`1
`2
`3
`4
`5
`6
`7
`8
`9
`10
`11
`12
`13
`14
`15
`16
`17
`18
`19
`20
`21
`22
`23
`
`Case PGR2018-00008
`Patent 9,597,594 B2
`
`
`JUDGE KIM: I have another question here. So they cite Core
`Wireless, and Core Wireless does say that, you know, there's sort of this
`confusion about moving between multiple programs and screens, and by
`doing the configurations they did in Core Wireless it makes it more user-
`friendly, if you will. So what's the line between a technical problem,
`business problem, mental problem? I mean, there it seemed like well yes,
`it's better for the user. I don't think the computer really cares how you
`move between programs themselves.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: In Core Wireless, the means for doing that
`was actually claimed. You know, it related to a user interface. It showed
`that here is where you go from this point in this menu, and here's what
`happens to the other applications while that's going on. That's different
`from here.
`JUDGE KIM: Well, okay. That's the solution aspect, but the
`problem aspect though, it's still fundamentally a user interface problem,
`right. It matters what the user thinks.
`MR. SACKSTEDER: I don't agree that what is in the ’594 patent
`is a user interface problem. That may be -- in the Core Wireless c