IP Investments Group entity patent challenged as likely invalid

On December 22, 2020, Unified filed a petition for inter partes review (IPR) against U.S. Patent 6,560,613, owned by DataCloud Technologies, LLC, an NPE and an IP Investments Group entity. The ‘613 patent relates generally to disambiguating file types on a computer system. The patent has been asserted against Box, Extreme Networks, F5 Networks, 1&1 Ionos, and Wix.com.

View district court litigations by DataCloud Technologies. To read the petition and view the case record, see Unified’s Portal. Unified is represented by Drew Sommer and Kyle Chen of Greenberg Traurig, and by in-house counsel, Alyssa Holtslander, Jung Hahm, and Roshan Mansinghani, in this proceeding.

$1,500 Awarded for Mountech IP prior art

Unified is pleased to announce the PATROLL crowdsourcing contest winner, Ekta Aswal, who received a cash prize of $1,500 for their prior art submission for U.S. Patent 7,991,784. The patent is owned by Mountech IP, an NPE and IP Edge subsidiary. The ‘784 patent generally relates to a method for automatic dynamic contextual data entry completion system. The ‘784 patent has been asserted in district court against ZTE, Samsung, Motorola, Blackberry, and LG.

To help the industry fight bad patents, we have published the winning prior art below.

We would also like to thank the dozens of other high-quality submissions that were made on this patent. The ongoing contests are open to anyone, and include tens of thousands of dollars in rewards available for helping the industry to challenge NPE patents of questionable validity by finding and submitting prior art in the contests. Visit PATROLL today to learn more about how to participate.

WINNING SUBMISSIONS

Webinar Materials - The Results Are In: The USPTO’s Request for Comments on Discretionary Denials

Speakers:

Ashraf Fawzy – Legal Head - SEP, Unified Patents

Joshua Landau — Patent Counsel - Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA)

Joe Matal — Partner, Haynes and Boone, LLP

We reviewed one of the most closely monitored rule changes in the AIA's history. The USPTO recently issued a request for comments regarding policy-based discretionary denials of PTAB proceedings. Such policy-based discretion included the PTAB's recent rise in considering: (a) parallel litigation (Fintiv Factors/NHK Spring); (b) parallel petitions; and (c) serial petitions when deciding whether to institute. We spoke about the proposed rule, the policy and practical considerations involved, and the competing interests which resulted in over 800 comments being submitted from stakeholders.

Thank you to our panelists for leading a great discussion!

To listen to the recorded webinar, click here: https://vimeo.com/492542852

The slide presentation from this webinar can be seen below, along with some accompanying materials — the collection of submitted comments that were mentioned; Apple's Arthrex Brief; and the request for comments.

https://www.unifiedpatents.com/insights/2020/5/13/ptab-procedural-denial-and-the-rise-of-314

Please join us at our next webinar, The Trial Before the Trial — Eliminating Presumptions and Other Recent USPTO Rule Changes on January 28th at 12p ET. For more information, visit our website.

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NavBlazer (Joao) patent determined likely invalid

On December 16, 2020, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) instituted trial on all challenged claims in an IPR filed by Unified against U.S. Patent 9,885,782, owned by NavBlazer LLC, an NPE. NavBlazer is associated with patent attorney and prolific inventor, Raymond Anthony Joao. Along with Caselas, GreatGigz Solutions, Joao Control and Monitoring Systems, and Joao Bock Transaction Systems, his companies have launched dozens of lawsuits against technologies ranging from streaming video to financial transactions. The ’782 patent is directed to vehicle navigation systems that provide information about a route and has been asserted against TomTom, Apple, Samsung, LG, Motorola Mobility, and Hyundai for their devices that provide vehicle navigation.

View NavBlazer’s district court litigation. To read the petition and view the case record, see Unified's Portal. Unified is represented by in-house counsel, Jessica L.A. Marks and Ashraf Fawzy, and James Stein from Lee & Hayes in this proceeding.

Breaking the 5G Curve by Looking Beyond the U.S. Patent System

Unified’s Shawn Ambwani and Sam Jaffna published an article in IPWatchdog.com analyzing the growth in 5G Self-Declared Standard Essential Patents (SD-SEPs) and the idea that strategic oppositions and invalidity proceedings filed outside the U.S. could prove useful to manufactures/equipment makers of 5G technology. There are 94,000 active grants and applications (25,700 families) 5G SD-SEPs as of September 2020.

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While successful validity challenges of a patent in foreign countries do not conclusively prove the invalidity of the U.S. counterpart, the successful arguments used in these challenges have been effective in the U.S. and used to argue lower portfolio values.

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“Manufacturers of equipment implementing 5G technologies should consider strategic oppositions and invalidity proceedings outside the United States against SEPs held by major licensees. These challenges cost a tenth or more less than typical U.S. challenges and could impact the licensing value of up to 50% of the self-declared families of the major SEP holders.”

Click HERE to read the entire article posted on IPWatchdog.com.