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Nature of Suit Code: 830
Nature of Suit: Patent
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals 

for the Federal Circuit ______________________ 

INFO-HOLD, INC.,

Plaintiff-Appellant

v.

APPLIED MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES 

CORPORATION,

Defendant-Appellee

______________________ 

2013-1528

______________________ 

Appeal from the United States District Court for the 

Southern District of Ohio in No. 08-CV-0802, Judge 

Timothy S. Black.

______________________ 

Decided: April 24, 2015 

______________________ 

DANIEL JOSEPH WOOD, Info-Hold, Inc., Cincinnati, 

OH, JAMES L. KWAK, Standley Law Group LLP, Dublin, 

OH, argued for plaintiff-appellant.

 

RAYMOND R. FERRERA, Adams & Reese LLP, Houston, 

TX, argued for defendant-appellee. Also represented by 

MELISSA STOK RIZZO, DONALD A. MIHOKOVICH, Tampa, FL.

______________________ 

Before REYNA, WALLACH, and TARANTO, Circuit Judges.

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2 INFO-HOLD, INC. v. APPLIED MEDIA TECH. CORP. 

REYNA, Circuit Judge.

This case comes before us on appeal of a final judgment that Applied Media Technologies Corporation 

(“AMTC”) does not infringe U.S. Patent No. 5,991,374 

(“ ’374 patent”). Info-Hold, owner of the ’374 patent,

asserted the patent against AMTC and Muzak LLC in 

separate suits before the same judge in the Southern 

District of Ohio. Those suits led to separate appeals, 

which were argued on the same day before the same 

panel. We address the issues raised in Info-Hold’s appeal 

in the Muzak suit in a separate opinion.

We find the district court adopted a construction that 

improperly narrowed the scope of the claims. We reverse 

the district court and remand for further proceedings 

consistent with our opinion.

BACKGROUND

The ’374 patent is directed to systems, apparatuses, 

and methods for playing music and messages (e.g., advertisements) through telephones and public speaker systems. Playback order of the music and message tracks is 

set on a remote server. The remote server generates and 

sends control signals to message playback devices, telling 

them to access and play back tracks in a specified order. 

One use of the disclosed technology involves directing the 

output of the message playback devices to a public address system at retail stores, so customers can hear the 

music and advertisements while shopping. The output of 

the message playback device can also be directed to a 

music-on-hold (“MOH”) system, which plays the tracks 

over the telephone to callers who are on hold.

In January 2010, an ex parte reexamination proceeding was initiated on the ’374 patent. After amendment of 

some claims and cancellation of others, the ’374 patent 

emerged from reexamination. Reexamined independent 

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INFO-HOLD, INC. v. APPLIED MEDIA TECH. CORP. 3

claim 7 is representative of the technology claimed in the 

’374 patent and recites:

7. A programmable message delivery system for 

playing messages on message playback devices at one or more remote sites comprising:

a communication link;

a plurality of message playback devices, each of said message playback devices communicating with a respective 

telephone system and comprising a 

storage device for storing messages 

and for playing selected ones of said 

messages through an output of said 

message playback device when a caller 

is placed on hold; and

a computer remotely located from said 

plurality of message playback devices 

and operable to generate and transmit 

control signals via said communication 

link for controlling at least one of said 

plurality of message playback devices;

each of said plurality of message playback devices 

being adapted to receive said control signals 

via said communication link and being programmable to access at least one of said messages from said storage device and to provide 

said accessed message to said output in accordance with said control signals when a 

caller is placed on hold; 

wherein said computer comprises a display device 

and is programmable to generate screens on 

said display device that include user selectable menu items for selection by an operator to define relationships between said 

plurality of message playback devices and 

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4 INFO-HOLD, INC. v. APPLIED MEDIA TECH. CORP. 

said messages, the screens guiding an operator to make choices selected from the group 

consisting of which of said messages are to be 

played, which of said plurality of message 

playback devices are to play said selected 

messages, a time of day when said control 

signals are to be transmitted to said message 

playback devices, a date on which said control 

signals are to be transmitted to said message 

playback devices, a sequence in which said selected messages are to be played, and how 

many times to repeat at least one of said selected messages in said sequence, and to generate said control signals to implement said 

choices via said message playback devices.

’374 patent reexamination certificate, col. 1 ll. 28-67.

LITIGATION HISTORY

Info-Hold filed suit in November 2003, accusing 

AMTC’s Remotelink IP and EOS Horizon devices 

(“AMTC’s Accused Devices”) of infringing the ’374 patent. 

During the litigation, a third-party requester initiated an 

ex parte reexamination of the ’374 patent. The Patent 

Office’s decision to reexamine the ’374 patent resulted in 

a stay of the infringement suit against AMTC that was 

pending in the district court. While the reexamination 

proceeding was pending, Info-Hold brought a separate 

suit against Muzak LLC (“Muzak”), with the same judge 

in the Southern District of Ohio presiding over both cases. 

After the ’374 patent emerged from reexamination, the 

stay of the AMTC suit was lifted. Subsequently, it became apparent that the district court would conduct claim 

construction proceedings in the Muzak case first. InfoHold and AMTC agreed to be bound in their case by the 

constructions rendered in the Muzak case. J.A. 1296-97.

Among the terms the district court construed in the 

Muzak case was “when a caller is placed on hold.” The

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district court construed the term to mean “at the moment 

a caller is placed on hold,” a construction favoring Muzak. 

Info-Hold, Inc. v. Muzak Holdings LLC, No. 1:11-cv-283, 

at *8 (S.D. Ohio Sept. 10, 2012). 

In this case, the district court issued an order construing three terms, adopting AMTC’s proposed construction 

for each. The district court primarily relied on statements 

from the patent’s written description to support its claim 

construction. Before construing the claims, however, the 

district court also noted its interest in what it viewed as 

“extrinsic evidence related to” U.S. Patent No. 6,741,683 

(“ ’683 patent”), namely the ’683 patent’s Notice of Allowability. Info-Hold, Inc. v. Applied Media Techs. Corp., No. 

1:08-cv-802, at *7 (S.D. Ohio Apr. 25, 2013) (“Claim 

Construction Order”).1 According to the district court, 

when explaining the reasons for allowance of the ’683 

patent, the examiner stated that prior art MOH patents 

did not teach systems in which the local device initiates

contact with a server to determine whether new content is 

available. Id. The district court explained that this 

“statement assists the Court in determining what a 

person of ordinary skill in the art would understand the 

claims to present” at the time of the invention described 

in the ’374 patent. Id. The district court did not tie its 

construction of any of the terms in dispute to this statement or otherwise explain how the statement affected its 

constructions.

The district court construed “transmit” as “to initiate 

a contact with and send an electronic signal to another 

device.” Id. at *8. It construed the term “message play1 The ’683 patent issued over three years after the 

’374 patent issued and is unrelated to the ’374 patent. 

The ’683 patent covers local on-hold music devices that 

contact and interact with a server from which the local 

device receives content. 

 

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6 INFO-HOLD, INC. v. APPLIED MEDIA TECH. CORP. 

back device” as “a device configured to select and access 

from its storage device one or more stored messages and 

to play those messages through an output, and adapted to 

receive control signals after initiation of contact from 

another source.” Id. And it construed the term “operable 

to generate and transmit control signals” as “capable to 

initiate a contact with the message playback device, and 

generate and send control signals to it.” Id. at *9. The 

constructions effectively required any communication 

between the server and the message playback device to be 

initiated by the server, a construction favorable to AMTC.

After the district court rendered constructions unfavorable to Info-Hold in both cases, AMTC and Info-Hold 

filed a joint stipulation of noninfringement in favor of 

AMTC. The stipulation stated that the construction of 

each of the three terms in this case was dispositive on the 

issue of infringement for each claim having any of the 

terms, thereby establishing noninfringement for AMTC’s 

Accused Devices. Likewise, the stipulation conceded that 

the district court’s construction of “when a caller is placed 

on hold” established that AMTC’s Accused Devices did not 

infringe each claim having this term. The parties further 

requested that the district court enter final judgment of 

noninfringement to allow Info-Hold to appeal the constructions. Based on the parties’ stipulations and request, 

the district court entered final judgment of noninfringement in favor of AMTC.

Info-Hold appeals the district court’s claim constructions rendered in this case, as well as the construction of 

the term “when a caller is placed on hold” from the Muzak 

case. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(1).

DISCUSSION

We review the district court’s evaluation of the patent’s intrinsic record during claim construction de novo. 

Teva Pharm. USA, Inc. v. Sandoz, Inc., 135 S. Ct. 831, 

841 (2015). Subsidiary factual determinations based on 

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INFO-HOLD, INC. v. APPLIED MEDIA TECH. CORP. 7

extrinsic evidence are reviewed for clear error. Id. The 

ultimate construction of the claim is a legal question and, 

therefore, is reviewed de novo. Id. 

Claim terms are generally given their ordinary and 

customary meaning as understood by a person of ordinary 

skill in the art at the time of the invention. Phillips v. 

AWH Corp., 415 F.3d 1303, 1312-13 (Fed. Cir. 2005) (en 

banc). Such a skilled artisan reads claim language in the 

context of the claims, the specification, and the prosecution history, using them to resolve any uncertainties. 

Though the claim term may appear plain on its face, we 

may depart from that plain meaning “1) when a patentee 

sets out a definition and acts as his own lexicographer, or 

2) when the patentee disavows the full scope of the claim 

term either in the specification or during prosecution.” 

Thorner v. Sony Computer Entm’t Am. LLC, 669 F.3d 

1362, 1365 (Fed. Cir. 2012) (citation omitted).

Info-Hold’s appeal of the district court’s construction 

of the three terms in this case—“transmit,” “operable to 

generate and transmit control signals,” and “message 

playback devices”—challenges whether the district court 

erroneously required that all communication between the 

remote server and the message playback devices must be 

initiated by the server. 

As noted above, the district court referred to the laterissued ’683 patent—which is cited in the ’374 patent’s 

reexamination certificate—and the Notice of Allowability 

for the ’683 patent. Neither of these references calls for 

clear-error review. The former is part of the ’374 patent’s 

own prosecution history (on reexamination), hence intrinsic evidence whose interpretation is “a determination of 

law.” Teva, 135 S. Ct. at 841. The latter is not itself cited 

in the ’374 patent’s prosecution history, and we need not 

classify it as “intrinsic” or “extrinsic” for at least these 

reasons: this public record presents no disputed issue of 

fact as to the Notice’s existence or content; the district 

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8 INFO-HOLD, INC. v. APPLIED MEDIA TECH. CORP. 

court made no findings about it; and what remains is 

what, if any, significance it might have for the ultimate 

claim construction, which is a question of law. Vasudevan 

Software, Inc. v. MicroStrategy, Inc., No. 2014-1094, 2015 

WL 1501565 at *3, *5 (Fed. Cir. Apr. 3, 2015). Therefore, 

we apply the de novo standard in reviewing the district 

court’s claim constructions. We begin our review with the 

term “transmit,” given that the construction of the term is 

vital to, and necessarily influences, the construction of the 

other terms. 

I. “TRANSMIT” 

The district court construed the term “transmit” to 

mean “initiate a contact with and send an electronic 

signal to another device.” Claim Construction Order at 

*10. It based the construction on its understanding that 

the patent exclusively disclosed the sending of control 

signals from the server to the remote playback devices, 

and that the remote playback devices were only configured to receive transmissions.

Info-Hold argues that the district court erred by limiting the claims to features disclosed in the preferred 

embodiment. It notes that we have rejected the contention that it is proper to limit the claims to the single 

disclosed embodiment absent a clear expression of intent 

to limit the claims’ scope. E.g., Enzo Biochem, Inc. v. 

Applera Corp., 599 F.3d 1325, 1342 (Fed. Cir. 2010), cert. 

denied on other grounds, 131 S. Ct. 3020 (2011). InfoHold also contends that it is improper to import limitations from the specification absent an express statement 

limiting the claims. Since there is no language in the 

claims limiting the term “transmit” to the initiation of 

communication to either device prior to transmission of 

data, initiation by either the server or the message playback device would be covered by the claims.

AMTC contends that if the preferred embodiment is 

synonymous with the invention itself, our precedent 

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restricts the scope of the claims to the features disclosed 

in that embodiment. See Wang Labs. v. Am. Online, Inc., 

197 F.3d 1377, 1382 (Fed. Cir. 1999) (limiting claims to 

one of two alternatives because only one was described 

and enabled). According to AMTC, in the single embodiment disclosed in the ’374 patent, the message playback 

device only receives control signals after another device 

initiates contact. Further, the message playback device 

disclosed in the invention is incapable of initiating contact 

with another device, meaning that transmission can only 

be initiated by the server.

We find that the claim term “transmit” and the specification support a construction that is neutral as to 

whether the message playback device or the server initiates the transmission. Nothing in the word “transmit” 

suggests a limitation on initiation: there is no linguistic 

ambiguity to resolve. And the specification confirms the 

term’s neutrality as to initiation. For instance, the patent 

discloses that the “message playback device is preferably 

operational in a receive-only manner . . . .” ’374 patent, 

col. 18 ll. 5-6. The mention of a preferred “receive-only” 

manner implies the invention’s ability to operate in a 

manner in which the message playback device may 

transmit. Operating in such a manner would allow for 

communications which are initiated by the message 

playback device. The claims themselves are indeterminate as to which communication endpoint initiates the 

transmission. Also, even if the embodiment in the specification only disclosed server-initiated communication, we 

have “expressly rejected the contention that if a patent 

describes only a single embodiment, the claims of the 

patent must be construed as being limited to that embodiment.” Liebel-Flarsheim Co. v. Medrad, Inc., 358 F.3d 

898, 906 (Fed. Cir. 2004) (citations and quotations omitted). 

The ’374 patent’s written description does not invoke 

the exception to the rule that we will not read limitations 

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10 INFO-HOLD, INC. v. APPLIED MEDIA TECH. CORP. 

from the preferred embodiment into the claims. Under 

that exception, the scope of the invention is properly 

limited to the preferred embodiment if the patentee uses 

words that manifest a clear intention to restrict the scope 

of the claims to that embodiment. Id. We find nothing in 

the ’374 patent’s preferred embodiments or the remainder 

of the specification that evinces a clear intention to restrict the invention’s communications to those initiated by 

the server. Absent an intentional statement of restriction, we refuse to restrict the patent’s claims to cover 

only server-initiated transmissions. 

We also find a lack of a clear, intentional disavowal of 

claim scope that would require the incorporation of a step 

of initiating contact in the construction of “transmit.” We 

find no basis to depart from the ordinary and customary 

meaning of the term. See, e.g., Tex. Digital Sys., Inc. v. 

Telegenix, Inc., 308 F.3d 1193, 1204 (Fed. Cir. 2002)

(explaining the presumption favoring ordinary meaning 

will be overcome by the inventor’s use of words that 

represent “a clear disavowal of claim scope”), cert. denied, 

538 U.S. 1058 (2003).

Moreover, the patentee has not defined the term 

“transmit” by implication. We have found that a patentee 

defined a term “by implication” where the patentee used 

the term throughout the specification in a way that was 

consistent with only one meaning. Bell Atl. Network 

Servs. v. Covad Commc’ns Grp., Inc., 262 F.3d 1258, 1271 

(Fed. Cir. 2001) (quoting Vitronics Corp. v. Conceptronic, 

Inc., 90 F.3d 1576, 1582 (Fed. Cir. 1996)). This principle 

does not apply in this case because the ’374 patent does 

not consistently use the term “transmit” in a way that 

necessarily restricts the term to server-initiated communications. As explained above, the patent’s “preferably 

operational in a receive-only manner” language illustrates 

that transmission can occur in either direction. Other 

statements in the specification also use the term “transmit” in a way that is consistent either with serverCase: 13-1528 Document: 63-2 Page: 10 Filed: 04/24/2015
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initiated or message-playback-device-initiated communications. For instance, the specification discloses that “the 

invention relates to a system for generating and transmitting message playlists to remotely located optical disc 

players” that are part of MOH systems. Claim Construction Order, at *4 (citing ’374 patent, col. 1 ll. 9-11) (emphases omitted). While this statement illustrates the 

direction of transmission of the playlists, it says nothing 

about whether the remote playback device could first send 

a signal requesting that the server transmit the playlist. 

This shows that the term “transmit” does not require all 

communications to be server-initiated. Accordingly, the 

patentee has not implicitly defined the term “transmit” by 

its usage in the ’374 patent.

Finally, we decline to accept AMTC’s invitation to analyze this case under Wang. This court explained in 

Liebel-Flarsheim that we have never read Wang to stand 

for the proposition that a patent’s claims are limited to 

the subject matter discussed in the sole embodiment of a 

patent. 358 F.3d at 907. In Wang, the disputed term 

could only be understood to have one possible meaning 

when read in the light of the specification. Wang, 197 

F.3d at 1382. Furthermore, during prosecution, the 

inventors disclaimed a construction that would have 

encompassed the second possible meaning. Id. at 1383-

84. As discussed above, the ’374 patent does not support 

a reading that restricts the term “transmit” to one meaning. Nor does AMTC point to any disclaimer in the intrinsic evidence that would restrict the term to serverinitiated communications. Therefore, Wang does not 

control this case. 

In sum, the ’374 patent’s discussion of preferred embodiments discloses the possibility of transmission that 

may be initiated by the message playback device, while 

there is no requirement in the remainder of the patent’s 

disclosure that the server initiate all communications. As 

such, the claims should not be limited to server-initiated 

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12 INFO-HOLD, INC. v. APPLIED MEDIA TECH. CORP. 

transmissions. For these reasons, we reverse the district 

court’s construction of the term “transmit.” 

II. “MESSAGE PLAYBACK DEVICE” AND “OPERABLE TO 

GENERATE AND TRANSMIT CONTROL SIGNALS” 

The district court’s construction of both of these terms 

rests on its adopted construction that limits the claimed 

invention to server-initiated transmissions. The construction of “message playback device” includes the requirement that the device be “adapted to receive control signals 

after initiation of contact from another source.” Claim 

Construction Order, at *8 (emphasis added). Similarly, 

the construction of “operable to generate and transmit 

control signals” requires the capability “to initiate contact 

with the message playback device.” Id. at *9. Additionally, the latter term includes the term “transmit.” 

Because the construction of each of these terms depends on the construction of the term transmit, we reverse 

the district court’s construction of the terms “message 

playback device” and “operable to generate and transmit 

control signals.”

III. “WHEN A CALLER IS PLACED ON HOLD” 

Info-Hold asks us to construe the term “when a caller 

is placed on hold.” As discussed above, Info-Hold and 

AMTC agreed to be bound by the construction rendered in 

the Muzak case. The parties’ arguments in this case 

regarding the construction of this term are not materially 

different from the arguments presented in the Muzak 

case. Therefore, we decline to adopt a different construction from that rendered in the Muzak case.

CONCLUSION

Because the district court erred in limiting the claims 

to require that all communications between the server 

and message playback devices be server-initiated, we 

reverse the construction of the term “transmit,” as well as 

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the terms “message playback device” and “operable to 

generate and transmit control signals,” which depend on 

the construction of “transmit.” We further remand the 

case to the district court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

REVERSED AND REMANDED

COSTS

Each party shall bear its own costs.

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