Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca13-15-01725/USCOURTS-ca13-15-01725-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Apple Inc.
Appellee
Unwired Planet, LLC
Appellant

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals 

for the Federal Circuit ______________________ 

UNWIRED PLANET, LLC,

Plaintiff-Appellant

v.

APPLE INC.,

Defendant-Appellee

______________________ 

2015-1725

______________________ 

Appeal from the United States District Court for the 

Northern District of California in No. 3:13-cv-04134-VC, 

Judge Vince Chhabria.

______________________ 

Decided: July 22, 2016

______________________ 

 JOHN BRUCE CAMPBELL, McKool Smith, PC, Austin, 

TX, argued for plaintiff-appellant. Also represented by 

KEVIN LEE BURGESS, KATHY HSINJUNG LI, JOEL LANCE 

THOLLANDER; THEODORE STEVENSON, III, DOUGLAS AARON 

CAWLEY, Dallas, TX.

 MARK ANDREW PERRY, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP, 

Washington, DC, argued for defendant-appellee. Also 

represented by BRIAN BUROKER; ALEXANDER N. HARRIS, 

San Francisco, CA; YU-CHIEH ERNEST HSIN, HERVEY 

MARK LYON, STUART ROSENBERG, Palo Alto, CA; BROOKE 

MYERS WALLACE, Los Angeles, CA. 

Case: 15-1725 Document: 70-2 Page: 1 Filed: 07/22/2016
2 UNWIRED PLANET, LLC v. APPLE INC. 

______________________ 

Before MOORE, BRYSON, and REYNA, Circuit Judges.

MOORE, Circuit Judge.

Unwired Planet, LLC (“Unwired”) appeals the United 

States District Court for the Northern District of California’s summary judgment of non-infringement on U.S. 

Patent Nos. 6,532,446; 6,647,260; 6,317,831; and 

6,321,092 in favor of Apple Inc. (“Apple”). We affirm-inpart, vacate-in-part, and remand. 

I. BACKGROUND

Unwired brought a patent infringement suit against 

Apple on ten patents in the United States District Court 

for the District of Nevada in September 2012. A year 

later, the case was transferred to the Northern District of

California. After the transfer, Unwired dismissed without 

prejudice five of the ten patents it previously asserted. 

The district court construed ten claim terms from the 

remaining five patents, and the parties stipulated to noninfringement as to the asserted claims of one patent.

The district court granted summary judgment of noninfringement with respect to the ’446, ’260, and ’831 

patents. As to the ’092 patent, the district court granted 

summary judgment of no indirect infringement, and 

Unwired subsequently agreed to dismiss its claim for 

direct infringement of the ’092 patent with prejudice. On 

May 29, 2015, the district court entered its final judgment 

in favor of Apple. Unwired timely appeals, arguing that 

the district court erred in (i) its construction of claim 

terms from the ’446 and ’260 patents, (ii) granting summary judgment of non-infringement after resolving factual disputes against Unwired as to the ’446, ’260, and ’831 

patents, and (iii) granting summary judgment of no 

indirect infringement as to the ’092 patent after applying 

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UNWIRED PLANET, LLC v. APPLE INC. 3

an incorrect legal standard. We have jurisdiction under 

28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(1).

II. STANDARD OF REVIEW

If based upon the intrinsic record, we review claim 

construction de novo. Teva Pharm. USA, Inc. v. Sandoz, 

Inc., 574 U.S. ____, 135 S. Ct. 831, 841–42 (2015). We 

review summary judgment decisions under regional 

circuit precedent, here, the Ninth Circuit. Lexion Med., 

LLC v. Northgate Techs., Inc., 641 F.3d 1352, 1358 (Fed.

Cir. 2011). We review the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of Apple de novo. Greater Yellowstone Coal. v. Lewis, 628 F.3d 1143, 1148 (9th Cir. 2010). 

Summary judgment is appropriate when, drawing all 

justifiable inferences in the nonmovant’s favor, “the 

movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any 

material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a 

matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a); Anderson v. Liberty 

Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 255 (1986).

III. U.S. PATENT NO. 6,532,446

1. Background

Unwired challenges the district court’s (i) construction 

of the claim term “voice input” and (ii) grant of summary 

judgment of non-infringement based on that term. 

According to the ’446 patent, there had been efforts to 

equip mobile devices with speech recognition technology, 

which generally required adding costly software and 

hardware resources (e.g., a faster processor, additional 

memory) to the mobile devices. ’446 patent, col. 2 ll. 5–21. 

The ’446 patent explains that such “modifications would 

add considerable cost to the final price of the mobile 

device, possibly pricing them out of the target price range 

usually occupied by mass-market mobile devices.” Id., 

col. 2 ll. 26–29. The claimed invention relates to extending speech recognition capabilities to mobile devices with 

limited resources by relying on network-based resources. 

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Id., col. 1 ll. 15–18. In the disclosed system, a mobile 

device sends a user’s voice input to a remote speech 

recognition server. The server translates the received 

voice input into a data file that can be processed by the 

mobile device, and then the data file is sent back to the 

mobile device. Id., col. 2 ll. 46–63. Unwired accused 

Apple’s Siri service of infringing claims 15 and 35. Apple’s Siri service allows a user to speak into an iOS device 

(e.g., iPhone, iPad) using server-based speech recognition.

On appeal, the parties dispute the construction of the 

claim term “voice input,” which is present in both of the 

asserted claims. Claim 15 is a method claim that ultimately depends on claim 1, which recites “retrieving a 

voice input signal.” Claim 35 is an apparatus claim that 

ultimately depends on claim 31, which similarly recites 

computer program code for “receiving a voice input.” Both 

claims further recite converting the “voice input [signal] 

into a symbolic data file.” Before the district court, Unwired argued that the plain and ordinary meaning should 

be given to the term, requiring no construction. Alternatively, Unwired proposed “speech input” as a construction. 

Apple proposed construing the term to mean “speech 

provided over a voice channel.” The parties’ claim construction dispute is whether the “voice input” should be 

limited to a voice input transmitted over a particular type 

of channel, a voice channel as opposed to a data channel. 

In adopting Apple’s proposed construction, the district 

court relied on the summary of the invention in the ’446 

specification. The summary consists of five paragraphs, 

the first of which is reproduced below:

The present invention relates to a wireless communication system that utilizes a remote speech 

recognition server system to translate voice input 

received from mobile devices into a symbolic data 

file (e.g. alpha-numeric or control characters) that 

can be processed by the mobile devices. The 

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translation process begins by establishing a voice 

communication channel between a mobile device 

and the speech recognition server. A user of the 

mobile device then begins speaking in a fashion 

that may be detected by the speech recognition 

server system. Upon detecting the user’s speech, 

the speech recognition server system translates 

the speech into a symbolic data file, which is then 

sent to the user through a separate data communication channel. The user, upon receiving the 

symbolic data file at the mobile device, reviews 

and edits the content of the symbolic data file and 

further utilizes the file as desired. For example a 

user could use the symbolic data file to fill in 

fields in an email or a browser request field.

’446 patent, col. 2 ll. 46–63. The district court noted that 

the first sentence describing “[t]he present invention” is 

immediately followed by a sentence describing the particular task of “establishing a voice communication channel”

as part of the voice recognition process. Unwired Planet, 

LLC v. Apple Inc, No. 13-cv-04134-VC, 2014 WL 5592990, 

at *11 (N.D. Cal. Nov. 3, 2014) (claim construction order). 

The district court concluded that the sentence referring to 

“establishing a voice communication channel” falls within 

the scope of the “present invention” language, and thus 

held that the sentence limits the scope of the claims. Id.

at *12. It noted that the ’446 patent consistently maintained the distinction between voice input sent to a server 

over a voice channel and a data file sent back to the 

mobile device over a data channel, and found this use of 

two separate channels to be a core feature of the invention. Id.; Unwired Planet, LLC v. Apple Inc, 106 F. Supp. 

3d 1083, 1090 (N.D. Cal. 2015) (summary judgment order). 

Thus, the district court concluded that the voice input 

limitation should be construed as requiring that the voice 

input signal be conveyed over a voice channel. 

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6 UNWIRED PLANET, LLC v. APPLE INC. 

Apple moved for summary judgment of noninfringement based on the construction, arguing that Siri 

transmits a user’s speech to the Siri servers using the 

Transmission Control Protocol / Internet Protocol 

(“TCP/IP”) and that TCP/IP is not a “voice channel.” 

Thus, while Apple may convey a voice input signal, the 

signal is not conveyed over a voice channel and therefore 

Apple does not infringe. Unwired acknowledged that Siri 

sends a user’s speech using TCP/IP, but argued that Siri 

uses a voice channel because the user’s speech is sent to 

the Siri servers for speech recognition in a manner nearly 

indistinguishable from a Voice-over-IP (“VoIP”) call, 

which persons of ordinary skill in the art recognized as 

using a voice channel. In response to these arguments, 

the district court further clarified its construction to 

require “[a] voice channel must be an actual, identifiable 

type of channel, not some ambiguous channel that can be 

labeled a voice channel merely because it transports 

voice.” Unwired Planet, 106 F. Supp. 3d at 1090–91. It 

granted summary judgment of non-infringement after 

concluding that no reasonable jury could find Siri transmits voice input over a “voice channel.” Id. at 1092. It 

explained that a voice channel must transmit voice without delays, yet Siri transmits speech using TCP/IP, which 

neither distinguishes between voice and non-voice data 

nor includes any of the properties needed to ensure realtime transmission. Id. at 1092–93. It pointed out that 

(i) Siri records 200 milliseconds of voice input before 

transmitting it to the Siri servers, (ii) there was no evidence that Siri transmits packets including errors to 

ensure real-time delivery, and (iii) the Siri channel does 

not receive any priority from wireless carriers or any 

dedicated network resources to ensure real-time transmission. Id.

2. Discussion

Unwired has appealed the district court’s construction 

of “voice input.” Claim terms are generally given their 

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UNWIRED PLANET, LLC v. APPLE INC. 7

ordinary and customary meaning as understood by a 

person of ordinary skill in the art when read in the context of the specification and prosecution history. Thorner 

v. Sony Comput. Entm’t Am. LLC, 669 F.3d 1362, 1365 

(Fed. Cir. 2012). We have recognized “only two exceptions 

to this general rule: 1) when a patentee sets out a definition and acts as his own lexicographer, or 2) when the 

patentee disavows the full scope of a claim term either in 

the specification or during prosecution.” Id. at 1365 

(citing Vitronics Corp. v. Conceptronic, Inc., 90 F.3d 1576, 

1580 (Fed. Cir. 1996)).

We conclude that the district court erred in its construction of “voice input.” The claims require a voice 

input, not a voice channel. By its plain language, the 

term “voice input” does not dictate the manner in which 

voice is to be transmitted from a mobile device to a server, 

and Apple does not argue otherwise. It is undisputed that 

a voice input signal could be transmitted over either a 

voice channel or a data channel or, as Apple itself does, 

over TCP/IP. Apple does not argue that the patentee 

acted as his own lexicographer and defined “voice input”

different from its plain and ordinary meaning. Thus, the 

district court’s construction, adopted at Apple’s urging, 

can be justified if there exists a clear and unmistakable 

disclaimer in the specification or the prosecution history. 

Thorner, 669 F.3d at 1367. We see no such disclaimer in 

the specification. 

We do not agree that the second sentence in the 

summary of the invention constitutes a disclaimer that 

limits the scope of every claim. A disclaimer or disavowal 

of claim scope must be clear and unmistakable, requiring 

“words or expressions of manifest exclusion or restriction” 

in the intrinsic record. Teleflex, Inc. v. Ficosa N. Am. 

Corp., 299 F.3d 1313, 1327 (Fed. Cir. 2002). We have held 

statements such as “the present invention includes . . . ,” 

“the present invention is . . . ,” and “all embodiments of 

the present invention are . . .” to be clear and unmistakaCase: 15-1725 Document: 70-2 Page: 7 Filed: 07/22/2016
8 UNWIRED PLANET, LLC v. APPLE INC. 

ble statements constituting disavowal or disclaimer. See 

Luminara Worldwide, LLC v. Liown Elecs. Co., 814 F.3d 

1343, 1353 (Fed. Cir. 2016). The summary of the invention section begins with a sentence stating that “[t]he 

present invention relates to a wireless communication 

system” using a remote speech recognition server. ’446 

patent, col. 2 ll. 46–50. As a preliminary matter, this first 

sentence does not even mention a voice communication 

channel. It is true, as Apple argues, that the specification 

discusses voice channels in many places. But it is certainly not the case that everything in that first paragraph in 

the summary of the invention constitutes a mandatory 

claim limitation to be read into claims. For example, that 

same paragraph describes a user receiving, using, and 

editing the data file. Id., col. 2 ll. 58–61. It is not true 

that because one sentence in the paragraph begins with 

the “present invention” language that everything that 

follows in the same paragraph limits all subsequent 

claims. This should not be interpreted as any sort of hard 

rule regarding claim construction. Every claim construction, and each potential disclaimer, has to be considered 

in the context of each individual patent. We do not read 

this specification as clearly and unmistakably requiring 

that voice signals be transmitted exclusively over voice 

channels. And we will thus not import any such limitation into the claims at issue. In this context, we do not 

think the sentences describing the translation process rise 

to the level of “manifest exclusion or restriction” of the 

claim scope.

Moreover, the patent contains other claims, for example claim 21, that specifically recite “establishing a voice 

communication channel,” a limitation not present in the 

asserted claims. If the patentee intended to restrict the 

claims-at-issue to require a voice input to travel over a 

particular type of channel, it could have included that 

same limitation. Claim 31, from which asserted claim 35 

ultimately depends, recites “receiving a voice input” 

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without specifying any path on which the voice input 

travels—a voice channel or otherwise. And claim 1, from 

which asserted claim 15 ultimately depends, specifies 

“retrieving a voice input signal . . . from a first communication path” without requiring that path to be a voice 

channel. We see no clear disavowal in the specification to 

justify importing a “voice channel” limitation into every 

claim given these differences between the claims. 

To justify the district court’s construction, Apple argues that the only embodiments disclosed in the ’446 

patent use a voice channel. However, we have repeatedly 

held that it is “not enough that the only embodiments, or 

all of the embodiments, contain a particular limitation” to 

limit claims beyond their plain meaning. Thorner, 669 

F.3d at 1366; GE Lighting Sols., LLC v. AgiLight, Inc., 

750 F.3d 1304, 1309 (Fed. Cir. 2014). Apple also attempts 

to justify the district court’s construction by arguing that 

the claims would be invalid as anticipated if the “voice 

input” were construed to have its plain meaning. We 

decline to address whether the asserted claims are anticipated because that issue is not before us and was not fully 

briefed. See generally Radio Sys. Corp. v. Lalor, 709 F.3d 

1124, 1132 (Fed. Cir. 2013) (“[I]nvalidity cannot be an 

alternative ground for affirming a judgment of noninfringement absent a cross-appeal.”). 

3. Conclusion

We construe the claim term “voice input” to have its 

plain meaning, which does not require the use of any 

particular type of channel for its transmission. We vacate 

the district court’s summary judgment of noninfringement as to the ’446 patent because it was based 

on the district court’s erroneous construction of “voice 

input.”

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10 UNWIRED PLANET, LLC v. APPLE INC. 

IV. U.S. PATENT NO. 6,647,260

1. Background

Unwired challenges the district court’s (i) grant of 

summary judgment of non-infringement based on the 

“user information” limitation, and (ii) construction of the 

claim term “provisioning” to mean “enabling or modifying 

communication capabilities.”

The ’260 patent discloses an invention for providing 

new or updated features and services to a mobile phone

through a process referred to as “provisioning.” It explains that “a number of parameters must be provisioned 

into [a mobile device] in order to enable communication 

services and applications and in order to distinguish the 

device from others within the communications network.” 

’260 patent, col. 1 ll. 33–37. The patent provides a solution that allows users to provision a mobile device themselves in a secure manner, without the need to visit a 

physical store. 

Unwired accused Apple of infringing claims 1 and its 

dependent claim 16, which are reproduced below:

1. A method for provisioning a two-way mobile 

communications device having a display and a user interface, the method being performed by the 

two-way mobile communications device and comprising:

receiving user information required to establish a user account; 

displaying a list of selectable identifiers on 

the display, each selectable identifier corresponding to a selectable service or feature for which the two-way mobile 

communications device can be provisioned;

receiving a user’s selection of a selectable 

identifier from the list;

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generating a provisioning request comprising the user information and the user’s selection; 

establishing a communications link with a 

provisioning server;

providing authentication information to 

enable a remote server to authenticate the 

two-way mobile communications device;

sending the provisioning request to the 

provisioning server over the communications link;

receiving a reply to the provisioning request; and

provisioning the two-way mobile communications device with a feature or service 

based on the reply.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving the 

reply comprises receiving a notification relating to 

a state of processing of the provisioning request.

Id., col. 9 ll. 15–39; col. 10 ll. 19–21 (emphases added).

The accused Apple services are Apple’s App Store and 

iTunes Store. The App Store allows an iOS device user to 

purchase and download applications for the device. 

According to Unwired, the iTunes Store allows an iOS 

device user to purchase and download music, movies, and 

TV shows to the device, and both the App Store and the 

iTunes Store process a user’s download requests similarly 

using an iTunes account.

In order to purchase an app from Apple’s App Store or 

a song from Apple’s iTunes Store, a user must first have 

an iTunes account. To establish an iTunes account, a 

user must select a password, which, according to UnCase: 15-1725 Document: 70-2 Page: 11 Filed: 07/22/2016
12 UNWIRED PLANET, LLC v. APPLE INC. 

wired, satisfies the claimed “user information required to 

establish a user account” limitation.

When an iOS device user with an iTunes account 

wants to purchase an app or a song, the user first enters 

his Apple ID and password to the iOS device, which sends 

them to Apple’s servers. Second, Apple’s servers respond 

with an “X-token,” which contains a hashed version of the 

user’s password and a timestamp generated by the servers. Third, the iOS device sends a “buyProduct request,” 

which includes the X-token and the user’s selection of 

content. Because an X-token is valid for 15 minutes, if a 

user wishes to purchase another app or song in the next 

15 minutes, the iOS device simply sends a buyProduct 

request, bypassing the first two steps, namely, the user 

entering his password and Apple’s servers responding 

with an X-token. 

Before the district court, Unwired argued that the 

buyProduct request satisfies the “provisioning request 

comprising the user information and the user’s selection” 

limitation. Specifically, Unwired argued that the hashed 

version of a user’s password in the X-token, which is 

included in the buyProduct request, corresponds to the 

claimed “user information,” and the user’s selection of 

content (e.g., a song, an app) in the buyProduct request 

corresponds to the claimed “user’s selection.” The district 

court disagreed, noting that claim 1 requires “the user 

information” in the provisioning request to be the same 

“user information required to establish a user account,” 

recited earlier in the claim. The district court held that a 

hash of the password in the buyProduct request (as part 

of the X-token) cannot be “the user information” recited in 

the claim, because a hashed password is different from 

the password itself, which corresponds to the claimed 

“user information required to establish a user account,” 

recited earlier.

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2. Discussion

Unwired argues that a hashed password is merely a 

mathematical function applied to the user’s password. It 

argues the district court improperly resolved on summary 

judgment whether merely hashing the user information 

along with a time stamp transforms it into something 

non-infringing. It argues the district court erred in resolving this fact issue because the X-token contains the 

same substantive content, only in a different (i.e., hashed) 

format.

We agree with Unwired that the district court erred 

in granting summary judgment of non-infringement. The 

district court correctly noted that “the user information” 

in claim 1 refers to the same “user information” recited 

earlier in the claim as part of the “receiving user information required to establish a user account” step. However, in granting summary judgment of non-infringement, 

the district court essentially required the claimed “user 

information” to be in a particular format. We do not agree 

with such a reading of the term. While “user information”

refers to some information, knowledge, or data on a user, 

the plain meaning of the term does not require that 

information to be in any specific format or form. For 

example, the English word “apple” and the Russian word 

for “apple” contain the same information to the extent 

that they both refer to the round fruit of a tree of the rose 

family, despite their differences in form. We think a 

reasonable jury could find that a hashed password in the 

X-token contains the same information as in the user’s 

unmodified password, albeit in a different form.

Apple argues the hashed password cannot contain the 

same substantive content as the password because Unwired’s expert admitted that it is impossible to determine 

from the hashed password what the password is. It 

argues the hashed password is not simply the password in 

a different form, citing its expert’s report for support. J.A. 

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14 UNWIRED PLANET, LLC v. APPLE INC. 

10251 (“[A] hash is designed so that the original input 

into the hash function cannot be derived from the hash 

value, and thus can be used for validation only.”).

We are not convinced by Apple’s argument. We do not 

think the non-reversibility of a hash function—i.e., that a 

hashed password cannot be decrypted into the password—

is determinative of the relevant inquiry. Whether the 

hashed password in Apple’s X-token contains the same 

“user information” as in a user’s password is a fact question properly left to the jury. See Acumed LLC v. Stryker 

Corp., 483 F.3d 800, 806 (Fed. Cir. 2007). The claims do 

not dictate a particular form in which “user information” 

exists, and we decline to adopt interchangeability or 

reversibility as the essential characteristic in determining 

whether multiple forms of expression have the same 

underlying information.

3. Conclusion

We vacate the district court’s summary judgment of 

non-infringement as to claims 1 and 16 of the ’260 patent.1

V. U.S. PATENT NO. 6,317,831

1. Background

Unwired challenges the district court’s grant of summary judgment of non-infringement, which was based on 

the claim term “narrowband channel.”

 

1 Because we vacate the district court’s summary 

judgment based on the “user information” limitation, we 

do not consider the district court’s rejection of Unwired’s 

alternative infringement analysis that does not rely on 

the hashed password for the claim limitation “the user 

information.”

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The ’831 patent is related to secure data transmissions over wireless networks. ’831 patent, col. 1 ll. 21–23. 

According to the ’831 patent, to securely transfer data, a 

sender and a receiver must first exchange security information, referred to as “cryptographic handshake operations,” which require the use of a two-way channel. Id., 

col. 3 ll. 28–33. The ’831 patent explains that even 

though wideband channels are usually two-way and 

capable of transferring data more quickly, it is often more 

expensive to use than a narrowband channel, which is 

usually a one-way channel from the server to client. Id., 

col. 3 ll. 6–9, col. 8 ll. 14–19. It discloses improved techniques for facilitating secure data transfer using narrowband channels. Id., col. 3 ll. 25–27. Unwired asserted 

claims 17, 23, and 25, all of which require a wideband 

channel to first exchange security information, and a 

narrowband channel to then transmit encrypted data. 

The parties agreed that a “narrowband channel” means a 

“channel with a meaningfully lower data transfer rate or 

bandwidth than the wideband channel.” For the purposes 

of this appeal, claim 17 is exemplary, which is a method 

claim that depends on claim 14:

14. A method for transmitting data in a secure 

manner from a server to a client, said method 

comprising the acts of:

exchanging security information between 

the client and the server over a two-way 

channel between the client and the server;

encrypting data to be transmitted from 

the server to the client based on the security information; and

transmitting the encrypted data from the 

server to the client over a one-way channel 

between the client and the server that 

carries data from the server to the client,

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wherein the two-way channel is a wideband channel, and the one-way channel is 

a narrowband channel. 

17. A method as recited in claim 14, wherein at 

least a portion of the narrowband channel and the 

wideband channel are wireless.

Id., col. 19 ll. 34–46, col. 19 ll. 52–54 (emphases added).

The accused feature is Apple’s Push Notification Service (“APNS”), which is a service that allows app providers to send push notifications to iOS devices via APNS 

servers. An iOS device may have a number of apps that 

receive notifications (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, ESPN). 

Rather than connecting with multiple app provider servers, the iOS device only needs to connect to APNS servers, 

because the multiple app providers all send messages to 

APNS servers, which then send messages to the iOS 

devices. It is undisputed that the exchange of security 

information and the transmission of push notifications 

occur over TCP/IP.

2. Discussion

Apple moved for summary judgment of noninfringement, arguing that APNS does not meet the 

“narrowband channel” limitation. 2 Unwired’s infringement theory is that the “narrowband channel” extends 

from an app provider (i.e., a push notification sender) to 

an iOS device, whereas the “wideband channel” is the 

channel that carries the communications between the 

APNS and the iOS device. It argues that the channel that 

 

2 Apple also argued it was entitled to summary 

judgment because it uses a single channel rather than 

two different channels as required by the claims. In light 

of our conclusion regarding the narrowband channel, we 

need not reach this argument.

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carries communications between an app provider server 

and an iOS device is a narrowband channel because it is 

at a meaningfully lower data transfer rate. According to 

Unwired, APNS places a 256-byte data limit on the size of 

a push notification from an app provider to an iOS device. 

Unwired argues that this limit results in 124 bytes of 

total overhead for a single 256-byte notification, which 

represents 32.6% of the total size of the transmission. It 

reasons that this overhead is much larger than the minimal percentage of overhead for standard TCP/IP traffic in 

the case of a wideband channel, and thus the channel for 

notifications in APNS is a narrowband channel. Unwired 

argues that APNS’s data-size restriction is similar to the 

data-size restriction on SMS messages discussed in the 

’831 patent, which is a narrowband channel.

Apple argues that we should affirm the district court’s 

grant of summary judgment of non-infringement because 

there is no genuine issue of fact; APNS does not use a 

narrowband channel. The stipulated construction of the 

narrowband channel requires “a meaningfully lower data 

transfer rate or bandwidth than the wideband channel.” 

Apple argues that there is no dispute that APNS uses the 

same TCP/IP connection, with the bits traveling at the 

same speed, for both the exchange of security information 

and the transmission of the push message. We agree with 

Apple that the characteristics of the data being transmitted by APNS cannot transform the wideband channel

based on TCP/IP into a narrowband channel. Under the 

agreed upon construction, Apple has met its burden of 

proving that there is no genuine issue of material fact.

3. Conclusion

We affirm the district court’s summary judgment of 

non-infringement of claims 17, 23, and 25 of the ’831 

patent.

Case: 15-1725 Document: 70-2 Page: 17 Filed: 07/22/2016
18 UNWIRED PLANET, LLC v. APPLE INC. 

VI. U.S. PATENT NO. 6,321,092

1. Background

Unwired challenges the district court’s grant of summary judgment of no indirect infringement. The ’092 

patent discloses an improved technology for identifying 

the location of a wireless station, such as a cell phone or 

pager. In order to more accurately locate a wireless 

station, the invention gathers inputs about the location of 

the wireless station from multiple location finding equipment (“LFE”) such as handset global positioning system 

(“GPS”), time difference of arrival, and the use of 

cell/sector location. It then responds to a location request 

by providing the location information. Unwired alleged 

that the location-finding technology of iOS devices infringes claim 20, which is a method claim comprising, in 

relevant part, “receiving a plurality of device dependent 

location inputs provided by said location finding equipment.” ’092 patent, col. 16 ll. 19–20 (emphasis added).

The district court denied Apple’s motion for summary 

judgment of no direct infringement, which was based on 

Apple’s argument that the iOS devices only use a single 

“location input.” The district court, however, granted 

Apple’s motion for summary judgment of no induced or 

contributory infringement. It reasoned that Apple’s noninfringement argument—i.e., that iOS devices only use 

one “location input”—is strong enough that no reasonable 

juror could conclude that Apple acted with actual 

knowledge that it was inducing or contributing to infringement. The court concluded that no reasonable juror 

could conclude that Apple was willfully blind because of 

“the strength of Apple’s noninfringement argument.” The 

district court erred by basing summary judgment on its 

own estimation of the objective strength of Apple’s noninfringement defense. The proper focus of indirect infringement analysis is on the subjective knowledge of the 

accused infringer, and the district court’s conclusion that 

Case: 15-1725 Document: 70-2 Page: 18 Filed: 07/22/2016
UNWIRED PLANET, LLC v. APPLE INC. 19

Apple’s non-infringement defenses were strong at most 

created a factual question as to Apple’s own subjective 

beliefs.

2. Discussion

On appeal, Apple argues that Unwired presented no 

evidence that Apple knew or was willfully blind to the fact 

that the induced acts were infringing the asserted claims 

of the ’092 patent. Apple is correct that indirect infringement requires knowledge of the underlying direct 

infringement—not merely the knowledge of the existence 

of the patent. Global-Tech Appliances, Inc. v. SEB S.A., 

563 U.S. 754, 765–66 (2011); Commil USA LLC v. Cisco 

Systems, Inc., 575 U.S. ____, 135 S. Ct. 1920, 1926 (2015). 

This knowledge requirement may be satisfied under the 

doctrine of willful blindness. Global-Tech Appliances, 563 

U.S. at 768. The Supreme Court cautioned that the 

accused’s deliberate indifference to a known risk of infringement alone is not sufficient. Rather, the doctrine of 

willful blindness requires the patentee to show not only 

that the accused subjectively believed that there was a 

high risk of infringement, but also that the accused took 

deliberate actions to avoid confirming infringement. 

Global-Tech Appliances, 563 U.S. at 769–70. Apple 

argues that Unwired’s evidence at most creates a question 

of fact regarding Apple’s knowledge of the patent but that 

none of the evidence supports an inference that Apple 

knew or was willfully blind to any infringing acts. If 

correct, this would be a basis for summary judgment. We 

defer to the district court to make this determination in 

the first instance. Because the district court’s grant of 

summary judgment was based exclusively on its view of 

the strength of Apple’s non-infringement argument, we 

vacate. The Supreme Court’s Global-Tech Appliances and 

Commil decisions require a showing of the accused infringer’s subjective knowledge as to the underlying direct 

infringement. The district court’s reliance on the objective strength of Apple’s non-infringement arguments as 

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20 UNWIRED PLANET, LLC v. APPLE INC. 

precluding a finding of induced or contributory infringement was erroneous. In this case, we conclude only that 

summary judgment is inappropriate on the basis the 

district court decided, and we pass no judgment on how 

the factual issues ought to be resolved by a fact finder. 

The district court is not precluded from considering 

Apple’s alternative summary judgment argument regarding knowledge. 

3. Conclusion

We therefore vacate the district court’s summary 

judgment of no indirect infringement as to claim 20 of the 

’092 patent. On remand, the district court may reconsider 

Apple’s motion for summary judgment of no indirect 

infringement consistent with this opinion.

VII. CONCLUSION

We vacate the district court’s summary judgment of 

non-infringement as to the asserted claims of the ’446, 

’260, and ’092 patents. We affirm the district court’s 

summary judgment of no infringement as to the asserted 

claims of the ’831 patent. 

AFFIRMED IN PART, VACATED IN PART, AND 

REMANDED

COSTS

No costs.

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