NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

United States Court of Appeals 

for the Federal Circuit ______________________

TENSTREET, LLC,

Plaintiff-Appellant

v.

DRIVERREACH, LLC,

Defendant-Appellee

______________________

2020-1101

______________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the 

Southern District of Indiana in No. 1:18-cv-03633-JRSTAB, Judge James R. Sweeney II.

______________________

Decided: October 19, 2020

______________________

PAUL A. STEWART, Knobbe, Martens, Olson & Bear, 

LLP, Irvine, CA, for plaintiff-appellant. Also represented 

by MICHAEL K. FRIEDLAND, LAUREN KATZENELLENBOGEN. 

 ANDREW M. MCCOY, Faegre Drinker Biddle & Reath

LLP, Indianapolis, IN, for defendant-appellee. Also represented by LOUIS PERRY; JD SCHNEIDER, Denver, CO. 

 ______________________

Before LOURIE, HUGHES, and STOLL, Circuit Judges.

Case: 20-1101 Document: 49 Page: 1 Filed: 10/19/2020
2 TENSTREET, LLC v. DRIVERREACH, LLC

HUGHES, Circuit Judge.

Tenstreet appeals the Southern District of Indiana’s 

determination that its patented method of using peer-topeer networking to verify employment history is directed 

to patent-ineligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101. 

Because the district court correctly determined that the

claims of the patent-in-suit are directed to an abstract idea

and lack an inventive concept, we affirm. 

I

For motions to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, we apply the law of the regional circuit. Bascom Glob. Internet Servs., Inc. v. AT&T 

Mobility LLC, 827 F.3d 1341, 1347 (Fed. Cir. 2016). The 

Seventh Circuit reviews a grant of a motion to dismiss de 

novo. Bible v. United Student Aid Funds, Inc., 799 F.3d 

633, 639 (7th Cir. 2015). We review patent eligibility under 

35 U.S.C. § 101 de novo. OIP Techs., Inc. v. Amazon.com, 

Inc., 788 F.3d 1359, 1362 (Fed. Cir. 2015).

The Supreme Court has established a two-part test for

determining patent eligibility under 35 U.S.C. § 101. Alice

Corp. Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank Int’l, 573 U.S. 208, 217–18 

(2014). “We must first determine whether the claims at 

issue are directed to a patent-ineligible concept.” Id. If 

they are, we “consider the elements of each claim both individually and ‘as an ordered combination’ to determine 

whether the additional elements ‘transform the nature of 

the claim’ into a patent-eligible application.” Id. (quoting 

Mayo Collaborative Servs. v. Prometheus Labs., Inc., 566 

U.S. 66, 78–79 (2012)).

II

Tenstreet owns U.S. Patent No. 8,145,575 (the ’575 patent), which recites a method for using a peer-to-peer network to verify the employment history of job applicants, 

particularly for use in the truck driving industry, where 

such verification is required by regulation. Tenstreet 

Case: 20-1101 Document: 49 Page: 2 Filed: 10/19/2020
TENSTREET, LLC v. DRIVERREACH, LLC 3

argues that the ’575 patent claims are patent eligible because they provide three advantages over conventional processes for employment verification: (1) a single channel for 

routing transmissions; (2) the ability for job applicants to 

monitor the verification process; and (3) database storage 

of employment history. 

The test for patent-eligible subject matter is not 

whether the claims are advantageous over the previous 

method. Even if the ’575 patent provides advantages over 

manual collection of data, the patent claims no technological improvement beyond the use of a generic computer network. Accordingly, the district court correctly determined 

that the ’575 patent claims are directed to the abstract idea 

of collecting, organizing, and storing data on a conventional 

computer network, and that the ’575 patent claims recite 

no elements that transform them to patent-eligible applications. Tenstreet, LLC v. DriverReach, LLC, 417 F. Supp. 

3d 1144, 1148 (S.D. Ind. 2019).

We have considered the appellant’s remaining arguments and find them unpersuasive. We conclude that the 

district court correctly determined that the ’575 patent 

claims are directed to patent-ineligible subject matter.

Thus, we affirm the district court’s decision.

AFFIRMED

Case: 20-1101 Document: 49 Page: 3 Filed: 10/19/2020