NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

United States Court of Appeals 

for the Federal Circuit ______________________

ILIFE TECHNOLOGIES, INC.,

Plaintiff-Appellant

v.

NINTENDO OF AMERICA, INC.,

Defendant-Appellee

______________________

2020-1477

______________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the 

Northern District of Texas in No. 3:13-cv-04987-M, Chief 

Judge Barbara M.G. Lynn.

______________________

Decided: January 13, 2021

______________________

MICHAEL CRAIG WILSON, Munck Wilson Mandala, LLP, 

Dallas, TX, for plaintiff-appellant. Also represented by 

CHASE COBERN, SAMUEL WALLACE DUNWOODY, IV, SHAIN 

KHOSHBIN, WILLIAM A. MUNCK, JORDAN C. STRAUSS. 

 STEPHEN R. SMITH, Cooley LLP, Washington, DC, for 

defendant-appellee. Also represented by SAMUEL WHITT; 

MATTHEW J. BRIGHAM, DENA CHEN, Palo Alto, CA. 

 ______________________

Case: 20-1477 Document: 51 Page: 1 Filed: 01/13/2021
2 ILIFE TECHNOLOGIES, INC. v. NINTENDO OF AMERICA, INC.

Before MOORE, REYNA, and CHEN, Circuit Judges.

MOORE, Circuit Judge.

iLife Technologies, Inc., appeals a Northern District of 

Texas order holding that claim 1 of U.S. Patent No. 

6,864,796 is directed to patent ineligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101. We affirm.

BACKGROUND

iLife owns the ’796 patent, which is directed to a motion 

detection system that evaluates relative movement of a 

body based on both dynamic acceleration (e.g., vibration, 

body movement) and static acceleration (i.e., the position of 

a body relative to earth). See ’796 patent at Abstract; 1:62–

67; 3:26–32. Claim 1 recites:

1. A system within a communications device capable of evaluating movement of a body relative to an 

environment, said system comprising:

a sensor, associable with said body, that senses dynamic and static accelerative phenomena of said 

body, and

a processor, associated with said sensor, that processes said sensed dynamic and static accelerative 

phenomena as a function of at least one accelerative event characteristic to thereby determine 

whether said evaluated body movement is within 

environmental tolerance

wherein said processor generates tolerance indicia 

in response to said determination; and

wherein said communication device transmits said 

tolerance indicia.

iLife sued Nintendo asserting that Nintendo infringed

claim 1. Nintendo moved for summary judgment asserting

that claim 1 was directed to patent ineligible subject matter. After the court declined to decide that issue, the 

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ILIFE TECHNOLOGIES, INC. v. NINTENDO OF AMERICA, INC. 3

parties continued to trial, agreeing not to present eligibility 

questions to the jury. Following a jury verdict in iLife’s 

favor, Nintendo moved for judgment as a matter of law

(“JMOL”), renewing its assertions that claim 1 was directed to ineligible subject matter. The court granted Nintendo’s motion, holding that claim 1 was directed to the 

abstract idea of “gathering, processing, and transmitting 

information” and failed to recite an inventive concept. J.A. 

25. iLife appeals. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. 

§ 1295(a)(1).

DISCUSSION

We review a grant of a motion for JMOL under regional 

circuit law. Lucent Techs., Inc. v. Gateway, Inc., 580 F.3d 

1301, 1309 (Fed. Cir. 2009). The Fifth Circuit reviews an 

order granting JMOL de novo. Hurst v. Lee Cty., Miss., 764 

F.3d 480, 483 (5th Cir. 2014). We also review a district 

court’s determination of patent eligibility under 35 U.S.C. 

§ 101 de novo. DDR Holdings, LLC v. Hotels.com, L.P., 773 

F.3d 1245, 1255 (Fed. Cir. 2014). 

We apply a two-step framework for “distinguishing patents that claim laws of nature, natural phenomena, and 

abstract ideas from those that claim patent-eligible applications of those concepts.” Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. v. CLS 

Bank Int’l, 573 U.S. 208, 217 (2014). “First, we determine 

whether the claims at issue are directed to” a patent-ineligible concept, such as an abstract idea. Id. If they are, we 

examine “the elements of [each] claim to determine 

whether it contains an ‘inventive concept’ sufficient to 

‘transform’ the claimed abstract idea into a patent-eligible 

application.” Id. at 221 (quoting Mayo Collaborative Servs. 

v. Prometheus Labs., Inc., 566 U.S. 66, 72, 79–80 (2012)).

If the elements involve “well-understood, routine, [and] 

conventional activity previously engaged in by researchers 

in the field,” Mayo, 566 U.S. at 73, they do not constitute 

an “inventive concept.”

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4 ILIFE TECHNOLOGIES, INC. v. NINTENDO OF AMERICA, INC.

I. Alice Step One

At step one, the district court held that claim 1 is directed to the abstract idea of “gathering, processing, and 

transmitting information.” J.A. 25. We agree. Claim 1 

recites a motion sensor system that evaluates and communicates the relative movement of a body using static and 

dynamic acceleration information collected from sensors. 

Failing to provide any concrete detail for performing the 

associated functions, however, claim 1 merely amounts to 

a system capable of sensing information, processing the collected information, and transmitting processed information.

We have routinely held that claims directed to gathering and processing data are directed to an abstract idea. 

See Elec. Power Grp., LLC v. Alstom S.A., 830 F.3d 1350, 

1354 (Fed. Cir. 2016); SAP Am., Inc. v. InvestPic, LLC, 898 

F.3d 1161, 1167 (Fed. Cir. 2018) (holding claims directed to 

the abstract idea of “selecting certain information, analyzing it using mathematical techniques, and reporting or displaying the results of the analysis”); Content Extraction & 

Transmission LLC v. Wells Fargo Bank, Nat. Ass’n, 776 

F.3d 1343, 1347 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (holding claims directed to 

the “abstract idea of 1) collecting data, 2) recognizing certain data within the collected data set, and 3) storing that 

recognized data in a memory”).

iLife argues claim 1 is not directed to an abstract idea 

because it recites a physical system that incorporates sensors and improved techniques for using raw sensor data 

like the claims we held eligible in Thales Visionix Inc. v. 

United States, 850 F.3d 1343 (Fed. Cir. 2017) and CardioNet, LLC v. InfoBionic, Inc., 955 F.3d 1358 (Fed. Cir. 2020). 

But in Thales, the claims recited a particular configuration 

of inertial sensors and a specific choice of reference frame 

in order to more accurately calculate position and orientation of an object on a moving platform. 850 F.3d at 1349. 

We held the claims were not directed to an abstract idea 

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ILIFE TECHNOLOGIES, INC. v. NINTENDO OF AMERICA, INC. 5

because they sought to protect “only the application of 

physics to the unconventional configuration of sensors as 

disclosed.” Id. Likewise, the claims in CardioNet were not 

abstract because they focused on a specific means or 

method that improved cardiac monitoring technology, improving the detection of, and allowing more reliable and 

immediate treatment of, atrial fibrillation and atrial flutter. 955 F.3d at 1368. In contrast, claim 1 of the ’796 patent is not focused on a specific means or method to 

improve motion sensor systems, nor is it directed to a specific physical configuration of sensors. It merely recites a 

motion sensor system that evaluates movement of a body 

using static and dynamic acceleration information. 

While we agree with the district court that these claims 

are directed to the abstract idea of gathering, processing 

and transmitting data, the district court erred to the extent 

that it incorporated conventionality of claim elements at 

step 1. See, e.g., J.A. 26 (“Nothing in claim 1, understood 

in light of the specification, requires anything other than 

conventional sensors and processors performing ‘conventional activit[ies] previously known to the industry.’” (quoting Alice, 573 U.S. at 225 (quoting Mayo, 566 U.S. at 73))). 

The conventionality of the claim elements is only considered at step two if the claims are deemed at step 1 to be 

directed to a patent ineligible concept, such as an abstract 

idea. Alice, 573 U.S. at 217, 225. A claim is not directed to 

an abstract idea simply because it uses conventional technology. This claim is, however, directed to an abstract idea 

because it contains nothing more than the idea of gathering 

processing and transmitting data.

II. Alice Step Two

At step two, 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.” Alice, 

573 U.S. at 217 (quoting Mayo, 566 U.S. at 78–79). We 

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6 ILIFE TECHNOLOGIES, INC. v. NINTENDO OF AMERICA, INC.

have explained that this step is satisfied when the claim 

elements “involve more than performance of ‘well-understood, routine, [and] conventional activities previously 

known to the industry.’” Content Extraction, 776 F.3d at 

1347–48 (quoting Alice, 573 U.S. at 225); see also Aatrix 

Software, Inc. v. Green Shades Software, Inc., 882 F.3d 

1121, 1128 (Fed. Cir. 2018) (collecting cases).

As the district court held, the elements of claim 1, considered individually and as an ordered combination, fail to 

recite an inventive concept. J.A. 28. Aside from the abstract idea, the claim recites only generic computer components, including a sensor, a processor, and a 

communication device. The specification’s description of 

these elements confirms they are generic. See, e.g., ’796 

patent at 2:46–50 (communication device includes “cellular 

phones, . . . laptops, computers, . . . and other similar types 

of communications equipment”); 2:64–67 (sensor broadly 

means “a device that senses one or more absolute values, 

changes in value . . . of at least the sensed accelerative phenomena”); 4:34–38 (processor means “any device, system, 

or part thereof that controls at least one operation”). iLife 

argues that configuring an acceleration-based sensor and 

processor to detect and distinguish body movement as a 

function of both dynamic and static acceleration is an inventive concept. Appellant’s Br. at 53–54. But the specification clarifies sensors (e.g., accelerometers) “that measure 

both static and dynamic acceleration [were] known.” ’796 

patent at 2:1–2. And unlike the claims in Thales, claim 1 

does not recite any unconventional means or method for 

configuring or processing that information to distinguish 

body movement based on dynamic and static acceleration. 

Therefore, we conclude that claim 1’s mere call for sensing 

and processing static and dynamic acceleration information using generic components does not transform the 

nature of claim 1 into patent eligible subject matter. See 

Elec. Power, 830 F.3d at 1355; see also BSG Tech LLC v. 

Buyseasons, Inc., 899 F.3d 1281, 1290–91 (Fed. Cir. 2018)

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(“If a claim’s only ‘inventive concept’ is the application of 

an abstract idea using conventional and well-understood 

techniques, the claim has not been transformed into a patent-eligible application of an abstract idea.”). Accordingly, 

we hold claim 1 is directed to patent-ineligible subject matter.

CONCLUSION

We have considered iLife’s remaining arguments and 

find them unpersuasive. For the foregoing reasons, we conclude that claim 1 of the ’796 patent is ineligible under 

§ 101, and, therefore, we affirm. 

AFFIRMED

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