UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS 

MARSHALL DIVISION 

HEADWATER RESEARCH LLC, 

 Plaintiff, 

v. 

SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS CO., LTD and 

SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS AMERICA, 

INC., 

 Defendant.

Case No. 2:23-CV-00103-JRG-RSP 

SAMSUNG’S OBJECTIONS 

TO CLAIM CONSTRUCTION ORDER (DKT. 118) 

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TABLE OF CONTENTS 

Page 

I. “DEVICE AGENTS” (’733 PATENT) ...............................................................................1

II. “DEVICE MESSAGING AGENTS” (’117 PATENT) .......................................................4

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Pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 72, Defendants Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. and Samsung 

Electronics America, Inc. (together “Samsung”) respectfully objects to the constructions in the 

Claim Construction Order (Dkt. 118) (the “R&R”). 

I. “DEVICE AGENTS” (’733 PATENT) 

The R&R clearly erred in construing “device agent” to mean “a piece of software on the 

end-user device that performs certain functions for other software” for at least five reasons. 

First, while the Court recognized the ambiguity with the term “device agent,” it found it 

was not indefinite in contravention to the intrinsic evidence. As Samsung pointed out in its 

briefing, the ’733 Patent does not provide any guidance to save “device agent” from indefiniteness. 

Claim 1 recites that a plurality of device agents are “communicatively coupled to the service 

control device link agent through an agent communication bus,” that each device agent is 

“identifiable by an associated device agent identifier,” and that a “particular” device agent receives 

message content delivered by a “service control device link agent.” Dkt. No. 94-2, Claim 1. These 

generic operations do not inform the boundaries of a “device agent”: they leave open the question 

of whether a “device agent” adopts the meaning of an “agent” and, if so, how the prefix “device” 

modifies its meaning. The patent specification is similarly not helpful. The specification uses the 

term “device agent” only a few times, describing its generic function or indicating that a device 

agent is software. See, e.g., Dkt. No. 94-2 at 15:58-60 (“[T]he service processor 115 includes 

various components, such as device agents, that perform service policy implementation or 

management functions.”); id. at 11:65-66 (“the device agent software”), 160:7-8, 162:34-35, 

162:47-48. In fact, the specification introduces ambiguity to the “device agent” term by 

inconsistently describing some agents in the device as “device agents,” but not others. See Dkt. 96 

at 9-10. The Court’s construction does not resolve this ambiguity. At best, a POSITA would glean 

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from these disclosures that a device agent performs functions related to service and management, 

but these abstract disclosures do not meaningfully delineate the bounds of a device agent. 

Second, the Court’s decision to not exclude applications in the construction for “device 

agent” contravenes the specification. As explained in Samsung’s briefing, the very little guidance 

provided by the ’733 patent regarding what the “device agent” is shows device agents are not 

applications. For example, Figure 16 of the ’733 patent expressly shows that apps are different 

from “agents” that are inside a device. Dkt. 96 at 9-11; see also Dkt. No. 94-2 at 52:5-9 (“As 

shown in FIG. 16, the application interface agent 1693 is in communication with various 

applications, including a TCP application 1604, an IP application 1605, and a voice application 

1602.”). Although the Court raised the possibility that “there might be at least some overlap” 

between “device agents” and “apps,” nowhere does the specification suggest such overlap. Dkt. 

96 at 13. 

Third, to the extent the Court found the term “device agent” not indefinite because the term 

“agent” has a plain and ordinary meaning (see Dkt. 118 at 10), this is clear error. Claim terms can 

be indefinite despite individual words having accepted industry meaning. See, e.g., Joao Control 

& Monitoring Sys., LLC v. Protect Am., Inc., No. 1-14-CV-134-LY, 2015 WL 4937464, at *7–8 

(W.D. Tex. Aug. 18, 2015) (holding “intelligent agent,” “software agent,” and “mobile agent” 

indefinite); Mantissa Corp. v. First Fin. Corp., No. 2022-1963, 2024 WL 607717, at *4 (Fed. Cir. 

Feb. 14, 2024) (holding “transaction partner” indefinite); Infinity Computer Prod., Inc. v. Oki Data 

Americas, Inc., 987 F.3d 1053, 1062 (Fed. Cir. 2021) (holding “passive link” indefinite); IQASR 

LLC v. Wendt Corp., 825 F. App’x 900, 904 (Fed. Cir. 2020) (holding “magnetic fuzz” indefinite); 

Cap. Sec. Sys., Inc. v. NCR Corp., 725 F. App’x 952, 959 (Fed. Cir. 2018) (holding “transactional 

operator” indefinite). Here, the individual words do not require an interpretation that a device 

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agent is an agent that is “on the end-user device.” For example, device agent might also mean an 

agent for a device (which would also be too generic to satisfy Section 112) that could include an 

agent not on the device but performs certain functions on behalf of said device. 

Fourth, the Court did not address Samsung’s argument that a construction that “device 

agent” simply means an agent in a device renders “device” meaningless because the claim structure 

already makes plain that a “device agent” is something comprised in a device. Dkt. No. 94 at 5; 

see Dkt. No. 94-2, Claim 1 (an “end-user device” comprising “a plurality of device agents”). The 

prefix “device” would be rendered extraneous if all that the “device agent” term meant was an 

agent in a device. Becton, Dickinson & Co. v. Tyco Healthcare Grp., LP, 616 F.3d 1249, 1257 

(Fed. Cir. 2010) (“Claims must be interpreted with an eye toward giving effect to all terms in the 

claim.”). This alone is a basis to find “device agents” indefinite, and accordingly it was error for 

the Court to not consider this argument. 

Fifth, Headwater admitted, and the Court recognized, that “downloadable apps are not

‘device agents’ themselves, but suggested they might include ‘device agents.’” Dkt. 118 at 13 

(emphasis added). This highlights the indefiniteness of “device agent” because Headwater 

provides no reasoning for why a downloadable app could not be a device agent, but might include 

a device agent. By arbitrarily drawing the line around apps, Headwater merely obscures the 

boundary of what device agent means. Because all downloadable apps interact with a mobile 

device’s operating system, the Court’s construction that a “device agent” is “a piece of software 

on the end-user device that performs certain functions for other software” does not provide 

guidance to a person of ordinary skill in the art to determine when an app contains or does not 

contain a device agent. 

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For at least the foregoing reasons, Samsung respectfully request that the Court (a) modify 

the construction of “device agent” to be indefinite or, in the alternative (b) modify the construction 

of “device agent” to exclude applications. 

II. “DEVICE MESSAGING AGENTS” (’117 PATENT) 

The R&R erred in construing “device messaging agent” to mean “a piece of software on a 

mobile end-user device that performs certain messaging functions for other software.” 

First, similar to the arguments above regarding the ’733 patent’s “device agent,” the ’117 

patent’s claims merely ascribe some functions to a “device messaging agent” and leave open the 

question whether the term adopts the meaning of an “agent” and, if so, how its prefixes modify the 

meaning of that term—especially since the claim already requires the term to be “executable on . 

. . mobile end-user devices” and to receive “Internet data messages.” Dkt. No. 94-3, Claim 1. The 

specification sheds no light because it does not use that term at all. 

Second, the Court erred by discounting Samsung’s arguments that the prosecution history 

of the related ’353 Application ascribed a meaning to “device messaging agents” inconsistent with 

how the ’117 patent uses the term “agents.” Dkt. 118 at 15. The Court found that Samsung had 

presumed the term was coined and failed to consider how a POSITA would understand the term 

outside the context of the patent. Id. But even if there is no dispute about the meaning of “agent,” 

by itself, no evidence of record indicates that the larger term “device messaging agent” was known 

or that a POSITA would assume that “messaging” is the function performed by the agent. “[T]he 

person of ordinary skill in the art is deemed to read the claim term not only in the context of the 

particular claim in which the disputed term appears, but in the context of the entire patent, 

including the specification.” Phillips v. AWH Corp., 415 F.3d 1303, 1313 (Fed. Cir. 2005). Given 

that the specification specifies that agents are involved in “service policy” or “management” 

functions (Dkt. 94-3 at 11:35-40, 15:58-60) and the related prosecution history eliminated those 

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defining features, a POSITA would not be reasonably certain of the scope of “device messaging 

agents.” 

For at least the foregoing reasons, Samsung respectfully request that the Court modify the 

construction of “device agent” to be indefinite. 

Dated: September 5, 2024 Respectfully submitted, 

By: /s/ Jonathan B. Bright 

 Ruffin B. Cordell 

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ATTORNEYS FOR DEFENDANTS

SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS CO., LTD. AND

SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS AMERICA, INC.

 

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CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE 

I hereby certify that counsel of record who are deemed to have consented to electronic 

service are being served on September 5, 2024, with a copy of this document via the Court’s 

CM/ECF. 

/s/Jonathan B. Bright 

Jonathan B. Bright 

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