Opinion ID: 820394
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The ’045 Patent: Indefiniteness

Text: We begin with FM’s argument that the district court erred in granting summary judgment that the ’045 patent was invalid for indefiniteness because it did not disclose a structure for the means plus function term “means for transmitting.” FM agrees that the recited function here is “transmitting said presentations to a selected media venue of the media venues,” Markman Order, slip op. at 9, and that the “means for transmitting” is the PGP, a piece of software. FM disagrees with the district court’s conclusion that, as in Blackboard, Inc. v. Desire2Learn, Inc., 574 F.3d 1371 (Fed. Cir. 2009), the specification of the ’045 patent “does not describe the means or steps taken to accomplish the end result,” and that “the PGP is merely a FUNCTION MEDIA v. GOOGLE 9 black box that accomplishes the claimed function.” J.A. 10. It is axiomatic that claims must “particularly point[] out and distinctly claim[] the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.” 35 U.S.C. § 112, ¶ 2 (2006). 5 Section 112, paragraph 6 allows for a limited exception, permitting “a claim [to] state the function of the element or step, and the ‘means’ covers the ‘structure, material, or acts’ set forth in the specification and equivalents thereof.” Typhoon, 659 F.3d at 1383. The trade-off for allowing such claiming is that “the specification must contain sufficient descriptive text by which a person of skill in the field of the invention would ‘know and understand what structure corresponds to the means limitation.’” Id. at 1383-84 (quoting Finisar Corp. v. DirecTV Grp., Inc., 523 F.3d 1323, 1340 (Fed. Cir. 2008)). It is well settled that “[s]imply disclosing software, however, ‘without providing some detail about the means to accomplish the function[,] is not enough.’” Noah Sys., Inc. v. Intuit, Inc., 675 F.3d 1302, 1312 (Fed. Cir. 2012) (quoting Finisar, 523 F.3d at 1340-41). When dealing with a “special purpose computer-implemented meansplus-function limitation,” we require the specification to disclose the algorithm for performing the function. The “specification can express the algorithm in any understandable terms including as a mathematical formula, in prose, or as a flow chart, or in any other manner that provides sufficient structure.” Id. Importantly, we have said that “[w]hile it is true that the patentee need not 5 Since this suit was filed in 2007, Congress has passed the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (“AIA”), Pub. L. No. 112-29, 125 Stat. 284 (2011). The AIA reformatted the paragraphs of § 112 as subsections and made other changes not relevant to this appeal. The citations to § 112 in this opinion refer to the statute as it existed prior to the AIA. 10 FUNCTION MEDIA v. GOOGLE disclose details of structures well known in the art, . . . the specification must nonetheless disclose some structure.” Default Proof Credit Card Sys., Inc. v. Home Depot U.S.A., Inc., 412 F.3d 1291, 1302 (Fed. Cir. 2005) (emphasis added) (explaining that even “the testimony of one of ordinary skill in the art cannot supplant the total absence of structure from the specification.”); see also Noah Sys., 675 F.3d at 1313 (distinguishing between software means plus function claims in which no algorithm is disclosed, which are indefinite, and claims in which an algorithm is disclosed, whose sufficiency is judged based on what a person of ordinary skill in the art would have understood them to disclose); Blackboard, 574 F.3d at 1384 (finding a means plus function claim to be indefinite because the specification language simply described the function to be performed without explaining how the function was to be performed). Here, there is no specific algorithm disclosed in prose, as a mathematical formula, in flow charts, or otherwise. FM cites to several places in the specification that it contends describe the software. These citations all explain that the software automatically transmits, but they contain no explanation of how the PGP software performs the transmission function. For example, the specification states only that the PGP “either transmits the presentation to the appropriate destination or holds it for a publication date to be submitted for a particular deadline or predetermined promotional market.” ’045 Patent col. 3 ll. 31-32; see also id. col. 51 ll. 16-23 (same); id. col. 17 ll. 7- 17 (noting vaguely that the PGP is involved in processing and transmitting data); id. col. 20 ll. 23-28 (“[T]he Communication and Transport Program 1760 monitors, directs, and controls the receiving and transmitting of messages . . . .”); id. col. 57 ll. 36-39 (“presentations . . . are automatically transmitted”). At most, the ’045 Patent specification discloses that the structure behind the function of transmitting is a computer proFUNCTION MEDIA v. GOOGLE 11 gram that transmits. Beyond the program’s function, however, no algorithm is disclosed. As in Blackboard, the PGP is “simply an abstraction that describes the function” to be performed. 574 F.3d at 1383. FM’s citation to the flow charts as sufficient structure is similarly unavailing because the charts also do not describe how the transmitting function is performed. Both charts cited by FM indicate transmission with a line, or lines, connecting the Central Processor to the Media Interface. See ’045 Patent figs. 1a, 4f. These lines do not explain how the software performs the transmission function. And although FM acknowledges that the structure is software, not hardware, FM also recites as structure the types of connections over which the transmission could occur, such as phone lines and data networks. Appellant’s Br. 27 (citing ’045 Patent col. 13 l. 55 to col. 14 l. 2). But the issue is not whether the ’045 patent discloses a physical structure over which the PGP transmits, it is whether the patent discloses the algorithm by which the PGP performs the transmission function. The flow charts make no such disclosure. Having failed to provide any disclosure of the structure for the “transmitting” function, FM cannot rely on the knowledge of one skilled in the art to fill in the gaps. FM argues that “‘in view of the existing knowledge in the field of the invention,’ it is unnecessary and extraneous to provide any more detail,” and that the disclosure “has more than ‘sufficient structure for a person of skill in the field to provide an operative software program for the specified function.’” Appellant’s Br. 28 (quoting Typhoon, 659 F.3d at 1385). In Typhoon, however, the “means for cross-referencing” was explained in prose as “entail[ing] the matching of entered responses with a library of possible responses, and, if a match is encountered, displaying the fact of the match, otherwise alerting the user, or displaying information stored in memory fields associated with that library entry.” 659 F.3d at 1386 (quoting U.S. 12 FUNCTION MEDIA v. GOOGLE Patent No. 5,379,057 col. 3 ll. 43-48). Here, in contrast, there is no explanation of how to transmit. Furthermore, it is well established that proving that a person of ordinary skill could devise some method to perform the function is not the proper inquiry as to definiteness—that inquiry goes to enablement. See Blackboard, 574 F.3d at 1385. Simply put, [a] patentee cannot avoid providing specificity as to structure simply because someone of ordinary skill in the art would be able to devise a means to perform the claimed function. To allow that form of claiming under section 112, paragraph 6, would allow the patentee to claim all possible means of achieving a function. Id. “Section 112, paragraph 6, is intended to prevent such pure functional claiming.” Id. (citing Aristocrat Techs. Australia Pty Ltd. v. Int’l Game Tech., 521 F.3d 1328, 1333 (Fed. Cir. 2008)). We therefore affirm the district court’s judgment that that claim 1 of the ’045 Patent is invalid for indefiniteness.