Opinion ID: 4540299
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Responding Limitation

Text: The Board determined “that the combination of Maes and Ransom teaches responding to the REST API request according to the specified API resource URI.” J.A. 60. It found that Maes teaches that a “telephony gateway, TEL 20, responds to an API request that specifies an API resource, such as ‘MakeCall,’ ‘TransferCall,’ or ‘Record,’ by modifying the state of a telephony session according to the request and the specified resource, such as by initiating, transferring, or recording a call.” J.A. 59. The Board rejected Twilio’s argument that those portions of Maes do not teach responding to an API request according to a specified 3 As discussed above, the Board further relied on Jiang to supports its holding that dependent claims 5 and 17 were obvious. Because Twilio only challenges the Board’s decisions as they relate to Maes and Ransom, we need not separately consider Jiang. Case: 19-1842 Document: 59 Page: 5 Filed: 06/10/2020 TWILIO INC. v. TELESIGN CORPORATION 5 URI, finding that Maes teaches that the response may be to a single specified source. And the Board found that “Ransom teaches that an API request can be a REST API request that specifies an API resource URI.” J.A. 60. The Board’s findings are based on substantial evidence. Maes teaches a system with an “audio I/O subsystem (or ‘TEL’)” which “comprises a gateway (e.g., telephony platform) that connects voice audio streams from a network to the various speech engines.” J.A. 5214–15 at 8:51–52, 9:5–7. It further teaches that the TEL component is “capable of receiving the HTTP/SOAP requests” and is capable of responding to those requests. J.A. 5227 at 34:7–35:8. Moreover, Maes teaches, for example, “[i]f play and/or record are part of the request, number of bytes played/recorded, number of overruns/underruns, completion reason, . . . play/record start/stop time . . . are included in the response.” J.A. 5228 at 35:25–28. Thus, Maes teaches responding to API requests according to the request and the specified source. Ransom teaches that REST and SOAP “are two common web service models wherein HTTP is the underlying application protocol” and in the REST model, “the service being invoked is the URI being accessed through the web.” J.A. 5282 at [0163]. Therefore, as the Board found, a person of ordinary skill in the art would understand that the HTTP/SOAP requests taught in Maes could instead be a REST API request with a specific URI, as taught in Ransom, resulting in the responding limitation. Twilio argues the Board improperly modified the grounds raised in Telesign’s petition by combining Ransom with Maes to teach the responding limitation when Telesign’s petition never referenced Ransom’s teachings with respect to that claim limitation. While it is true that it would “not be proper for the Board to deviate from the grounds in the petition and raise its own obviousness theory,” such is not the case here. Sirona Dental Sys. GmbH v. Institut Straumann AG, 892 F.3d 1349, 1356 (Fed. Cir. Case: 19-1842 Document: 59 Page: 6 Filed: 06/10/2020 6 TWILIO INC. v. TELESIGN CORPORATION 2018). Telesign argued in its petition that the combination of Maes and Ransom teaches the claim limitations, including both the requesting and responding limitations. Telesign specifically argued that Maes teaches a REST API request that specifies a resource URI, and teaches a response to that same request. J.A. 6361–64. It further argued that to the extent Maes does not teach a REST API request that specifies a URI, Ransom teaches that such a request was well known in the art. J.A. 6361–62. Accordingly, the Board found that Maes teaches responding to an API request and that Ransom teaches the API request can be a REST API request that specifies an API resource URI. J.A. 60. Telesign’s petition relies on Ransom to demonstrate that an API request can be a REST API request that specifies an API resource URI, which applies for both the requesting and responding limitations, and supports the Board’s findings related to the “responding” limitation. We hold therefore that the Board did not modify the grounds asserted in the petition, and substantial evidence supports the Board’s findings.