Case 2:20-cv-07872-GW-PVC Document 140 Filed 10/01/21 Page 1 of 9 Page ID #:2239
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`
`Dustin J. Edwards (pro hac vice)
`dedwards@winston.com
`WINSTON & STRAWN LLP
`800 Capital St., Suite 2400
`Houston, TX 77002-2925
`Telephone: (713) 651-2600
`Facsimile:
`(713) 651-2700
`
`Michael A. Tomasulo (SBN: 179389)
`mtomasulo@winston.com
`Diana Hughes Leiden (SBN: 267606)
`dhleiden@winston.com
`WINSTON & STRAWN LLP
`333 S. Grand Avenue, 38th Floor
`Los Angeles, CA 90071-1543
`Telephone: (213) 615-1700
`Facsimile:
`(213) 615-1750
`
`
`
`
`George C. Lombardi (pro hac vice)
`glombardi@winston.com
`WINSTON & STRAWN LLP
`35 West Wacker Drive
`Chicago, IL 60601-9703
`Telephone: (312) 558-5600
`Facsimile:
`(312) 558-5700
`
`E. Danielle T. Williams (pro hac vice)
`dwilliams@winston.com
`WINSTON & STRAWN LLP
`300 South Tryon Street, 16th Floor
`Charlotte, NC 28202
`Telephone: (704) 350-7700
`Facsimile:
`(704) 350-7800
`
`Michael S. Elkin (pro hac vice)
`melkin@winston.com
`WINSTON & STRAWN LLP
`200 Park Avenue
`New York, NY 10166
`Telephone: (212) 294-6700
`Facsimile: (212) 294-4700
`
`Attorneys for Defendants
`BANK OF AMERICA CORPORATION
`and BANK OF AMERICA, N.A.
`
`UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
`FOR THE CENTRAL DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA
`Case No. 2:20-cv-07872-GW-PVC
`NANTWORKS, LLC, a Delaware
`limited liability company, and
`
`DEFENDANTS BANK OF AMERICA
`NANT HOLDINGS IP, LLC, a
`CORPORATION AND BANK OF
`Delaware limited liability company,
`AMERICA, N.A.’S SUPPLEMENTAL
`
`CLAIM CONSTRUCTION BRIEF
`Plaintiffs,
`
`vs.
`
`BANK OF AMERICA
`CORPORATION, a Delaware
`corporation, and BANK OF
`AMERICA, N.A., a national banking
`association,
`
`
`
`
`Defendants.
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`Pursuant to the Court’s Order (Dkt. No. 134), Defendants Bank of America
`Corporation and Bank of America, N.A. (collectively “Bank of America”) submit this
`supplemental claim construction brief to address the relationship between the Asserted
`Patents and U.S. Patent No. 7,016,532 (“the ’532 priority patent”), and the relevance of the
`’532 priority patent to the construction of the “recognizing” claim terms in the Asserted
`Patents, as requested by the Court during the Markman hearing:
`MR. LOMBARDI: … All of these patents have -- stem from the
`’532 patent. Every patent in this case incorporates by reference the
`’532 patent. The ’532 patent has the references to … the heart of
`the present invention that we have been talking about.
`And I can go through every single one of the patents, Your Honor,
`if it would be helpful to Your Honor, and point out what the claims
`are and the fact that the present invention is the database as referred
`to in those patents, but it’s there for every single patent here.
`These patents are all from the same family and they all have the
`same language about the present invention involving the database.
`Would you like me to go through other claims or is that point
`sufficient?
`THE COURT: I will allow you to file a supplemental on that. There
`is no sense in going through them all one at a time at this point in
`time. I allow to you file a supplement on that, I will give the
`plaintiff’s counsel an opportunity to respond.
`Markman Tr. (Sept. 23, 2021), 19:15–20:12. As shown below, the ’532 priority patent
`includes the same or similar disclosures regarding “the present invention,” “the heart of the
`present invention,” and the “novel aspects of the present invention” that Bank of America
`relies on for its proposed constructions of the “recognizing” terms. Because the Asserted
`Patents claim priority to and incorporate the ’532 priority patent, these disclosures are
`intrinsic evidence and proper to consider in construing the “recognizing” terms.1
`
`
`Bank of America understands that NantWorks believes it is entitled to address
`1
`more issues in its supplemental brief beyond what this Court allowed. Bank of America
`disagrees with NantWorks’s position and objects to NantWorks’s inclusion of any
`issues beyond what this Court expressly authorized at the Markman hearing.
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`Case 2:20-cv-07872-GW-PVC Document 140 Filed 10/01/21 Page 3 of 9 Page ID #:2241
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`A. Relationship Between the ’532 Priority Patent and the Asserted Patents
`The ’532 priority patent was filed on November 5, 2001 and issued on March 21,
`2006. Dkt. No. 111-4, p. 1. As explained in Bank of America’s Claim Construction Brief,
`each Asserted Patent claims priority to the ’532 priority patent and incorporates it by
`reference. Dkt. No. 111, 15 n.8. For example, the asserted ’529 patent states:
`This application is a Continuation of U.S. application Ser. No.
`11/342,094 filed Jan. 26, 2006 now U.S. Pat. No. 7,565,008, which
`is a CIP [Continuation-in-Part] of U.S. application Ser. No.
`09/992,942 filed Nov. 5, 2001 now U.S. Pat. No. 7,016,532, which
`claims priority to U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/317,521 filed
`Sep. 5, 2001, and U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/246,295 filed
`Nov. 6, 2000. These and all other extrinsic references are
`incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.
`Dkt. No. 40-1 (’529 patent), 1:4–11. The other Asserted Patents also claim priority to and
`incorporate the ’532 priority patent. See Dkt. No. 40-2 (’252 patent), 1:4–22; Dkt. No. 40-
`3 (’038 patent), 1:4–21; Dkt. No. 40-4 (’030 patent), 1:4–14; Dkt. No. 40-5 (’036 patent),
`1:4–17; Dkt. No. 40-6 (’897 patent), 1:4–28; Dkt. No. 40-7 (’278 patent), 1:4–25; Dkt. No.
`40-8 (’004 patent), 1:4–25.
`This priority relationship is not disputed. As illustrated in NantWorks’s tutorial
`presentation, shown below with the ’532 priority patent at the far left and each Asserted
`Patent highlighted in orange, all Asserted Patents claim priority to the ’532 priority patent
`as a continuation (“CONT”), continuation-in-part (“CIP”), or divisional (“DIV”)
`application:
`
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`NantWorks’s Tutorial Presentation, Slide 34. Thus, each Asserted Patent claims priority
`to the ’532 priority patent and incorporates the ’532 priority patent by reference.
`B.
`The ’532 Priority Patent Contains All Disclosures Cited by Bank of
`America Related to the Construction of the “Recognizing” Terms.
`As explained in Bank of America’s Claim Construction Brief, the Asserted Patents
`acknowledge that it was known to modify an object with symbols, such as by applying a
`barcode, which could then be used to identify the object. Dkt. No. 111, 8. The Asserted
`Patents thus claim a particular way of identifying an object in an image―using only the
`visual appearance (e.g., color or shape) of the object in the image, without relying on
`symbols, to identify the object. Id. (citing Dkt. No. 40-5 (’036 patent), 3:26–35, 14:35–
`40). The Asserted Patents use language like “the present invention” and “the heart of the
`present invention” to distinguish the invention’s way of “recognizing” an object in an
`image by matching the visual appearance of the object (e.g., color or shape) to images of
`known objects stored in a database from the prior art. Id. (citing Dkt. No. 40-5 (’036
`patent), 1:21–24, 5:8–11); see also Markman Tr. (Sept. 23, 2021), 39:9–41:9. As such,
`Bank of America proposes that the “recognizing” terms be construed to require, in part,
`recognizing an object as a known object using a database to find the best match. Dkt. No.
`111, 8–17; see also Markman Tr. (Sept. 23, 2021), 41:21–43:13.
`The ’532 priority patent includes the same or similar disclosures regarding “the
`present invention,” “the heart of the present invention,” and the “novel aspects of the
`present invention” that Bank of America relies on for its proposed constructions of the
`“recognizing” terms in the Asserted Patents. Dkt. No. 111, 15 n.8. For example, the ’532
`priority patent explains:
`Many different variations on machine vision “target location and
`identification” exist in the current art. However, they all tend to
`provide optimal solutions for an arbitrarily restricted search space.
`At the heart of the present invention is a high-speed image
`matching engine that returns unambiguous matches to target
`objects contained in a wide variety of potential input images.
`This unique approach to image matching takes advantage of the
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`fact that at least some portion of the target object will be found in
`the user-acquired image.
`
`D.I. 111-4, 3:36–45 (emphasis added). Similarly, the ’532 priority patent explains:
`The unique database search methodology and subsequent object
`match scoring criteria are novel aspects of the present invention
`that deserve special attention. Each decomposition of the
`Reference image and Input image regions represent an independent
`characterization of salient characteristics of the image. The Wavelet
`Decomposition, Color Cube Decomposition, Shape Decomposition,
`and evaluation of a sub-sampled
`low-resolution Grayscale
`representation of an input image all produce sets of parameters that
`describe the image in independent ways. Once all four of these
`processes are completed on the image to be tested, the parameters
`provided by each characterization are compared to the results of
`identical characterizations of the Reference images, which have
`been previously calculated and stored in the database. These
`comparisons, or searches, are carried out in parallel. The result of
`each search is a numerical score that is a weighted measure of
`the number of salient characteristics that “match” (i.e. that are
`statistically equivalent).
`
`Id. at 10:6–25 (emphasis added); see also id. at 1:11–14 (“The invention relates [to] an
`identification method and process for objects from digitally captured images thereof that
`uses image characteristics to identify an object from a plurality of objects in a database.”);
`4:37–48 (“For object images, the present invention performs a ‘decomposition’ … of a
`high-resolution input image into several different types of quantifiable salient parameters.
`This allows for multiple independent convergent search processes of the database to occur
`in parallel, which greatly improves image match speed and match robustness in the
`Database Matching 36.”); 3:11–12 (“FIGS. 3A and 3B are a schematic block diagram of
`process details of the present invention.”); 11:3–4 (“FIGS. 3A and 3B show the process
`flow within the Database Matching operation.”) (emphasis added throughout).
`The other disclosures Bank of America relies on for its proposed constructions (Dkt.
`No. 111, 8–13) are also included in the ’532 priority patent. Compare Dkt. No. 40-5 (’036
`patent), 1:21–24, 3:26–35, 4:40–41, 5:8–11, 6:4–10, 11:15–34, 12:13–14, Fig. 1, Fig. 3A,
`4
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`DEFENDANTS’ SUPPLEMENTAL CLAIM CONSTRUCTION BRIEF
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`Case 2:20-cv-07872-GW-PVC Document 140 Filed 10/01/21 Page 6 of 9 Page ID #:2244
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`Fig. 3B, with Dkt. No. 111-4 (’532 priority patent), 1:11–14, 1:63–2:13, 3:11–12, 3:36–48,
`4:37–48, 10:6–25, 11:3–4, Fig. 1, Fig. 3A, Fig. 3B. In addition, the application for the ’532
`priority patent contains the same disclosures in the issued ’532 priority patent. Dkt. No.
`111-4 (’532 priority application), 1–6, 16–17.
`C.
`The ’532 Priority Patent is Relevant to Claim Construction
`Because the Asserted Patents claim priority to and incorporate the ’532 priority
`patent by reference, the ’532 priority patent (including its specification and prosecution
`history) is intrinsic evidence to the Asserted Patents and is thus proper to consider in
`construing the claims of the Asserted Patents. See, e.g., X2Y Attenuators, LLC v. Int'l
`Trade Comm'n, 757 F.3d 1358, 1362–63 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (“The incorporated patents
`are ‘effectively part of the host [patents] as if [they] were explicitly contained
`therein.’”); E.I. du Pont De Nemours & Co. v. Unifrax I LLC, 921 F.3d 1060, 1069 (Fed.
`Cir. 2019) (“This court’s precedent supports treating the specification of the [priority]
`patent as intrinsic evidence in construing claims in the [asserted] patent, which issued from
`a continuation-in-part of the application for the [priority] patent, because ‘the subject matter
`is common to the continuation-in-part application.’ . . . When a parent application includes
`statements involving ‘common subject matter’ with the terms at issue, those statements are
`relevant to construction of the terms in the child patent.”); Wang Lab'ys, Inc. v. Am. Online,
`Inc., 197 F.3d 1377, 1384 (Fed. Cir. 1999) (applying statements from prosecution of a
`parent application to the continuation-in-part application).
`For these reasons, the disclosures from the ’532 priority patent apply to all Asserted
`Patents, including the Asserted Patents that repeat these same or similar disclosures in their
`own specifications (e.g., ’036, ’004, ’030, and ’529 patents) and the Asserted Patents that
`do not repeat these disclosures in their own specifications (e.g., ’038 and ’897 patents).2
`
`Bank of America does not concede that the asserted claims are in fact entitled to
`2
`the priority date of the ’532 priority patent. For example, NantWorks contends that the
`asserted claims encompass mobile check deposit applications, but there is no disclosure
`in the ’532 priority patent (or any of the Asserted Patents for that matter) related to
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`Case 2:20-cv-07872-GW-PVC Document 140 Filed 10/01/21 Page 7 of 9 Page ID #:2245
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`Dated: October 1, 2021
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`WINSTON & STRAWN LLP
`
`
`
`By: /s/ Dustin J. Edwards
`
`George C. Lombardi
`Michael S. Elkin
`E. Danielle T. Williams
`Dustin J. Edwards
`Michael A. Tomasulo
`Diana Hughes Leiden
`
`Attorneys for Defendants
`BANK OF AMERICA CORPORATION and
`BANK OF AMERICA, N.A.
`
`
`mobile check deposit. As such, the asserted claims as NantWorks seeks to interpret
`them have no written description support in the ’532 priority patent and thus are not
`entitled to its priority date. See, e.g., PowerOasis, Inc. v. T-Mobile USA, Inc., 522 F.3d
`1299, 1306 (Fed. Cir. 2008) (“It is elementary patent law that a patent application is
`entitled to the benefit of the filing date of an earlier filed application only if the
`disclosure of the earlier application provides support for the claims of the later
`application, as required by 35 U.S.C. § 112.”). Nevertheless, this priority dispute is not
`relevant to whether the disclosures of the ’532 priority patent apply to the Asserted
`Patents.
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`CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE
`United States District Court for the Central District of California
`NantWorks LLC et al. v. Bank of America Corporation, et al.
`Case No. 2:20-cv-7872-GW-PVC
`I am a resident of the State of North Carolina, over the age of eighteen years,
`and not a party to this action. My business address is Winston & Strawn LLP, 300 S.
`Tryon Street, 16th Floor, Charlotte, NC 28202. On October 1, 2021, I served true
`copies of the following document:
`DEFENDANTS BANK OF AMERICA CORPORATION AND
`BANK OF AMERICA, N.A.’S SUPPLEMENTAL CLAIM
`CONSTRUCTION BRIEF
`
` by electronically transmitting copies of the document(s) listed above via
`email to the addressees as set forth below, in accordance with the parties’
`agreement to be served electronically pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 5, or Local
`Rule of Court, or court order. No error messages were received after said
`transmission.
`
`
`SEE ATTACHED LIST
`I declare under penalty of perjury under the laws of the United States of
`America that the above is true and correct.
`Signed: /s/ Danielle T. Williams
`
`Dated: October 1, 2021
`
`
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`DEFENDANTS’ SUPPLEMENTAL CLAIM CONSTRUCTION BRIEF
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`Case 2:20-cv-07872-GW-PVC Document 140 Filed 10/01/21 Page 9 of 9 Page ID #:2247
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`SERVICE LIST
`
`NantWorks LLC et al. v. Bank of America Corporation, et al.
`Case No. 2:20-cv-7872-GW-PVC
`
`
`
`Kevin P.B. Johnson
`kevinjohnson@quinnemanuel.com
`Todd M. Briggs
`toddbriggs@quinnemanuel.com
`Brice C. Lynch
`bricelynch@quinnemanuel.com
`QUINN EMANUEL URQUHART
` & SULLIVAN, LLP
`555 Twin Dolphin Drive, 5th Floor
`Redwood Shores, California 94065
`Telephone: (650) 801-5000
`Facsimile: (650) 801-5100
`
`Eric Huang
`erichuang@quinnemanuel.com
`QUINN EMANUEL URQUHART
` & SULLIVAN, LLP
`51 Madison Avenue, 22nd Floor
`New York, New York 10010
`Telephone: (212) 849-7000
`Facsimile: (212) 849-7100
`
`James R. Asperger
`jimasperger@quinnemanuel.com
`QUINN EMANUEL URQUHART
` & SULLIVAN, LLP
`865 South Figueroa Street, 10th Floor
`Los Angeles, CA 90017-2543
`Telephone: (213) 443-3000
`Facsimile: (213) 443-3100
`
`
`Attorneys for Plaintiffs
`NANTWORKS, LLC and NANT HOLDINGS IP, LLC
`
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`DEFENDANTS’ SUPPLEMENTAL CLAIM CONSTRUCTION BRIEF
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