Trials@uspto.gov
`571-272-7822
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` Paper 18
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` Entered: February 3, 2014
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`UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
`
`BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
`
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`FACEBOOK, INC., LINKEDIN CORP., and TWITTER, INC.
`Petitioners,
`
`v.
`
`SOFTWARE RIGHTS ARCHIVE
`Patent Owner.
`_______________
`
`Case IPR2013-00479
`Patent No. 5,832,494
`
`
`
`Before SALLY C. MEDLEY, CHRISTOPHER L. CRUMBLEY, and
`BARBARA A. PARVIS, Administrative Patent Judges.
`
`CRUMBLEY, Administrative Patent Judge.
`
`
`DECISION
`Institution of Inter Partes Review
`37 C.F.R. § 42.108
`
`
`
`
`
`
`571-272-7822
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`
`
`
`
`
`
`
` Paper 18
`
`
` Entered: February 3, 2014
`
`
`
`UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
`
`BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`FACEBOOK, INC., LINKEDIN CORP., and TWITTER, INC.
`Petitioners,
`
`v.
`
`SOFTWARE RIGHTS ARCHIVE
`Patent Owner.
`_______________
`
`Case IPR2013-00479
`Patent No. 5,832,494
`
`
`
`Before SALLY C. MEDLEY, CHRISTOPHER L. CRUMBLEY, and
`BARBARA A. PARVIS, Administrative Patent Judges.
`
`CRUMBLEY, Administrative Patent Judge.
`
`
`DECISION
`Institution of Inter Partes Review
`37 C.F.R. § 42.108
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`Case IPR2013-00479
`Patent No. 5,832,494
`
`
`
`I.
`INTRODUCTION
`On July 30, 2013, Facebook, Inc., LinkedIn Corp., and Twitter, Inc.
`(collectively, “Petitioners”) filed a petition for inter partes review of claims 18-20,
`45, 48, 49, 51 and 54 of U.S. Patent No. 5,832,494 (Ex. 1201, “the ’494 Patent”).
`Paper 2, “Pet.” The owner of the ’494 patent, Software Rights Archive, LLC
`(“Patent Owner”), filed a preliminary response. Paper 15, “Prelim. Resp.” We
`have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 314.
`The standard for instituting an inter partes review is set forth in 35 U.S.C.
`§ 314(a), which provides as follows:
`THRESHOLD—The Director may not authorize an inter partes
`review to be instituted unless the Director determines that the
`information presented in the petition filed under section 311 and any
`response filed under section 313 shows that there is a reasonable
`likelihood that the petitioner would prevail with respect to at least 1 of
`the claims challenged in the petition.
`
`Upon consideration of Petitioners’ petition and Patent Owner’s preliminary
`response, we determine that the arguments and information presented establish that
`there is a reasonable likelihood that Petitioners would prevail with respect to
`claims 18-20, 45, 48, 49, 51 and 54 of the ’494 Patent. Accordingly, pursuant to
`35 U.S.C. § 314, we authorize an inter partes review to be instituted as to these
`claims.
`
`A. Related Proceedings
`
`Petitioners and Patent Owner both indicate that the ’494 patent is involved in
`the following co-pending district court proceedings: Software Rights Archive, LLC
`v. Facebook, Inc., Case No. 12-cv-3970; Software Rights Archive, LLC v. LinkedIn
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`Corp., Case No. 12-cv-3971; and Software Rights Archive, LLC v. Twitter, Inc.,
`Case No. 12-cv-3972, each pending in the United States District Court for the
`Northern District of California. Pet. 1; Paper 9, Patent Owner’s Mandatory Notice,
`2. In addition, Petitioners filed another petition, IPR2013-00480, which also seeks
`inter partes review of the ’494 patent. Petitioners filed other petitions on related
`patents including: (1) IPR2013-00478, which seeks inter partes review of U.S.
`Patent No. 5,544,352 (the “’352 patent”) and (2) IPR2013-00481, which seeks
`inter partes review of U.S. Patent No. 6,233,571 (the “’571 patent”). The ’352
`patent issued from the parent of the application that issued as the ’494 patent. The
`’571 patent issued from an application that was a divisional of the application that
`issued as the ’494 patent. The ’494 patent was the subject of Reexamination No.
`90/011,014.
`
`B. The ’494 Patent
`
`The ’494 Patent relates to computerized research on databases. Ex. 1201,
`1:11-13. The ’494 Patent discloses that it improves search methods by indexing
`data using proximity indexing techniques. Id. at 3:20-31. According to the ’494
`patent, proximity indexing techniques generate a quick-reference of the relations,
`patterns, and similarity found among the data in the database. Id. at 3:28-31.
`Figure 2 of the ’494 Patent illustrates the high-level processing of software
`for computerized searching (Id. at 8:7-8) and is reproduced below:
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`Case IPPR2013-004479
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`Patent NNo. 5,832,4494
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`software ssystem 60
`ion g Applicatity Indexingcomprisingg Proximit
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`Figuree 2 depicts
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`
`
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`Proogram 62, Computer Search Proogram for
`
`
`
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`Data Reprresented byy Matrices
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`
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`
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`(CSPDMM) 66, andd Graphical User Inteerface (GUUI) programm 70.
`
`
`r example,, a
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`
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`Ex. 12001, 11:29-336.
`
`
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`
`
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`PProcessing of softwarre system 660 begins wwith Proximmity Indexxing
`
`
`
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`Applicaation Progrram 62 indexing a daatabase. Idd. at 11:46--47. Then,
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` CSPDM 666
`
`
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`cts. Id. at
`
`
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`
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`searches the indexxed databasse and retrieves requuested objec
`11:49-53.
`lay.
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`
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`CSPDMM 66 relayss the retrievved objects to GUI pprogram 700 to displayy on a disp
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`Id. at 111:53-55.
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`SSoftware syystem 60 ruuns on a coomputer syystem compprising, fo
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`processor of a perrsonal commputer. Id.
`
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`5. The sysstem compprises a
`
`
`at 10:11-1
`
`
`Id. at 10:443-44. Exeemplary
`
`
`
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`display,, which dissplays information too the user.
`
`
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`
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`displayss include: ccomputer mmonitors, ttelevisions
`
`, LCDs, orr LEDs. Idd. at 10:44--46.
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`The processor is connected to a database to be searched. Id. at 10:18-20.
`Data in the database may be represented as a node. Id. at 12:29-33. Exemplary
`nodes include an object or a portion of an object, a document or section of a
`document, and a World Wide Web page. Id. at 12:35-38.
`A cluster link generation algorithm may be used alone or in conjunction with
`other proximity indexing subroutines, and prior to searching. Id. at 21:30-33. The
`cluster link generation algorithm may generate candidate cluster links (Id. at 21:64-
`66) and then derive actual cluster links, which are used to locate nodes for display
`(Id. at 22:1-4). Actual cluster links are: “a subset of the candidate cluster links . . .
`which meet a certain criteria.” Id. at 22:1-4.
`
`C. Illustrative Claim
`
`Of the challenged claims, only claim 18 is independent, whereas claims 19-
`20, 45, 48, 49, 51 and 54 depend directly or indirectly from claim 18. Claim 18 is
`illustrative of the claimed subject matter and is reproduced below:
`18. A method of analyzing a database having objects and a first
`numerical representation of direct relationships in the database,
`comprising the steps of:
`generating a second numerical representation using the first
`numerical representation, wherein the second numerical
`representation accounts for indirect relationships in the database;
`storing the second numerical representation;
`identifying at least one object in the database, wherein the
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`stored numerical representation is used to identify objects; and
`displaying one or more identified objects from the database.
`Ex. 1201, claims.
`
`D. Prior Art Relied Upon
`
`Petitioners rely upon the following prior art references:
`(Ex. 1207)
`Egger
`
`WO 95/00896
`
`Jan. 5, 1995
`Gerard Salton, Associative Document Retrieval Techniques Using
`Bibliographic Information, 10 JACM 440-57 (Oct. 1963) (“Salton 1963”) (Ex.
`1203).
`Colin F.H. Tapper, Citation Patterns in Legal Information Retrieval, 3
`Datenverarbeitung im Recht 249-75 (1976) (“Tapper 1976”) (Ex. 1204).
`Colin Tapper, The Use of Citation Vectors for Legal Information Retrieval,
`1 J. of Law and Info. Sci. 131-61 (1982) (“Tapper 1982”) (Ex. 1205).
`Edward A. Fox, Characterization of Two New Experimental Collections in
`Computer and Information Science Containing Textual and Bibliographic
`Concepts, (Sept. 1983) (Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell Univ. Dept. of Comp. Sci.)
`(“Fox Collection”) (Ex. 1206).
`Edward A. Fox, Some Considerations for Implementing the SMART
`Information Retrieval System under UNIX, (Sept. 1983) (Ph.D. dissertation,
`Cornell Univ. Dept. of Comp. Sci.) (“Fox SMART”) (Ex. 1208).
`Edward A. Fox, Extending the Boolean and Vector Space Models of
`Information Retrieval with P-Norm Queries and Multiple Concept Types, (Aug.
`1983) (Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell Univ. Dept. of Comp. Sci.) (“Fox Thesis”) (Ex.
`
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`1209).
`Edward A. Fox, et al., Users, User Interfaces, and Objects: Envision, a
`Digital Library, J. Am. Soc. Inf. Sci., 44 no. 8 pp. 480-91 (Sept. 1993) (“Fox
`Envision”) (Ex. 1210).
`Edward A. Fox, et al., Integrating Search and Retrieval with Hypertext,
`HYPERTEXT/ HYPERMEDIA HANDBOOK, pp. 329-355 (1991) (“Fox Hypertext”) (Ex.
`1211).
`Tatsuki Saito, A Clustering method using the strength of citation, 16 J. Inf.
`Sci. 175-181 (Jan. 1990) (“Saito Clustering”) (Ex. 1212).
`Tatsuki Saito, Design and Implementation for Scientific Article Data Base,
` Bulletin of the Faculty of Eng’g, Hokkaido Univ. no. 151 pp. 19-34 (July 30,
`1990) (“Saito Design”) (Ex. 1213).
`Roger Howard Thompson, The Design and Implementation of an Intelligent
`Interface for Information Retrieval, COINS Technical Report 88-88 (Ph.D. Thesis,
`Univ. of Mass., Comp. and Inf. Sci. Dept.) (February 1989) (“Thompson”) (Ex.
`1214).
`Thomas D.C. Little, Commerce on the Internet, IEEE Multimedia at Work
`pp. 74-78 (1994) (“Little”) (Ex. 1216).
`Franco Zizzo, Legal Resources Via World Wide Web, 10th BILETA
`Conf. Electronic Comms. 1-6 (Mar. 1995) (“Zizzo”) (Ex. 1217).
`
`Petitioners assert that all references relied upon are prior art to the ’494
`patent under 35 U.S.C. § 102. Pet. 7. Patent Owner does not challenge the prior
`art status of any reference in its preliminary response.
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`E. The Asserted Grounds
`
`Petitioners assert that the challenged claims are unpatentable based on the
`following grounds.
`Claims
`18-20, 48, 49
`
`Basis References
`§ 102
`Fox SMART
`
`§ 102 Fox Thesis
`
`18-20, 48, 49
`
`18-20, 48, 49
`
`§ 103 Fox Thesis, Fox SMART, and Fox Collection
`
`18-20, 48, 49
`
`§102
`
`Thompson
`
`18-20, 48, 49
`
`§ 103 Thompson
`
`18-20, 48, 49
`
`§ 102 Tapper 1976
`
`18-20, 48, 49
`
`18-20, 48, 49
`
`Tapper 1982
`
`§ 102
`
`§ 103 Tapper 1976 and Tapper 1982
`
`18-20, 48, 49
`
`§ 103 Saito Design and Saito Clustering
`
`18-20, 48, 49
`
`§ 102 Salton 1963
`
`45, 51
`
`45, 51
`
`§ 103 Egger, Fox Envision, and Saito Clustering
`
`§ 103 Fox Thesis, Fox SMART, Fox Collection, Saito
`Design, Saito Clustering, Fox Envision, and Fox
`Hypertext
`
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`54
`
`51
`
`45, 51, 54
`
`
`
`§ 103 Fox Thesis, Fox SMART, Fox Collection, Fox
`Hypertext, Fox Envision, Saito Design, Saito
`Clustering, and Little
`§ 103 Thompson, Fox Hypertext, Fox Envision, and
`Little
`§ 103 Tapper 1976, Tapper 1982, Fox Envision, Little,
`and Zizzo
`
`II. ANALYSIS
`
`A. Claim Construction
`
`Petitioners contend, and Patent Owner does not dispute, that the ’494 Patent
`expired on June 14, 2013. Pet. 6. The Board’s interpretation of the claims of an
`expired patent is similar to that of a district court’s review. See In re Rambus, Inc.,
`694 F.3d 42, 46 (Fed. Cir. 2012). We are, therefore, guided by the principle, that
`the words of a claim “are generally given their ordinary and customary meaning”
`as understood by a person of ordinary skill in the art in question at the time of the
`invention. Phillips v. AWH Corp., 415 F.3d 1303, 1312-13 (Fed. Cir. 2005) (en
`banc) (internal citation omitted). “In determining the meaning of the disputed
`claim limitation, we look principally to the intrinsic evidence of record, examining
`the claim language itself, the written description, and the prosecution history, if in
`evidence.” DePuy Spine, Inc. v. Medtronic Sofamor Danek, Inc., 469 F.3d 1005,
`1014 (Fed. Cir. 2006) (citing Phillips, 415 F.3d at 1312-17). A patentee may act as
`its own lexicographer and depart from the ordinary and customary meaning by
`defining a term with “reasonable clarity, deliberateness, and precision.” See
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`Renishaw PLC v. Marposs Societa Per Azioni, 158 F.3d 1243, 1249 (Fed. Cir.
`1998) (citing In re Paulsen, 30 F.3d 1475, 1480 (Fed. Cir. 1994)). There is a
`“heavy presumption,” however, that a claim term carries its ordinary and
`customary meaning. CCS Fitness, Inc. v. Brunswick Corp., 288 F.3d 1359, 1366
`(Fed. Cir. 2002) (internal citation omitted).
`Petitioners note that in prior litigation the challenged claims were asserted,
`but the district court did not provide an express construction of any claim terms
`appearing in those claims. Pet. 6. Petitioners also do not proffer any express
`constructions, instead providing a chart of claim terms with “illustrative guidance
`on the terms’ meanings” which consist of citations to the ’494 specification. Id. at
`6-7. It is unclear whether Petitioners request that we adopt this “illustrative
`guidance” as our construction of the terms. In any event, Petitioners’ “illustrative
`guidance” appears to be citations to examples in the specification of the ’494
`patent where a particular term is described. Petitioners’ citations alone are
`insufficient to show that certain claim terms should be construed a particular way.
`Accordingly, we do not adopt Petitioners’ “illustrative guidance” to the extent that
`it is a proffered construction for any claim term.
`For its part, Patent Owner does not proffer alternative claim constructions or
`address the constructions reached by the district court. Patent Owner merely states
`that it does not agree with Petitioners’ claim constructions. Prelim. Resp. 6 n.3.
`
`1. Direct Relationships and Indirect Relationships
`Although Petitioner does not proffer a construction of the terms direct
`relationships and indirect relationships, Petitioners’ expert, Dr. Roger Thompson,
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`applies a particular construction of these terms in his analysis of the claims. Ex.
`1219 ¶ 37. According to Dr. Thompson, in prior litigation involving different
`defendants than Petitioners, the parties agreed that direct relationships means a
`“relationship where one object[] cites to another object.” Ex. 1219 ¶ 37. Those
`parties also agreed that indirect relationships means a “relationship where at least
`one intermediate object exists between two objects and where the intermediate
`objects connect the two objects through a chain of citations.” Id. An example of
`such an indirect relationship is provided: “[I]f A cites B and B cites C, A and C
`have an indirect relationship.” Id.
`Petitioners point to “illustrative guidance” to the meaning of the terms found
`in the specification of the ’494 patent. Petitioners give the example of “B cites A”
`as a direct relationship. Pet. 6-7 (citing Ex. 1201, 14:24-26, 14:61-66). As an
`example of an indirect relationship, Petitioners provide the following examples:
`“A cites C, and B cites C” (known in the art as bibliographic coupling), “A cites
`both B and C” (co-citation coupling), and “A cites B, and B cites C” (directed
`walk). Id. (citing Ex. 1201, 14:26-30, 14:65-15:5).
`Upon reviewing the ’494 patent, we consider the constructions agreed upon
`by the parties to the prior litigation to be consistent with the specification and the
`customary and ordinary meaning of the terms. We, therefore, construe direct
`relationships as “relationships where one object cites to another object,” and
`indirect relationships as “relationships where at least one intermediate object exists
`between two objects and where the intermediate objects connect the two objects
`through a chain of citations.”
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`B. Obviousness Over Fox Thesis, Fox SMART, and Fox Collection
`
`Petitioners assert that claims 18-20, 48, and 49 are unpatentable under 35
`U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over the combined teachings of Fox Thesis, Fox SMART,
`and Fox Collection (collectively, the “Fox Papers”). Pet. 8-18. In support of this
`asserted ground of unpatentability, Petitioners set forth the teachings of the Fox
`Papers, provide a detailed claim chart, and cite to the declaration of Dr. Fox (Ex.
`1218 ¶¶ 182-210), explaining how each limitation is disclosed in the Fox Papers.
`Pet. 8-18. We note that Patent Owner does not discuss this asserted ground of
`unpatentability in its preliminary response.
`
`1. Fox Thesis
`Fox Thesis describes improving query and document representation schemes
`for information retrieval. Ex. 1209, 261. In particular, useful types of
`bibliographic data are incorporated into a model to test clustering and retrieval
`functions. Id. at 164. Bibliographic connections between articles are illustrated for
`an exemplary set “O” of documents, which are represented by letters A through G.
`Id. at 165-66; Fig. 6.2. This exemplary set “O” includes direct and indirect citation
`references. Id. at 166-67; Table 6.2.
`Based on the reference pattern for a set of documents, Fox Thesis describes
`deriving various measures of the interconnection between the documents. Id. at
`166. For example, weights are assigned “based upon integer counts” for
`bibliographically coupled documents. Id. at 167. Citation submatrices represent
`
`reference or citation information. Id. at 169. For example, submatrix (cid:1854)(cid:1855)
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`represents bibliographically coupled reference information and submatrix (cid:1855)(cid:1855)
`
`represents co-citation reference information. Id. at 169-72; Figs. 6.3-6.5.
`
`2. Fox SMART
`Fox SMART describes the System for Mechanical Analysis and Retrieval of
`Text (SMART) as a project for designing a fully automatic document retrieval
`system and for testing new ideas in information science. Ex. 1208, 3. Fox
`SMART describes the computer system used to implement the experiments
`described in the Fox Thesis. Ex. 1218, ¶ 27. The software components of SMART
`are implemented in the C Programming Language and run under the UNIX™
`operating system on a VAX™ 11/780 computer. Ex. 1208, 1, 4.
`In SMART, an automatic indexing component constructs stored
`representations of documents. Id. at 3. Bibliographic information is used to
`enhance document representations. Id. at 29. The SMART system may process
`basic raw data, such as an exemplary N collection of articles and citation data
`describing which articles are cited by others. Id. at 29-30. Data is entered into the
`SMART system as a set of tuples (di, dj) which describe which documents are cited
`by other documents. Id. at 29. The exemplary input data also includes indirect
`citation relationships, such as bibliographic coupled and co-citation relationships.
`Id. at 30-32. These relationships are used to create extended vectors which can
`then be clustered and searched to aid document retrieval. Id. at 29.
`
`3. Fox Collection
`Fox Collection describes collections of data which are said to be useful for
`investigating the interaction of textual and bibliographic data in retrieval of
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`documents. Ex. 1206, 1. According to the testimony of Dr. Fox, Fox Collection
`was originally part of the same work as Fox Thesis and Fox SMART, and
`describes the manner in which the data sets were obtained and processed prior to
`their use in the Fox SMART experiments. Ex. 1218 ¶ 27.
`According to Fox Collection, data was obtained from articles and entered
`into a set Raw_data which contained pairs of identifiers (citing, cited) which
`corresponded to the citing article and the one contained in the article’s
`bibliography. Ex. 1206, 14. From this Raw_data matrix, secondary matrices such
`as bc (bibliographic coupling) and cc (co-citation) were derived computationally.
`Id. at 14-15.
`
`4. Obviousness of Claims 18-20, 48, and 49
`We find persuasive at this stage of the proceeding Petitioners’ unchallenged
`analysis of how the claim elements are taught in the Fox Papers. For example,
`Petitioners have shown sufficiently that the references disclose a database having
`objects and a first numerical representation of direct relationships in the database
`as required by claim 18, by creating a set of tuples which describe which
`documents are cited by other documents. Ex. 1208, 29. These first numerical
`representations are based upon direct relationships. Ex. 1209, 181. The tuples are
`stored in the matrix “Raw_data.” Ex. 1206, 14.
`Furthermore, Petitioners have shown sufficiently that the Fox Papers
`describe analyzing this stored data for indirect relationships, thereby generating a
`second numerical representation using the first numerical representation as
`required by claim 18. The Raw_data tuples are used to create submatrices, such as
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`“co-citation” (cc) and “bibliographic coupling” (bc). Id. at 14-15; Ex. 1209, 179.
`These represent indirect relationships among the documents. These second
`numerical representations are then stored and used for identifying objects in the
`database. Ex. 1208, 27-29. The identified objects are then displayed when the
`documents are retrieved. Id. at 23-24, Fig. 6.
`Dr. Fox, the author of the Fox Papers, testifies on behalf of Petitioners and
`supports the foregoing conclusions. Ex. 1218. Dr. Fox states that the Fox Papers
`disclose first numerical representations in the form of its Raw_data relation, which
`contain pairs of identifiers derived from the document identification numbers
`assigned to a collection. Id. at ¶ 94. Dr. Fox also testifies that the Fox Papers
`disclose second numerical representations derived from this Raw_data relation,
`such as the numerical bc and cc subvectors. Id. at ¶ 102. Dr. Fox’s testimony is
`consistent with the disclosure of the Fox Papers, and therefore, we give it
`substantial weight at this stage of the proceeding.
`We are persuaded as well that Petitioners have provided a sufficient showing
`that the elements of the dependent claims are disclosed in the Fox Papers. For
`example, claim 48 requires that the step of identifying objects using the second
`numerical representation comprises using the second numerical representation and
`semantical factors to rank objects for display. Dr. Fox’s testimony that Figure 14
`of Fox SMART discloses an example that meets these limitations is consistent with
`the disclosure of Fox SMART. Ex. 1218 ¶ 203. The query processing example of
`Figure 14 uses indirect relationships (bibliographic coupling and co-citation) as
`well as semantical factors (author names and terms). Ex. 1208, 41. Retrieval
`results that are ranked highest (highest similarity to the query) are returned. Id.
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`Petitioners argue that a person of ordinary skill in the art would have had
`reason to combine the teachings of Fox Thesis, Fox SMART, and Fox Collection
`due to their common authorship, similar subject matter, and the fact that all three
`documents were created by breaking up a single thesis written by Dr. Fox. Pet. 8.
`We find Petitioner’s arguments to be persuasive and to set forth articulated
`reasoning supported by factual underpinning. See KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc.,
`550 U.S. 398, 418 (2007). Based on the record before us, and in the absence of
`rebuttal from Patent Owner, Petitioners have established a reasonable likelihood
`that they would prevail in showing that each of claims 18-20, 48, and 49 would
`have been obvious over the Fox Papers.
`
`C. Obviousness Over Tapper 1976 and Tapper 1982
`
`Petitioners assert that claims 18-20, 48, and 49 are unpatentable under 35
`U.S.C. § 103 as obvious over the combined teachings of Tapper 1976 and Tapper
`1982 (collectively, the “Tapper Papers”). Pet. 36-37. In support of this asserted
`ground of unpatentability, Petitioners set forth the teachings of the Tapper Papers
`in a detailed claim chart explaining how each limitation is disclosed. Id. at 27-36.
`We note that Patent Owner does not discuss this asserted ground of unpatentability
`in its preliminary response.
`
`1. Tapper 1976
`Tapper 1976 discloses a “citation vector technique” for retrieving legal
`information that seeks to overcome perceived deficiencies in Boolean search
`strings. Ex. 1204, 270-71. Rather than characterizing a legal document by the
`words it contains, vector matching focuses on the citations the document contains.
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`Id. at 263. Tapper 1976 also notes that the technique may be used as an adjunct to
`a full-text retrieval system. Id. at 272.
`By repeating the vector characterization of the documents, Tapper 1976
`discloses that a matrix may be created that shows the similarities between the
`documents. Id. By re-ordering the matrix, the documents may be clustered
`according to their similarity. Id. The reference also discloses that “second
`generation citations” may be used: “if a case cites cases A', B' and C', and case A'
`cites a1', a2' and a3', case B' b1', b2' and b3' and case C' c1', c2' and c3' the original
`case would be represented by a combination of its own vector, and those of cases
`A', B' and C'.” Id. at 266.
`
`2. Tapper 1982
`Tapper 1982 similarly focuses on the drawbacks of full-text searching of
`legal documents and the alternative use of citation vectors for legal research. Ex.
`1205, 135-36. The reference discusses weighting certain citation vectors more
`heavily than others, for example by the difference in the ages of the citing and
`cited case. Id. at 138.
`A pilot project implementing such a citation vector-based system is also
`described by Tapper 1982. Id. at 139. The reference discloses a correlation
`algorithm used in the pilot project to cluster together vectors with a high degree of
`association. Id. at 143-44. Such clustering is said to permit a document to be
`retrieved “not only because it is itself closely associated with another target
`document, but also because both it and the target document are closely
`associated with a third.” Id.
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`3. Obviousness of Claims 18-20, 48, and 49
`We find persuasive at this stage of the proceeding Petitioners’ unchallenged
`analysis of how the claim elements are taught in the Tapper Papers. For example,
`Petitioners have shown sufficiently that the legal documents described in Tapper
`1976 are characterized by the citations each contains and represented by a vector,
`which is a first numerical representation of these direct relationships. Ex. 1204,
`259, 262, 266. The reference further discloses that the similarity between two
`documents may be computed from these citations. Id. at 272. “Second generation
`citations” then are created which are second numerical representations derived
`from analysis of the direct relationships, and which represent indirect relationships
`between the documents. Id. at 266. These indirect relationships can then be used
`to identify at least one object in the database. Ex. 1205, 144 (“enables a document
`to be retrieved, not only because it is itself closely associated with another target
`document, but also because both it and the target document are closely associated
`with a third.”). Tapper 1976 discloses a “computerised full text retrieval system,”
`which reasonably suggests displaying identified objects to a user. Ex. 1204, 270;
`see also id. at 272 (results are “provided to the lawyer through the . . . terminal”).
`Similarly, Petitioners provide sufficient evidence that the elements of
`dependent claims 19, 20, 48, and 49 are taught by the Tapper papers. For example,
`with respect to claim 48, Tapper 1982 teaches that both semantical and secondary
`numerical representations (indirect relationships) are used together. Ex. 1205, 160
`(“a citation vector system is necessarily parasitic upon retrieval systems which are
`already in place. . . . It is obviously convenient if the systems can be used
`interactively through the same terminal, since here the two systems address
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`different aspects of the same legal function and are mutually complementary.”).
`Furthermore, Tapper 1976 discloses displaying search results in descending order
`of relevance to the search, thereby ranking objects for display as recited in claim
`48. Ex. 1204, 254.
`Petitioners argue that a person of ordinary skill in the art would have had
`reason to combine the teachings of Tapper 1976 and Tapper 1982 due to their
`common authorship, objectives, and teachings. Pet. 36-37. Petitioners point out
`that both documents are directed to “overcoming the deficiencies of Boolean full-
`text searching for legal research by using non-semantical, citation-based indexing,
`search, and retrieval techniques.” Id. at 27. We find Petitioner’s arguments to be
`persuasive and to set forth articulated reasoning supported by factual underpinning.
`See KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 418 (2007). Based on the record
`before us, and in the absence of rebuttal from Patent Owner, Petitioners have
`established a reasonable likelihood that they would prevail in showing that each of
`claims 18-20, 48, and 49 would have been obvious over the Tapper Papers.
`
`D. Obviousness Over Fox Thesis, Fox SMART, Fox Collection, Saito Design, Saito
`Clustering, Fox Envision, and Fox Hypertext
`
`Petitioners assert that claims 45 and 51 are unpatentable under 35 U.S.C.
`§ 103 as obvious over the combined teachings of Fox Thesis, Fox SMART, Fox
`Collection, Saito Design, Saito Clustering, Fox Envision, and Fox Hypertext. Pet.
`53-55. In support of this asserted ground of unpatentability, Petitioners set forth
`the teachings of these references in a detailed claim chart explaining how each
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`limitation is disclosed. Id. We note that Patent Owner does not discuss this
`asserted ground of unpatentability in its preliminary response.
`Claim 45 depends from claim 19, whereas claim 51 depends from claim 48,
`and Petitioners rely on the disclosures of the Fox Papers to meet the limitations of
`claims 19 and 48. As we concluded above that Petitioners have established a
`reasonable likelihood that claims 19 and 48 would have been obvious over the Fox
`Papers, we also conclude that Petitioners have sufficiently established that the
`elements of claims 19 and 48 incorporated in claims 45 and 51 are taught by the
`Fox Papers.
`Claim 45 additionally requires that the direct relationships of claim 19 are
`hyperlinks between objects on the World Wide Web, and the second numerical
`representation is “generated by analyzing direct link weights in a set of paths
`between two indirectly related objects.” Petitioners cite Fox Envision to teach
`application of existing search techniques to “wide area hypertext systems . . . like
`the WorldWideWeb.” Pet. 54 (citing Ex. 1210, 482). Petitioners then rely on
`Saito Clustering, which is said to teach “applying a weighting factor to each link in
`the path that diminishes as the number of links increases.” Pet. 50 (citing Ex.
`1212, 176-77). Saito Clustering discloses that these weighting factors are then
`used to identify key articles. Ex. 1212, 180.
`Claim 51 depends from the method of claim 48, further requiring that the
`identified objects include web sites and the step of identifying includes “providing
`a Universal Resource Locator that identifies a web page within one of said web
`sites.” Petitioners assert that Fox Envision teaches these elements, as it suggests
`coordinating hypertext linking with the various approaches to search and retrieval,
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`including “not only citation (reference), but also inheritance, inclusion, association,
`synchronization, sequencing, and other relationships.” Pet. 50 (citing Ex. 1210,
`482). According to Petitioners, the disclosure of the World Wide Web inherently
`discloses the use of URLs to identify webpages. Id. at 53.
`Upon review, we find persuasive Petitioners’ unchallenged analysis of how
`the claim elements of claims 48 and 51 are taught in Fox Envision and Saito
`Clustering. Petitioners have provided sufficient evidence that Fox Envision
`teaches the application of existing search techniques (such as those disclosed in Dr.
`Fox’s prior work, the Fox Papers) to the World Wide Web, which would include
`hyperlinks and URLs. Furthermore, Petitioners have demonstrated sufficiently that
`Saito Clustering discloses weighting relationships according to the paths between
`two indirectly related objects.
`Petitioners argue that a person of ordinary skill in the art would have had
`reason to combine the teachings of Fox Envision and Saito Clustering with the Fox
`Pape
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