YYZ LLC v. Hewlett Packard Company

Filing 112

MEMORANDUM ORDER re: claim construction. Signed by Judge Sue L. Robinson on 12/12/2014. Associated Cases: 1:13-cv-00136-SLR, 1:13-cv-00579-SLR, 1:13-cv-00581-SLR(nmfn)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF DELAWARE
YYZ, LLC,
Plaintiff,
v.
HEWLETT-PACKARD COMPANY,
Defendant.

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Civ. No. 13-136-SLR

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YYZ, LLC,

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Plaintiff,
V.

ADOBE SYSTEMS, INC.,
Defendant.

YYZ, LLC,
Plaintiff,

v.
PEGASYSTEMS, INC.,
Defendant.

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Civ. No. 13-579-SLR

Civ. No. 13-581-SLR

MEMORANDUM ORDER
At Wilmington this ~ay of December, 2014, having heard argument on, and
having reviewed the papers submitted in connection with, the parties' proposed claim
construction;
IT IS ORDERED that the disputed claim language of U.S. Patent Nos. 7,603,674

("the '674 patent") and 7,062,749 ("the '749 patent") shall be construed consistent with
the tenets of claim construction set forth by the United States Court of Appeals for the
Federal Circuit in Phillips v. AWH Corp., 415 F.3d 1303 (Fed. Cir. 2005), as follows:
1. "Asynchronous messaging environment:" 1 "A computer-based
environment in which data is transmitted through messages (instead of large files)
without prior coordination between communication end points." The specification
describes the invention as "relat[ing] to computer-based apparatus and
systems for measuring, monitoring, tracking and simulating enterprise communications
and processes in an asynchronous messaging environment." (1:17-20} 2 To distinguish
an asynchronous messaging environment from a synchronous one, the specification
explains that
enterprise communications were formerly primarily synchronous, or
connection oriented, in which a connection is established with prior
coordination between communication end points with data then being
transmitted over the connection. Enterprise communications are now
increasingly asynchronous, or connectionless, transmitting data without
prior coordination between communication end points, such as through
"event based" communications which use messages to move data instead
of large files.
(1 :48-57)
2. "Process:" 3 "Business operation." The specification explains that "[t]he

1

Claims 1, 46, 51 and 70 of the '674 patent and claims 1, 22, 55, and 56 of the
'7 49 patent.
2

As the '67 4 and '7 49 specifications are substantively identical but have different
line numbers, the court refers to the '67 4 patent throughout unless indicated otherwise.
3

Claims 1, 46, 51, 55, and 76 of the '674 patent and claims 4, 22, 23, 28, 29, and
55 of the '7 49 patent.

2

activities of a business or enterprise can be grouped into processes. Processes are
business operations that are separated as desired and usually occur across business
units." (1 :24-26)
3. "Sub process:" 4 "Step of a business operation." The specification explains
that "[t]he processes are comprised of sub-processes." (1 :28-29)
4. "Activity:" 5 "Part of a step of a business operation." The specification
explains that "[e]ach sub-process may in turn be broken down into discrete activities
such as providing customer number, entering that customer number, establishing
pricing, determining a shipping date, etc." (1 :34-36)
5. "Original message:" 6 "A message originating from a business process, sub
process, or activity carrying information for the execution of a business process, sub
process ,or activity." The specification explains that an original message is sent within
a process, sub process, or activity. (3:11-12) The original messages are "received by
the [messaging] broker." (3:58-59) In a certain embodiment, the "original messages
[pass] between the sub-processes." (3:60-61)
6. "Original message data:" 7 "Data from the original message." The parties
agree on this construction.

4

Claims 1, 46, 51, 70, and 71 of the '674 patent and claims 4, 22, and 56 of the
'749 patent. The specification also uses "sub-process."
5

Claims 1, 46, and 70 of the '674 patent and claims 1 and 4 of the '749 patent.

6

Claims 1, 46, 51, and 70 of the '674 patent and claims 1, 3, 4, 5, 22, 55, and 56
of the '7 49 patent.
7

Claims 1, 46, 51, 52, 56, and 70 of the '674 patent and claims 1, 3, 4, 5, 22, 55,
and 56 of the '7 49 patent.

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7. "Part of said original message data." 8 The court declines to construe this
limitation, in light of the construction of "original message" and "original message data." 9
The specification provides examples of data, including "date, time, customer number,
materials, quantity, amount, or other information .... " (3:15-17)
8. "Monitoring message:" 10 "A message distinct from an original message,
created by the messaging component of a messaging broker that contains at least part
of the original message data, where a messaging broker is communication software
that performs at least message transformation and routing based on information in the
message." The specification provides that "[f]or each original message sent within a
process, sub-process or activity, the preferred embodiments of the present invention
send a separate monitoring message containing data from the central message
repository or database. . . . Other embodiments may add data to the monitoring
message aside from that contained in the original message." 11 (3:11-19, 4:19-23) The
parties agree that the messaging broker performs at least "transformation" and
"routing." Defendants' additional requirements for the messaging broker are not

8

Claims 1, 46, and 51 of the '674 patent and claims 1, 55, and 56 of the '749

patent.
9

Specifically, the court declines to add the limitation that the data must be
"unchanged,'' as proposed by defendants. Having reviewed the portion of the
prosecution history cited by the parties (D.I. 85, ex.Bat JA-161-63), the court
concludes that the additional limitation is not warranted.
10

Claims 1, 46, 51, 56, and 70 of the '674 patent and claims 1, 22, 55, and 56 of
the '7 49 patent.
11

Plaintiff's proposal that a "messaging broker" may be hardware finds no support
in the specification. Plaintiff cites only to an extrinsic document from April 2008 as
support.

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supported by the specification, which states that "[t]his messaging broker permits
certain sophisticated messaging uses, such as message queuing, some data
translation, etc." (3:53-54 (emphasis added))
9. "Central message repository:" 12 "Database for storing monitoring
messages from more than one process, sub-process, or activity." The specification
states that "the terms 'repository' and 'database' are used interchangeably .... " (3:6365) "The monitoring message with its data is then sent from the messaging broker to a
central database repository or database .... " (3:61-65) Contrary to plaintiff's
proposed construction and as explained by the specification, other data "aside from that
contained in the original message" may be part of the monitoring message. 13 (3:17-19,
4:22-23)
10. "Providing, through a monitoring message, at least part of said original
message data to a central message repository:" 14 "Sending, through a messaging
broker, the monitoring message, with at least part of said original message data to a
central message repository." This construction is supported by the specification which
explains that the messaging broker creates a monitoring message and then sends it to

12

Claims 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 38, 46, 51, 55, 70, 75, and 76 of the '674 patent and
claims 1, 22, 27, 28, 55, and 56 of the '749 patent.
13

Having reviewed the declaration in the reexamination file (D.I. 85, ex. Kat JA546, 548), the court concludes that plaintiff did not "unmistakably disavow[] writing the
monitoring message as records to a flat file or database during the reexamination."
(D.I. 101 at 9). Therefore, the court declines to add defendants' proposed limitation
regarding the format of the monitoring messages.
14

Claims 1, 46 and 51 of the '674 patent and claims 1, 55, and 56 of the '749

patent.

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the central database repository. (3:61-63, 4:16-19) While plaintiff argues that
construction of this limitation is unnecessary, the parties agree that the monitoring
message is created by the messaging component of a messaging broker and that the
monitoring message is sent from the messaging broker to a central message repository.
(See, D.I. 85, ex.Kat JA-582-583, Patent owner's response to final office action)
Therefore, the action of "providing" in this claim limitation is performed "through a
messaging broker" and the addition of such limitation to the construction is appropriate.
11. "Transaction record:" 15 "A record in the central message repository."
Defendants' additional limitation that such record "contains all of the monitoring
message data for a process" is not supported by the specification. The "transaction
record" is updated as "monitoring messages progress through any given process and/or
sub-process." (4:60-62) Only "[o]nce the monitoring messages complete the
transaction record, [is] all of the information needed to measure that transaction through
the process ... contained in one record in the central message database." (4:59-66)
Some embodiments provide real-time tracking of the progress of transaction records.
(5:22-24)
12. "Orders:" 16 "Request to purchase, sell, or supply goods or to perform
work." The specification describes "taking orders and turning those orders into
revenue," as well as, monitoring pipeline capacity to "sell, trade or barter ... unused
capacity." (1 :27-28; 5:26-32)

15

Claims 1, 46, 51, 57, and 70 of the '674 patent and claims 1, 2, 22, 55, and 56
of the '7 49 patent.
16

Claim 44 and 82 of the '67 4 patent and claim 37 of the '7 49 patent.

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13. "Reviewing data collected in said transaction record." 17 The court
declines to construe this limitation. "Transaction record" is construed above.
14. "Reviewing said central message repository." 18 The court declines to
construe this limitation. "Central message repository" is construed above.
15. "Real time"/"real-time:" 19 "In a non-deferred manner." The specification
describes the use of "a 'real-time' tool[, which] may be used to track the progress of
transaction records and/or processes .... " (5:23-24)
16. "Transmitting said original message data from said first activity, via a
first monitoring message, to a central message repository:" 20 "Sending, through a
messaging broker, the original message data from said first activity, via a first
monitoring message, to a central message repository." "Transmitting said original
message data from said second activity, via a second monitoring message, to
said central message repository:" 21 "Sending, through a messaging broker, the
original message data from said second activity, via a second monitoring message, to
said central message repository." "Transmitting said original message data from
said first sub process, via a first monitoring message, to a central message

17

Claim 51 of the '674 patent and claim 2 of the '749 patent.

18

Claims 75 and 76 of the '674 patent and claims 27 and 28 of the '749 patent.

19

Claim 46 of the '67 4 patent and claim 29 of the '7 49 patent.

2

°Claim 70 of the '67 4 patent. The court declines to construe "transmitting" in
isolation as requested by the parties.
21

Claim 70 of the '674 patent.

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repository:" 22 "Sending, through a messaging broker, the original message data from
said first sub process, via a first monitoring message, to a central message repository."

"Transmitting said original message data from said second sub process, via a
second monitoring message, to said central message repository:" 23 "Sending,
through a messaging broker, the original message data from said second sub process,
via a second monitoring message, to said central message repository." As with the
"providing" limitation above, the addition of the limitation "through a messaging broker"
is appropriate.
17. "Secure basis:" 24 "Access on an authorized basis." The parties agree to
this construction.
18. The court has provided a construction in quotes for the claim limitations at
issue. The parties are expected to present the claim construction to the jury consistently
with any explanation or clarification herein provided by the court, even if such language
is not included within the quotes.

22

Claim 22 of the '7 49 patent.

23

Claim 22 of the '7 49 patent.

24

Claim 38 of the '67 4 patent.

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