UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS
TYLER DIVISION
EOLAS TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
Plaintiff,
v.
ADOBE SYSTEMS, INC. ET AL.,
Defendants.
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CIVIL ACTION NO. 6:09-CV-446 (LED)
DEFENDANT AMAZON.COM INC.’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES,
AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO PLAINTIFFS’ THIRD AMENDED PATENT
INFRINGEMENT COMPLAINT
Defendant Amazon.com, Inc. (“Amazon”) responds to Plaintiffs Eolas
Technologies, Incorporated’s (“Eolas”) and The Regents of the University of California
(“University”) (together, “Plaintiffs”) Third Amended Complaint for Patent Infringement
(“Complaint”) as follows:
ANSWER
Par ties
1.
Amazon denies that “[d]uring the last 15 years, Plaintiffs’ innovations have
enabled corporations around the world to enhance their products and improve their customers’
website experiences by enabling browsers, in conjunction with servers, to act as platforms for
fully interactive embedded applications” to the extent that Plaintiffs intend this allegation to
apply to Amazon. As to the remaining allegations, Amazon is without knowledge or information
sufficient to form a belief as to the truth of the statements in Paragraph 1 of the Complaint, and,
on that basis, denies those allegations.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 1
2.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 2 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
3.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 3 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
4.
Amazon admits the allegations in Paragraph 4 of the Complaint.
5.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 5 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
6.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 6 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
7.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 7 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
8.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 8 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
9.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 9 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
10.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 10 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
11.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 11 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 2
allegations.
12.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 12 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
13.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 13 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
J ur isdiction and Venue
14.
Amazon incorporates its responses contained in Paragraphs 1–13 as though fully
set forth here.
15.
Amazon admits that this Court has subject matter jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C.
§§ 1331 and 1338(a). Amazon admits that the Complaint purports to be an action that arises
under the patent laws of the United States, 35 U.S.C. § 1 et seq, but denies any wrongdoing or
liability on its own behalf for the reasons stated herein. Except as so expressly admitted herein,
Amazon denies the allegations in Paragraph 15 of the Complaint.
16.
Amazon admits that the Complaint alleges that personal jurisdiction over
defendants exists generally and specifically.
Amazon admits that it operates a website,
www.amazon.com, that may be accessed from anywhere in the world, including the Eastern
District of Texas. Amazon denies that it has committed any acts of infringement within this
district and specifically denies any wrongdoing, infringement, inducement of infringement or
contribution to infringement. Amazon lacks sufficient knowledge or information regarding the
other defendants and on that basis denies the allegations of Paragraph 16 with respect to the other
defendants. Except as so expressly admitted herein, Amazon denies the allegations in Paragraph
16 of the Complaint.
17.
Amazon denies that venue is appropriate in this district and moved to transfer
venue.
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Patent Infr ingement
18.
Amazon incorporates its responses contained in Paragraphs 1–17 as though fully
set forth here.
19.
Amazon admits that U.S. Pat. No. 5,838,906 (“the ’906 patent”) is entitled
“Distributed hypermedia method for automatically invoking external application providing
interaction and display of embedded objects within a hypermedia document” and Amazon admits
that U.S. Pat. No. 7,599,985 (“the ’985 patent”) is entitled “Distributed hypermedia method and
system for automatically invoking external application providing interaction and display of
embedded objects within a hypermedia document.” Amazon admits that the issue date on the
face of the ’906 patent is November 17, 1998, and Amazon admits that the issue date on the face
of the ’985 patent is October 6, 2009. Amazon denies that either the ’906 patent or the ’985
patent was “duly and legally issued.” Except as so expressly admitted, Amazon denies the
allegations in Paragraph 19 of the Complaint.
20.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 20 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
21.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 21 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
22.
Amazon denies the allegations in Paragraph 22 of the Complaint.
23.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 23 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
24.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 24 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
25.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 4
truth of the statements in Paragraph 25 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
26.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 26 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
27.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 27 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
28.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 28 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
29.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 29 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
30.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 30 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
31.
Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as to the
truth of the statements in Paragraph 31 of the Complaint, and, on that basis, denies those
allegations.
32.
Amazon denies the allegations contained in Paragraph 32 of the Complaint as to
Amazon. As to the other defendants, Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to
form a belief as to the truth of the statements in Paragraph 32 of the Complaint, and, on that
basis, denies those allegations.
33.
Amazon denies the allegations contained in Paragraph 33 of the Complaint as to
Amazon. As to the other defendants, Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to
form a belief as to the truth of the statements in Paragraph 33 of the Complaint, and, on that
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 5
basis, denies those allegations.
34.
Amazon denies the allegations contained in Paragraph 34 of the Complaint as to
Amazon. As to the other defendants, Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to
form a belief as to the truth of the statements in Paragraph 34 of the Complaint, and, on that
basis, denies those allegations.
35.
Amazon denies the allegations contained in Paragraph 35 of the Complaint as to
Amazon. As to the other defendants, Amazon is without knowledge or information sufficient to
form a belief as to the truth of the statements in Paragraph 35 of the Complaint, and, on that
basis, denies those allegations.
Pr ayer For Relief
36.
Amazon denies that Plaintiffs are entitled to any of the relief sought in their
prayer for relief. Amazon has not directly or indirectly infringed any claims of the ’906 or ’985
patents, either literally or by the doctrine of equivalents, willfully or otherwise. Plaintiffs are not
entitled to recover statutory damages, compensatory damages, enhanced damages, an accounting,
injunctive relief, costs, fees, interest, or any other type of recovery from Amazon. Plaintiffs’
prayer should, therefore, be denied in its entirety and with prejudice, and Plaintiffs should take
nothing.
AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES
Further answering Plaintiffs’ complaint, Amazon asserts the following affirmative
defenses, without assuming any burden of proof that it would not otherwise bear. Amazon
reserves the right to amend its answer as additional information is obtained.
Background and Facts
37.
Michael D. Doyle (“Doyle”) is one of the named inventors of the ’906 patent and
the ’985 patent.
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38.
The University is the owner and named assignee of the ’906 patent and the ’985
39.
Charles E. Krueger (“Krueger”) was the patent prosecutor for the patents-in-suit,
patent.
the ’906 and the ’985 patents.
40.
Doyle, as the named inventor, the University, as the owner, and Krueger, as the
patent prosecutor, each had a duty of candor and good faith in dealing with the United States
Patent and Trademark Office (“the Patent Office”) during prosecution of the ’906 and ’985
patents.
41.
Krueger’s, the University’s, and Doyle’s duty of candor and good faith also
existed during the reexaminations of the ’906 patent.
42.
The duty of candor and good faith owed by Krueger, Doyle, and the University
included a duty to disclose to the Patent Office all information known to that individual to be
material to patentability as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.56.
43.
On information and belief, Doyle and the University had a financial incentive to
deceive the Patent Office.
44.
On information and belief, Doyle and the University had a financial incentive to
deceive the Patent Office during prosecution of the ’906 patent, during the reexaminations of the
’906 patent, and during the prosecution of the ’985 patent.
45.
On information and belief, Doyle was the Director of the Center for Knowledge
and Technology at the University’s San Francisco campus when he allegedly conceived of the
inventions claimed in the ’906 and ’985 patents. Importantly, while serving as Director for the
University, Doyle became aware of a prior invention to the ‘906 and ‘985 patents by Pei Wei, a
former University student.
Nevertheless, Doyle and the University intentionally failed to
disclose this information to the Patent Office when applying for the patent and, instead, ignored
and buried the work of a former University student to advance their own financial interests.
46.
On information and belief, the ’906 and ’985 patents are owned by the University.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 7
47.
On information and belief, the University is entitled to receive royalties related to
the ’906 and/or ’985 patents.
48.
On information and belief, Doyle and his co-inventors are entitled to receive a
portion of any royalties paid to the University related to the ’906 and/or ’985 patents.
49.
On information and belief, Doyle is a founder of one of the plaintiffs in this
action, Eolas.
50.
After learning of Pei Wei’s invention, on information and belief, Doyle quit his
job at the University’s San Francisco campus to found Eolas, and personally invested time and
money in Eolas.
51.
On information and belief, Doyle has had a financial interest in Eolas since at
least August 21, 1995.
52.
On information and belief, on or about August 21, 1995, Eolas acquired certain
rights to the patent application that matured into the ’906 patent from the University.
53.
On information and belief, Doyle was personally involved in the prosecution of
the ’906 patent, the reexaminations of the ’906 patent, and the prosecution of the ’985 patent at
the same time that he had a financial interest in Eolas and a financial interest in any royalties on
the ’906 and/or ’985 patents paid to the University.
54.
As explained in more detail below, on information and belief, Krueger, Doyle,
and the University breached the duty of candor and good faith in dealing with the Patent Office.
On information and belief, Krueger, Doyle, and the University failed to disclose material
information and made affirmative misrepresentations of material facts. On information and
belief, Krueger, Doyle, and the University did so with knowledge of the information withheld,
with knowledge of the falsity of the misrepresentations, and with the specific intent to deceive
the Patent Office. The circumstances of Krueger’s, Doyle’s, and the University’s intentional
contrived plan and actions confirm their specific intent to deceive the Patent Office.
55.
As explained in more detail below, on information and belief, Krueger, Doyle,
and the University breached the duty of candor and good faith in dealing with the Patent Office
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by failing to disclose material information related to the ViolaWWW browser. On information
and belief, Krueger, Doyle, and the University did so with knowledge of the information they
withheld and with the specific intent to deceive the Patent Office.
The circumstances of
Krueger’s, Doyle’s, and the University’s actions confirm an intent to deceive the Patent Office.
56.
As explained in more detail below, on information and belief, the ViolaWWW
browser was material to the patentability of all the claims of the ’906 patent because it disclosed
limitations that the Patent Office believed were missing in the prior art, including interactivity
embedded within the webpage (as opposed to a separate window), automatic invocation of the
interactivity (as opposed to requiring a mouse click to enable the interactivity), and use of a
separate executable application (as opposed to a script). On information and belief, Krueger,
Doyle, and the University knew that the ViolaWWW browser disclosed these limitations, yet
they specifically and intentionally withheld this information from the Patent Office at the same
time that they argued to the Patent Office that these limitations were missing from the prior art.
57.
The application for the ’906 patent was filed on October 17, 1994.
58.
Thus the critical date for purposes of 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) was October 17, 1993.
Any printed publication describing the claimed invention, or any public use of the claimed
invention in the United States, before October 17, 1993, would be an absolute bar to
patentability.
59.
On information and belief, Doyle and the University knew before the application
for the ’906 patent was filed that a former University student who livedin Northern California
named Pei Wei had developed a browser called “ViolaWWW” before the critical date of October
17, 1993.
60.
On information and belief, Pei Wei was a student at the University of California,
Berkley while he was developing ViolaWWW. While a student at the University’s Berkeley
campus, Pei Wei submitted ViolaWWW as his project to join a student organization at the
University known as the eXperimental Computing Facility (“XCF”). Indeed, Pei Wei worked on
and developed ViolaWWW at the XCF while attending the University’s Berkeley campus. The
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purpose of the XCF was to produce computer science projects that would be released to the
public. The University encouraged the XCF students to develop these projects and to release
them to the public. For example, Pei Wei posted numerous versions of ViolaWWW to a File
Transfer
Protocol
(“FTP)
site
hosted
by
the
University
of
California,
Berkeley
(ftp://xcf.berkeley.edu), as such, these projects were known by the University.
61.
On information and belief, on May 20, 1994, David Raggett sent an e-mail to
Doyle, the Director of the University’s Center for Knowledge Management at the San Francisco
campus. The e-mail concerned object level embedding in web browsers. In this email, Raggett
advised Doyle that he “might want to look at Viola which [Raggett] seem[s] to remember takes
advantage of the tk tool kit to provide a certain level of embedding.”
62.
On information and belief, Raggett further advised Doyle that he could “find a
pointer to Viola off the CERN WWW project page.”
63.
On information and belief, on May 20, 1994, the same day that Raggett advised
Doyle to look at Viola, David Martin, the Assistant Director of the University’s Center for
Knowledge Management as the San Francisco campus, who reported to Doyle and who was
ultimately named as an inventor on the ’906 patent, responded to a posting from Pei Wei on a
publicly-accessible University of California e-mail distribution list. On information and belief,
Pei Wei’s post had included the following statements: “In order to do better testings and support
of ViolaWWW, I would like to solicit donations for guest accounts on the major Unix platforms.
. . . So, if your organization has some CPU crunchies to spare, good network connectivity, don't
have a firewall, want to help viola development, etc, please drop me a note. Based mostly on
network connectivity, I'll select one (maybe two) offer(s) for each different platform.” On
information and belief, David Martin’s response to Pei Wei included the following statements:
“I am willing to discuss providing accounts on SGI IRIX 5.x, Solaris 2.x, Alpha OSF/1. Please
let me know what you require in terms of disk space, compiler, utilities, etc...”
64.
On information and belief, by May 20, 1994 — several months before the
application for the ’906 patent was filed — Doyle and the University knew about the
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ViolaWWW browser of Pei Wei, the former University student.
65.
On information and belief, Doyle and/or the University did not disclose this
information to Krueger or Charles J. Kulas (“Kulas”), the patent prosecutor that filed the ’906
patent application, prior to the filing of the application that lead to the ’906 patent.
66.
On information and belief, Doyle, and the University as Doyle’s employer,
learned even more about the ViolaWWW browser before the application for the ’906 patent was
filed.
67.
On information and belief, on August 30, 1994, at approximately 11:15 p.m.
California time, Doyle posted a “Press Release” to the publicly-accessible VRML e-mail
distribution list that included the following statements:
Researchers at the U. of California have created software for
embedding interactive program objects within hypermedia
documents. Previously, object linking and embedding (OLE) has
been employed on single machines or local area networks using
MS Windows -TM-. This UC software is the first instance where
program objects have been embedded in documents over an open
and distributed hypermedia environment such as the World Wide
Web on the Internet.
68.
On information and belief, on August 31, 1994, at approximately 6:52 p.m.
California time, Pei Wei posted a response on the publicly-accessible VRML e-mail distribution
list that included the following statements: “I don’t think this is the first case of program objects
embedded in docs and transported over the WWW. ViolaWWW has had this capabilities for
months and months now.”
69.
On information and belief, Pei Wei’s response included a link to an FTP site
where anyone “interested in learning more about how violaWWW does this embedded objects
thing can get a paper on it.”
70.
On information and belief, the paper cited by Pei Wei was entitled “A Brief
Overview of the VIOLA Engine, and its Applications” (“August 1994 Viola Paper”).
71.
On information and belief, the paper cited by Pei Wei was dated August 16, 1994
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— over two months before the application for the ’906 patent was filed.
72.
On information and belief, the paper cited by Pei Wei included the following
statements and graphics:
Embedding mini applications
Viola's language and toolkit allows ViolaWWW to render
documents with embedded viola objects. Although the viola
language is not part of the World Wide Web standard (yet?),
having this capability provides a powerful extension mechanism to
the basic HTML.
For example, if the HTML's input-forms do not do exactly what
you want, you have the option to build a mini customized inputform application. And it could have special scripts to check for the
validity of the entered data before even making a connection to the
server.
Or, if your document needs to show data that is continuously
updated, you could build a small application such as this which
display the CPU load of a machine. Note that only the graph field
is continuously updated, but not the rest of the document.
Other possible applications include front-ends to the stock market
quotes, new wire updates, tele-video style service, etc.
Here's another example of a mini interactive application that is
embedded into a HTML document. It's a chess board in which the
chess pieces are actually active and movable. And, illegal moves
can be checked and denied straight off by the intelligence of the
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scripts in the application. Given more work, this chess board
application can front-end a chess server, connected to it using the
socket facility in viola.
What follows is a screendump of a demo of an embedded viola
application that lets readers of this HTML page communicate by
typing or drawing. Like the chess board application above, this
chat application can stand-alone (and have nothing to do with the
World Wide Web), or be embedded into a HTML document.
By the way, to make this possible, a multi-threaded/persistent
server was written to act as a message relay (and to handle HTTP
as well).
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This next mini application front-ends a graphing process (on the
same machine as the viola process). An important thing to note is
that, like all the other document-embeddable mini applications
shown, no special modification to the viola engine is required for
ViolaWWW to support them. All the bindings are done via the
viola language, provided that the necessary primitives are available
in the interpreter, of course.
Put it another way, because of the scripting capability, the
ViolaWWW browser has become very flexible, and can take on
many new features dynamically. C-code patches and recompilation of the browser can frequently be avoided.
This attribute can be very important for several reasons. It keeps
the size of the core software small, yet can grow dynamically as
less frequently used features are occasionally used, or as new
accessories/components are added.
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Such new accessories can be as simple as little applets that
accompany documents, or conceivably as complicated as a news or
mail reader. An analogy is how Emacs's programming
environment allows that text editor to become much more than just
a text editor.
Not only can mini applications be embedded inside of documents,
they can even be plugged into the ViolaWWW's "toolbar".
The following picture shows a "bookmark tool" that acts as a mini
table of contents for the page. In this case, the bookmark is linked
to the document (by using the tag of HTML 3.0), and the
bookmark will appear and disappear with the document.
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One can imagine many plug-in accessories/applets/tools possible
with this facility. Like, a self guiding slideshow tool. Or, document
set specific navigational tools/icons that are not pasted onto the
page so that the navigational icons don't scroll away from view.
Etc.
73.
On information and belief, “Doyle downloaded and read the paper.” 399 F.3d
1325, 1330 (Fed. Cir. 2005).
74.
On information and belief, on August 31, 1994, at approximately 9:06 p.m.
California time, Doyle responded to Pei Wei’s statement at approximately 6:52 p.m. that “I don’t
think this is the first case of program objects embedded in docs and transported over the WWW.
ViolaWWW has had this capabilities for months and months now.” Doyle responded by asking
Pei Wei, “How many months and months? We demonstrated our technology in 1993.”
75.
On information and belief, on August 31, 1994, at approximately 11:16 p.m.
California time, Pei Wei responded to the message that Doyle had sent at approximately 9:06
p.m. Pei Wei’s response included the following statements:
Definitely by May 8, 1993 we had demonstrated that plotting demo
(the very one shown in the viola paper) to visitors from a certain
computer manufacturer… This demo was memorable because
someone and I at ORA had lost sleep the night before the meeting,
in order to cook up that particular plotting demo :) We had to
show something cool.
That demo wasn't very hard to do because by that time the basic
capability was already in place for violaWWW to fetch viola
objects over HTTP (or whatever) and plug them into documents.
Of course, our wire-frame plotting demo isn't anywhere as
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comprehensive as yours. But, the point was that there was a way
to embed programmable & interactive objects into HTML
documents.
76.
On information and belief, when Pei Wei referred to the “plotting demo (the very
one shown in the viola paper),” he was referring to the plot of the fighter jet shown above in the
window titled “XPlot.”
77.
On information and belief, when Pei Wei referred to a demonstration “by May 8,
1993” to “visitors from a certain computer manufacturer,” he was referring to a demonstration of
the plotting demo to Karl Jacob and James Kempf from Sun Microsystems on May 7, 1993.
This demonstration took place in Northern California. There was no limitation, restriction or
obligation of secrecy on Karl Jacob or James Kempf.
78.
The Federal Circuit has held that “Wei’s May 7, 1993 demonstration to two Sun
Microsystems employees without confidentiality agreements was a public use under [35 U.S.C.
§ 102(b)].” 399 F.3d 1325, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 2005).
79.
On information and belief, on August 31, 1994, at approximately 11:13 p.m.
California time, Doyle, using a University computer, responded again to the message that Pei
Wei had sent at approximately 6:52 p.m.
80.
On information and belief, Doyle’s response was sent after Doyle had read Pei
Wei’s August 1994 Viola paper.
81.
On information and belief, Doyle’s response included the following statements:
“Pei is mistaken on two counts, as I describe below. . . . As Pei’s paper on Viola states, that
package did not support what it calls ‘embeddable program objects’ until 1994. . . . Furthermore,
Viola merely implements an internal scripting language. . . .”
82.
On information and belief, on August 31, 1994, at approximately 11:36 p.m.
California time, Doyle responded to the message that Pei Wei had sent at approximately 11:16
p.m. Doyle’s response included the following statements: “Out of curiosity, did you publicly
demonstrate this or publish any results before 1994?”
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83.
On information and belief, on September 1, 1994, at approximately 12:08 a.m.
California time, Pei Wei responded to the message that Doyle had sent at approximately 11:13
p.m.
84.
On information and belief, Pei Wei’s message at approximately 12:08 a.m. was
also responsive to the message that Doyle had sent at approximately 11:36 p.m.
85.
On information and belief, Pei Wei’s message to Doyle at 12:08 a.m. included the
following statements:
Well. Viola’s model was *demonstrated* in 1993, *released*
freely in 1994. . . . And, as for the plotting demo, it actually is
really just a front-end that fires up a back-end plotting program
(and the point is that that back-end could very well be running on a
remote super computer instead of the localhost). For that demo,
there is a simple protocol such that the front-end app could pass an
X window ID to the back-end, and the back-end draws the graphics
directly onto the window violaWWW has opened for it.
86.
On information and belief, Doyle deleted from his computer his emails with Pei
Wei on August 31 and September 1, 1994, and the copy of the August 1994 Viola paper that he
had downloaded and read. Doyle kept on his computer other emails from that timeframe,
however. Indeed, on information and belief, all of Doyle’s email exchanges were made by using
the University’s computers and were sent over University servers.
87.
On information and belief, Doyle, as Director of the University’s Center for
Knowledge Management was living in Northern California on August 31, 1994, when he
exchanged messages with Pei Wei about the ViolaWWW browser.
88.
On information and belief, Pei Wei was living in Northern California on August
31, 1994, when he exchanged messages with Doyle about the ViolaWWW browser.
89.
On information and belief, there was no limitation, restriction or obligation of
secrecy on the recipients of Pei Wei’s messages on August 31 and September 1, 1994, about the
ViolaWWW browser.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 18
90.
On information and belief, there was no limitation, restriction or obligation of
secrecy on the readers of Pei Wei’s August 1994 Viola paper.
91.
On October 17, 1994, the application for the ’906 patent was filed. Doyle and
Martin were among those named as inventors, and the University was the owner.
92.
The application for the ’906 patent discloses the Mosaic browser and the Cello
browser, but fails to disclose the ViolaWWW browser, the browser developed by the
University’s former student, Pei Wei. Indeed, although known by the University and Doyle, the
application wholly failed to mention any work of Pei Wei, the Viola WWW browser, the prior
public demonstrations of the ViolaWWW browser, or Doyle’s knowledge that Pei Wei was the
prior inventor of the invention claimed by the application for the ‘906 patent.
Instead, the
University and Doyle chose to bury the work of Pei Wei, the University’s student, in order to
advance their own financial interests and causes in attempt to obtain a patent. The University
and Doyle failed to disclose this material information to the Patent Office with the specific intent
to deceive the Patent Office so that it would issue the patent.
93.
The application for the ’906 patent included an information disclosure statement
that identified several pieces of prior art, but failed to identify the ViolaWWW browser. Indeed,
although known by the University and Doyle, the information disclosure statement wholly failed
to mention any work of Pei Wei, the Viola WWW browser, the prior public demonstrations of
the ViolaWWW browser, or Doyle’s knowledge that Pei Wei was the prior inventor of the
invention claimed by the application for the ‘906 patent . Again, rather than candidly providing
full disclosure, the University and Doyle failed to disclose the work of the University’s own
student in order to advance their own financial interests in attempting to obtain a patent. Indeed,
Doyle and the University specifically buried Pei Wei’s work and intended to deceive the Patent
Office so that it would issue the patent to them.
94.
On November 22, 1994, Doyle, as director of the University’s Center for
Knowledge Management, signed a declaration under penalty of perjury that included the
following statements: “I believe I am . . . an original, first and joint inventor . . . of the subject
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 19
matter which is claimed and for which a patent is sought . . . the specification of which . . . was
filed on October 17, 1994 as Application Serial No. 08/324,443. . . . I acknowledge the duty to
disclose information which is material to the examination of this application in accordance with
Title 37, Code of Federal Regulations, Section 1.56.”
95.
On information and belief, neither Doyle nor the University ever disclosed the
ViolaWWW browser, the prior public demonstrations of the ViolaWWW browser, or their
knowledge that Pei Wei was the prior inventor of the invention claimed by the application for the
‘906 patent to the Patent Office during prosecution of application number 08/324,443, which
matured into the ’906 patent.
96.
On information and belief, Doyle was reminded about Pei Wei and the
ViolaWWW browser in 1995, during prosecution of the ’906 patent. Nevertheless, Doyle and
the University continued to secrete this information from the Patent Office and did not disclose
the ViolaWWW browser to the Patent Office with the specific intent to deceive the Patent
Office.
97.
On information and belief, on August 21, 1995, at approximately 11:42 a.m.
California time, Doyle posted a “Press Release” to the publicly-accessible WWW-talk e-mail
distribution list. Doyle’s post included the following statements: “Eolas Technologies Inc.
announced today that it has completed a licensing agreement with the University of California
for the exclusive rights to a pending patent covering the use of embedded program objects, or
‘applets,’ within World Wide Web documents.”
98.
On information and belief, on August 21, 1995, at approximately 12:54 p.m.
California time, Pei Wei responded on the publicly-accessible WWW-talk e-mail distribution list
to Doyle’s “Press Release.” Pei Wei’s response included the following statements: “[F]or the
record, I just want to point out that the ‘technology which enabled Web documents to contain
fully-interactive “inline” program objects’ was existing in ViolaWWW and was *released* to the
public, and in full source code form, even back in 1993... Actual conceptualization and existence
occurred before ‘93.”
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99.
On information and belief, on August 21, 1995, at approximately 1:14 p.m.
California time, Doyle responded to the message Pei Wei had sent at approximately 12:54 p.m.
Doyle’s response included the following statements: “We’ve had this discussion before (last
September, remember?). You admitted then that you did NOT release or publish anything like
this before the Eolas demonstrations.”
100.
On information and belief, on August 21, 1995, at approximately 4:09 p.m.
California time, Pei Wei responded to the message that Doyle had sent at approximately 1:14
p.m. Pei Wei’s response included the following statements:
Please carefully
demonstrated in
applets stuff was
visited our office
time).
re-read my letter to you... I said Viola was
smaller settings, but before your demo. The
demo’ed to whomever wanted to see it and had
at O’Reilly & Associates (where I worked at the
This is what I wrote on the VRML list:
....
> Definitely by May 8, 1993 we had demonstrated that plotting demo
> (the very one shown in the viola paper) to visitors from a certain
> computer manufacturer… This demo was memorable because someone
and I
> at ORA had lost sleep the night before the meeting, in order to cook up
> that particular plotting demo :) We had to show something cool.
That date (May 93), at least, predates your demo if I’m not
mistaken. Then around August 93, it was shown to a bunch of
attendees at the first Web Conference in Cambridge. . . .
....
If you’re talking about interactive apps *specifically* on the web,
ie applets in-lined into HTML documents etc., and with bidirectional communications, then look at ViolaWWW as it existed
around late ’92 early ’93.
101.
On information and belief, when Pei Wei referred to the “plotting demo (the very
one shown in the viola paper),” he was referring to the plot of the fighter jet shown above in the
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window titled “XPlot.”
102.
On information and belief, when Pei Wei referred to a demonstration “by May 8,
1993,” he was referring to the demonstration of the plotting demo to two Sun Microsystems
employees that the Federal Circuit has held “was a public use under [35 U.S.C. § 102(b)].” 399
F.3d 1325, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 2005).
103.
On information and belief, when Pei Wei referred to the “first Web Conference in
Cambridge” “around August 1993,” he was referring to the “World-Wide Web Wizards
Workshop” held in Cambridge, Massachusetts on July 28–30, 1993.
104.
On information and belief, people attending the Wizards workshop included Tim
Berners-Lee, Marc Andreessen, Eric Bina, Dale Dougherty, Scott Silvey, and Pei Wei.
105.
On information and belief, Tim Berners-Lee and Dale Dougherty were the
organizers of the Wizards workshop.
106.
On information and belief, Dale Dougherty worked at O’Reilly & Associates in
Northern California.
107.
On information and belief, in 1992, Dale Dougherty learned about Viola and
recruited Pei Wei to join O’Reilly & Associates. Pei Wei’s job at O’Reilly & Associates was to
continue developing the ViolaWWW browser.
108.
On information and belief, Scott Silvey worked with Pei Wei at O’Reilly &
Associates in Northern California.
109.
On information and belief, when Pei Wei wrote “This demo was memorable
because someone and I at ORA had lost sleep the night before the meeting, in order to cook up
that particular plotting demo,” the other person he was referring to was Scott Silvey.
110.
On information and belief, Tim Berners-Lee is the person generally attributed to
be the inventor of the World Wide Web.
111.
On information and belief, Marc Andreesssen and Eric Bina were the authors of
Mosaic, a popular browser for the World Wide Web created at the National Center for
Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 22
112.
On information and belief, Marc Andreessen and Eric Bina went on to found
Netscape, the manufacturer of another popular browser for the World Wide Web.
113.
On information and belief, Pei Wei and Scott Silvey demonstrated the
ViolaWWW browser and its ability to automatically invoke interactive objects embedded within
a webpage using the “VOBJF” tag to at least Marc Andreessen and Tim Berners-Lee at the
Wizards workshop in Cambridge, Massachusetts in July 1993 — over one year before the
application for the ’906 patent was filed.
114.
On information and belief, there was no limitation, restriction or obligation of
secrecy on anyone at the Wizards workshop.
115.
On information and belief, Pei Wei’s demonstration at the Wizards workshop of
the ViolaWWW browser and its ability to automatically invoke interactive objects embedded
within a webpage using the “VOBJF” tag was a public use under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b).
116.
On information and belief, despite Pei Wei’s communications to Doyle, the
Director of the University’s Center for Knowledge Management, repeatedly providing evidence
that the ViolaWWW browser was material prior art under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b), neither Doyle nor
the University ever disclosed the ViolaWWW browser to the Patent Office during prosecution of
application number 08/324,443, which matured into the ’906 patent.
117.
Indeed, Chris McRae, a University employee for the Center for Knowledge
Management at the San Francisco campus attended the Wizards workshop in July 1993. After
the workshop, McRae returned to the University and told the University’s Assistant Director
David Martin about the ViolaWWW browser and its capabilities. Although the University’s
management knew of ViolaWWW, still it failed to advise the PTO of the ViolaWWW browser,
the public demonstrations or the prior inventorship of Pei Wei of the invention claimed by the
application for the ‘906 patent.
118.
On information and belief, Doyle instead deleted from his computer his emails
with Pei Wei on August 21, 1995. Doyle kept on his computer other emails from that timeframe,
however.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 23
119.
On information and belief, in 1998, during prosecution of the ’906 patent, Doyle
collected additional information about the ViolaWWW browser, but he still did not disclose any
information about the ViolaWWW browser to the Patent Office, as explained in more detail
below.
120.
On information and belief, during prosecution of the ’906 patent, Doyle
maintained a folder called “Viola stuff.”
121.
On information and belief, the “Viola stuff” folder included a printout of Pei
Wei’s message to Doyle on August 31, 1994, at approximately 6:52 p.m. California time, in
which Pei Wei told Doyle, “I don’t think this is the first case of program objects embedded in
docs and transported over the WWW. ViolaWWW has had this capabilities for months and
months now.”
122.
On information and belief, the “Viola stuff” folder included a printout of Doyle’s
message to Pei Wei on August 31, 1994, at approximately 11:36 p.m. California time, in which
Doyle asked Pei Wei, “Out of curiosity, did you publicly demonstrate this or publish any results
before 1994?”
123.
On information and belief, the “Viola stuff” folder included a printout from the
URL . This webpage has a heading
for the “WWWWizardsWorkshop” “Cambridge, Mass, July 1993” and includes links to
“Announcement,” “Agenda,” and “Photos of attendees.”
124.
On information and belief, “WWWWizardsWorkshop” refers to the World-Wide
Web Wizards Workshop held in Cambridge, Massachusetts on July 28–30, 1993, that Pei Wei
attended.
125.
On information and belief, the “Announcement” link links to a webpage at
that states that “Interactive objects” would be discussed at the Wizards workshop.
126.
On information and belief, the “Agenda” link links to a webpage at
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that
states that “Interactive objects” was on the agenda for discussion at the Wizards workshop.
127.
On information and belief, the webpages for the Wizards workshop corroborate
Pei Wei’s statement to Doyle on August 21, 1995, that the plotting demo described in the August
1994 Viola paper was “shown to a bunch of attendees at the first Web Conference in Cambridge”
“around August 93” — over one year before the application for the ’906 patent was filed.
128.
On information and belief, the “Viola stuff” folder included a printout of a
webpage with a link to the source code for viola-2.1.2, archived on September 2, 1993 — over
one year before the application for the ’906 patent was filed.
129.
On information and belief, the “Viola stuff” folder included a printout of a
webpage with the “README” file for viola-2.1.2. The date at the top of the “README” file is
July 27, 1992. The “README” file includes instructions for building the binary code for the
“viola” program, and instructions for running the ViolaWWW browser. The “README” file
states at the bottom:
Comments and questions:
Please send WWW specific bugs to www-bugs@info.cern.ch,
general comments to www-talk@info.cern.ch, and anything to
wei@xcf.Berkeley.EDU.
Pei Y. Wei
wei@xcf.berkeley.edu
130.
On information and belief, the “Viola stuff” folder included a printout of a
message that Pei Wei had sent to the publicly-accessible WWW-talk e-mail distribution list on
January 28, 1994, that included the following statements: “Right now, the ViolaWWW that is
under development can embed viola objects/applications inside of HTML documents.”
131.
On information and belief, the “Viola stuff” folder included a printout of a
message that Pei Wei had sent to the publicly-accessible WWW-talk e-mail distribution list on
February 25, 1994, that included the following statements:
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The new ViolaWWW is now available for ftp’ing. It’s beta and
feedback is very welcomed. The README file follows…
==============================================
ViolaWWW, Version 3.0 Beta
Feb 23 1994
======================
ViolaWWW is an extensible World Wide Web hypermedia
browser for XWindows.
....
Notable features in the new ViolaWWW
------------------------------------------------....
* Embeddable in-document and in-toolbar programmable viola
objects. A document can embed mini viola applications (ie: a
chess board), or can cause mini apps to be placed in the toolbar.
....
Availability
--------------Source and binary can be found in ftp://ora.com/pub/www/viola.
Sparc binary is supplied.
....
Pei Y. Wei (wei@ora.com)
O’Reilly & Associates, Inc.
132.
The
“Viola
stuff”
folder
included
a
printout
from
the
. The printout included the following statements:
ViolaWWW, Version 3.1 Beta
======================
Mar 23 1994
ViolaWWW is an extensible World Wide Web hypermedia
browser for XWindows.
....
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URL
Notable features in the new ViolaWWW
------------------------------------------------....
* Embeddable in-document and in-toolbar programmable viola
objects. A document can embed mini viola applications (ie: a
chess board), or can cause mini apps to be placed in the toolbar.
....
Availability
--------------Source and binary can be found in ftp://ora.com/pub/www/viola.
Sparc binary is supplied.
....
Pei Y. Wei (wei@ora.com)
O’Reilly & Associates, Inc.
133.
On information and belief, the “Viola stuff” folder included a printout from the
URL .
One of the files listed in the
printout is named “plotDemo.html”.
134.
On information and belief, the “Viola stuff” folder included a printout from the
URL . One of the files listed in the printout
is named “plot.v”.
135.
On information and belief, the following is a screenshot of the ViolaWWW
browser after parsing the file plotDemo.html:
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 27
136.
On information and belief, the files plotDemo.html and plot.v include code for the
plotting demo described in the August 1994 Viola paper .
137.
On information and belief, the file plotDemo.html specifies the location of the file
plot.v, which in turn specifies the location of a separate executable application named vplot.
138.
On information and belief, Pei Wei had told Doyle on August 31, 1994 how the
plotting demo worked: “[A]s for the plotting demo, it actually is really just a front-end that fires
up a back-end plotting program (and the point is that that back-end could very well be running
on a remote super computer instead of the localhost). For that demo, there is a simple protocol
such that the front-end app could pass an X window ID to the back-end, and the back-end draws
the graphics directly onto the window violaWWW has opened for it.”
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 28
139.
On information and belief, Pei Wei had told Doyle on August 31, 1994, and again
on August 21, 1995 that the plotting demo described in the August 1994 Viola paper was the
“very one” demonstrated “to visitors from a certain computer manufacturer” by May 8, 1993.
140.
On information and belief, when Pei Wei referred to a demonstration “by May 8,
1993,” he was referring to the demonstration of the plotting demo to two Sun Microsystems
employees that the Federal Circuit has held “was a public use under [35 U.S.C. § 102(b)].” 399
F.3d 1325, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 2005).
141.
On information and belief, during prosecution of the ’906 patent, Doyle knew
about Pei Wei’s demonstration of the plotting demo that the Federal Circuit has held was a
“public use” under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b); Doyle knew how the plotting demo worked; and Doyle
had access to the code for that plotting demo.
142.
On information and belief, during prosecution of the ’906 patent, Doyle printed
webpages containing information about a talk that Pei Wei gave at Stanford University in
Northern California in September 1994.
143.
On information and belief, the webpages that Doyle printed included the
following statements and graphic:
WWW Browsers: Extensibility Issues
Pei Wei, O’Reilly & Associates
Stanford Computer Forum WWW Workshop - September 20-21,
1994
....
Extensibility in WWW Browsers
The WorldWideWeb is a powerful medium which has many
applications beyond just publishing static documents. It is
certainly an interface to the space of “documents.” But already,
with established features such as input-forms and server-side
scripting, we see that the web is also increasingly becoming an
interface to the space of what is traditionally called “applications.”
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 29
....
In this talk I’ll describe a few possible approaches for a browser to
gain more flexibility, and to briefly describe one particular
approach as implemented by a system known as ViolaWWW.
....
Possible Ways to Extend Browsers
We already do “extend” browsers with things like “external
viewers.” But there’s not a very good integration with the
browser. Ideally those external viewers should be rendering inplace inside the document, and be working together with the
browser, be tightly integrated with the browser and other parts…
....
Work at O’Reilly & Associates: VIOLA-WWW
....
This is the Viola system that is being developed at O’Reilly and
Associates.
This system has the following interesting
characteristics:
....
Three, program objects can be embedded into documents and the
toolbar. . . .
....
The next example is a front-end application to a backend. And the
back-end is what actually does the computation and the drawing.
....
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144.
On information and belief, there was no limitation, restriction or obligation of
secrecy on anyone attending the talk that Pei Wei gave at Stanford University in September
1994.
145.
On information and belief, the plotting demo described in the talk at Stanford
University in September 1994 is the same plotting demo described in the August 1994 Viola
paper.
146.
On information and belief, Pei Wei had told Doyle on August 31, 1994, and again
on August 21, 1995 that the plotting demo described in the August 1994 Viola paper was the
“very one” demonstrated “to visitors from a certain computer manufacturer” by May 8, 1993.
147.
On information and belief, when Pei Wei referred to a demonstration “by May 8,
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 31
1993,” he was referring to the demonstration of the plotting demo to two Sun Microsystems
employees that the Federal Circuit has held “was a public use under [35 U.S.C. § 102(b)].” 399
F.3d 1325, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 2005).
148.
On information and belief, during prosecution of the ’906 patent, Doyle was
repeatedly confronted with evidence that the ViolaWWW browser was material prior art under
35 U.S.C. § 102(b), yet Doyle never disclosed the ViolaWWW browser to the Patent Office
during prosecution of application number 08/324,443, which matured into the ’906 patent.
149.
On information and belief, the ViolaWWW browser, including the August 1994
Viola paper, was disclosed to Krueger in August of 1998, after the Notice of Allowance for the
’906 patent issued but before the ’906 patent issued, when he received a fax containing a number
of references regarding the ViolaWWW browser.
150.
On information and belief, the fax sent to Krueger in August of 1998 was to allow
him to analyze whether the ViolaWWW browser, including the August 1994 Viola paper, should
be submitted to the Patent Office.
151.
On information and belief, Kruger was aware of Pei Wei’s May 1993
demonstration of the ViolaWWW browser to Sun Microsystems employees without a
confidentiality agreements.
152.
On information and belief, Krueger considered Pei Wei’s statements regarding the
May 1993 demonstration of the ViolaWWW browser to Sun Microsystems employees when he
analyzed whether to disclose the ViolaWWW browser to the Patent Office.
153.
On information and belief, Krueger had no reason to disbelieve Pei Wei’s
statements regarding the May 1993 demonstration of the ViolaWWW browser to Sun
Microsystems employees.
154.
On information and belief, Krueger made the determination, prior to the issuance
of the ’906 patent, to not disclose to the PTO the information he received regarding the
ViolaWWW browser.
155.
On information and belief, the ViolaWWW browser was material to the
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 32
patentability of the claimed inventions in the ’906 patent.
156.
On information and belief, there is a remarkable similarity between the
ViolaWWW browser and the preferred embodiment of the ’906 patent:
ViolaWWW
Fig. 9 of U.S. Patent No. 5,838,906
Both the ViolaWWW browser (on the left) and the preferred embodiment of the
’906 patent (on the right) enabled a user to interact with a 3-dimensional image
embedded in the middle of a webpage. In the ViolaWWW screenshot above,
there are three slide controls to the right of the embedded image that move up and
down; these rotate the embedded image on the X, Y, and Z axes. Similarly, in the
preferred embodiment of the ’906 patent shown above, box 354 has three slide
controls to the right of the embedded image that rotate the image on the X, Y, and
Z axes. Thus, ViolaWWW, like the ’906 patent, teaches a browser capable of
displaying embedded interactive objects.
157.
The Manual of Patent Examining Procedure in force at the time the application
for the ’906 patent was filed included the following statements:
Materiality is defined in 37 CFR 1.56(b) and discussed herein at
MPEP § 2001.05. In addition to prior art such as patents and
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publications, 37 CFR 1.56 includes, for example, information on
possible prior public uses, sales, offers to sell, derived knowledge,
prior invention by another, inventorship conflicts, and the like.
[emphasis in bold added]
158.
The Manual of Patent Examining Procedure in force today contains similar
language:
Materiality is defined in 37 CFR 1.56(b) and discussed herein at
MPEP § 2001.05. In addition to prior art such as patents and
publications, 37 CFR 1.56 includes, for example, information on
>enablement,< possible prior public uses, sales, offers to sell,
derived knowledge, prior invention by another, inventorship
conflicts, and the like. >“Materiality is not limited to prior art but
embraces any information that a reasonable examiner would be
substantially likely to consider important in deciding whether to
allow an application to issue as a patent.” Bristol-Myers Squibb
Co. v. Rhone-Poulenc Rorer, Inc., 326 F.3d 1226, 1234, 66
USPQ2d 1481, 1486 (Fed. Cir. 2003) (emphasis in original)
(finding article which was not prior art to be material to
enablement issue).< [emphasis in bold added]
159.
The Federal Circuit has confirmed that the ViolaWWW browser was material to
the patentability of the claimed inventions in the ’906 patent.
160.
The Federal Circuit held that a reasonable jury could find at least claims 1 and 6
of the ’906 patent anticipated by the ViolaWWW browser under 35 U.S.C. § 102(a), (b), and/or
(g). See 399 F.3d 1325, 1329, 1332–35 (Fed. Cir. 2005).
161.
The Federal Circuit held that “Wei’s May 7, 1993 demonstration to two Sun
Microsystems employees without confidentiality agreements was a public use under [35 U.S.C.
§ 102(b)].” 399 F.3d 1325, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 2005).
162.
The Federal Circuit held that a reasonable jury could find at least claims 1 and 6
of the ’906 patent obvious in light of the ViolaWWW browser. See 399 F.3d 1325, 1335 (Fed.
Cir. 2005).
163.
The Federal Circuit held that a district court could find that Doyle had committed
inequitable conduct by failing to disclose the ViolaWWW browser to the Patent Office. See 399
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 34
F.3d 1325, 1336 (Fed. Cir. 2005).
164.
On information and belief, Krueger was aware that the Federal Circuit confirmed
that the ViolaWWW browser was material to the patentability of the claimed invention in the
’906 patent, but he still did not discuss the ViolaWWW browser further with Doyle.
165.
On information and belief, even after Krueger was aware that the Federal Circuit
confirmed that the ViolaWWW browser was material to the patentability of the claimed
invention in the ’906 patent he did not disclose any additional information to help the Patent
Office consider ViolaWWW browser.
166.
The Patent Office has also confirmed that the ViolaWWW browser was material
to the patentability of the claimed inventions in the ’906 patent.
167.
On or about July 30, 2007, during the 2005 reexamination of the ’906 patent, the
Patent Office rejected all claims of the ’906 patent as being anticipated by DX95, which includes
a copy of the text found in Pei Wei’s August 1994 Viola paper.
168.
On information and belief, Pei Wei had told Doyle on August 31, 1994, about the
August 1994 Viola paper and Doyle had downloaded and read that paper the same day, yet
Doyle never disclosed the Viola paper to the Patent Office during the original examination of the
’906 patent.
169.
On information and belief, the fact that Doyle may have conceived of the
inventions claimed in the ’906 patent before August 16, 1994, does not render the August 1994
Viola paper immaterial, because the Viola paper describes features of the ViolaWWW browser
that existed before the invention date for the ’906 patent and/or over one year before the
application for the ’906 patent was filed.
170.
On information and belief, the plotting demo described in the August 1994 Viola
paper was part of the ViolaWWW browser software that was demonstrated to Sun Microsystems
on May 7, 1993 — over one year before the application for the ’906 patent was filed.
171.
On information and belief, none of the claimed inventions in the ’906 patent was
conceived before August 1993.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 35
172.
On information and belief, the ViolaWWW browser software that was described
in the August 1994 Viola paper and demonstrated to Sun Microsystems on May 7, 1993, also
corroborates anticipation of the claimed inventions in the ’906 patent under 35 U.S.C. § 102(g).
173.
Neither reexamination of the ’906 patent considered whether the claimed
inventions were anticipated by “Wei’s May 7, 1993 demonstration to two Sun Microsystems
employees without confidentiality agreements” which the Federal Circuit has held was a “public
use under [35 U.S.C. § 102(b)].” 399 F.3d 1325, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 2005).
174.
In an ex parte reexamination, “[r]ejections will not be based on matters other than
patents or printed publications, such as public use.” See Manual of Patent Examining Procedure
(MPEP) § 2258(I).
175.
On information and belief, Krueger new that the Patent Office could not consider
public use art during an ex parte reexamination.
176.
The Patent Office had the authority during the original examination of the ’906
patent to issue a rejection based on the “public use” provision of 35 U.S.C. § 102(b), but Doyle
and, Krueger never disclosed to the Patent Office during that examination the evidence they had
in their possession that the ViolaWWW browser was in “public use” more than one year before
the application for the ’906 patent was filed.
177.
On information and belief, the Patent Office would not have allowed the claims of
the ’906 patent if Doyle, Krueger, or the University had not engaged in inequitable conduct and
instead had fulfilled their duty of candor and good faith in dealing with the Patent Office.
178.
During prosecution of application number 08/324,443, which matured into the
’906 patent, Doyle, Krueger, and the University withheld extensive evidence about the
ViolaWWW browser.
179.
On information and belief, Doyle and the University failed to disclose the
following material information: the message from Raggett about the ViolaWWW browser and
embedded objects; the communications with Pei Wei in 1994 about the ViolaWWW browser and
the embedded interactive plotting demo that was in public use in May 1993; the August 1994
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 36
Viola paper describing the ViolaWWW browser and the embedded interactive plotting demo that
was in public use in May 1993; the communications with Pei Wei in 1995 about the ViolaWWW
browser and the embedded interactive plotting demo that was in public use in May 1993 and
again at the Wizards conference in July 1993; the contents of the “Viola stuff” folder that Doyle
maintained, which included information about the Wizards conference in July 1993 and links to
the ViolaWWW browser software, including source code for the embedded interactive plotting
demo that was in public use in May 1993; and Pei Wei’s talk at Stanford in September 1994
about the embedded interactive plotting demo that was in public use in May 1993.
180.
On information and belief, Krueger failed to disclose a number of material
references and other prior art regarding the ViolaWWW browser including at least the August
1994 Viola paper, Doyle’s communications with Pei Wei in 1994 about the ViolaWWW browser
and the embedded interactive plotting demo that was in public use in May 1993; the Viola paper
describing the ViolaWWW browser and the embedded interactive plotting demo that was in
public use in May 1993; and the contents of the “Viola stuff” folder that Doyle maintained and
was faxed to Krueger in August of 1998, which included information about the Wizards
conference in July 1993 and links to the ViolaWWW browser software, including source code
for the embedded interactive plotting demo that was in public use in May 1993.
181. On information and belief, the University failed to disclose the following material
information: ViolaWWW code written on computers in the XCF lab and posted to the
University’s FTP sites, the message between David Martin and Pei Wei in May 1994 about
ViolaWWW, the ViolaWWW browser including at least the August 1994 Viola paper, the prior
public demonstrations of the ViolaWWW browser, and the emails asserting that Pei Wei was the
prior inventor of the invention claimed by the application for the ‘906 patent. On information
and belief, Doyle, Krueger, and the University withheld information about the ViolaWWW
browser with the specific intent to deceive the Patent Office.
182. On information and belief, Doyle and the University had a financial interest in the
patentability of the claimed inventions in the ’906 patent.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 37
183. On information and belief, the ViolaWWW browser threatened the patentability
of the claimed inventions in the ’906 patent, and thus threatened Doyle’s and the University’s
financial interests.
184. On information and belief, Doyle was personally involved in the prosecution of
application number 08/324,443, which matured into the ’906 patent.
185.
For example, Doyle signed a declaration on or about November 22, 1994, stating
that he was an inventor and acknowledging his duty of candor and good faith in dealing with the
Patent Office.
186.
On or about January 2, 1997, Doyle signed a declaration that was submitted to the
Patent Office in an effort to establish an earlier date of invention for the claims of the ’906 patent
application.
187.
On or about February 24, 1997, Doyle and Krueger participated in an examiner
interview in an effort to secure allowance of the claims of the ’906 patent application.
188.
On or about May 27, 1997, Doyle signed a 28-page declaration (including an
appendix) that was submitted to the Patent Office in an effort to establish himself as an “expert”
in the subject matter of the claimed invention and to overcome various obviousness rejections to
the claims of the ’906 patent application.
189.
On or about October 29, 1997, Doyle signed another declaration that was
submitted to the Patent Office in an effort to establish an earlier date of invention for the claims
of the ’906 patent application.
190.
On or about November 6, 1997, Doyle and Krueger participated in another
examiner interview in an effort to secure allowance of the claims of the ’906 patent application.
191.
On information and belief, Krueger lacked a technical degree in computer science
or electrical engineering, and thus he relied on Doyle to understand and describe the subject
matter of the claimed invention and the prior art.
192.
On information and belief, Doyle personally reviewed and approved papers
submitted to the Patent Office during prosecution of the ’906 patent.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 38
193.
Despite Doyle’s and Krueger’s extensive personal involvement in the prosecution
of application number 08/324,443, which matured into the ’906 patent, Doyle and Krueger never
disclosed the ViolaWWW browser to the Patent Office during that prosecution.
194.
The circumstances of Krueger’s and Doyle’s actions demonstrate an intent to
deceive the Patent Office.
195.
On information and belief, during prosecution of the ’906 patent, Doyle and
Krueger made arguments for patentability that could not have been made if they had disclosed
the ViolaWWW browser to the Patent Office.
196.
On or about May 6, 1996, the Patent Office rejected several claims as being
anticipated by the University of Southern California’s “Mercury Project.”
197.
On or about August 6, 1996, a response to this rejection was submitted to the
Patent Office.
198.
On information and belief, Doyle personally reviewed and approved the response
submitted to the Patent Office on or about August 6, 1996.
199.
The response submitted on or about August 6, 1996, included the following
statements:
The claimed combination is fundamentally different from the
Mercury Project. In the claimed combination, the external object
and executable object are embedded by reference in the HTML
document and the object is displayed and processed within the
same window where a portion of the original document is
displayed. In the Mercury Project information is passed back to
the server and a new document is generated and displayed. There
is no display and processing the external object within the window
in which a portion of the original document is displayed.
200.
If Doyle, Krueger, or the University had disclosed the ViolaWWW prior art to the
Patent Office, it would not have been possible to distinguish the claims of the ’906 patent over
the prior art on the basis that the prior art failed to disclose “display[ing] and processing the
external object within the window in which a portion of the original document is displayed.”
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 39
201.
On or about March 26, 1997, the Patent Office rejected several claims as being
obvious in light of “Khoyi et al. US Patent 5,206,951” in combination with other prior art.
202.
On or about June 2, 1997, a response to this rejection was submitted to the Patent
203.
Doyle and Krueger personally reviewed and approved the response submitted to
Office.
the Patent Office on or about June 2, 1997.
204.
The response submitted on or about June 2, 1997, included the following
statements:
[T]here is no suggestion in Khoyi of modifying Mosaic so that an
external application . . . is invoked to display and interactively
process the object within the document window while the
document is displayed by Mosaic in the same window.
205.
On information and belief, if Doyle, Krueger, or the University had disclosed the
ViolaWWW prior art to the Patent Office, it would not have been possible to distinguish the
claims of the ’906 patent over the prior art on the basis that the prior art failed to disclose “an
external application [that] is invoked to display and interactively process the object within the
document window while the document is displayed by [the browser] in the same window.”
206.
On or about August 25, 1997, the Patent Office rejected several claims as being
obvious in light of “Koppolu et al. US Patent 5,581,686” in combination with other prior art.
207.
On or about December 23, 1997, a response to this rejection was submitted to the
Patent Office.
208.
On information and belief, Doyle and Krueger personally reviewed and approved
the response submitted to the Patent Office on or about December 23 1997.
209.
The response submitted on or about December 23, 1997, included the following
statements:
[T]here is no disclosure or suggestion in Mosaic or Koppolu of
automatically invoking an external application when an embed text
format is parsed. Each of those references require user input,
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 40
specifically clicking with a mouse pointer, to activate external
applications to allow display and interaction with an external
object.
210.
On information and belief, if Doyle, Krueger, or the University had disclosed the
ViolaWWW prior art to the Patent Office, it would not have been possible to distinguish the
claims of the ’906 patent on the basis that the prior art failed to disclose “automatically invoking
an external application when an embed text format is parsed.”
211.
On information and belief, Doyle’s and Krueger’s repeated use of arguments that
could not have been made if Doyle, Krueger, or the University had disclosed the ViolaWWW
prior art demonstrates an intent to deceive the Patent Office.
212.
On information and belief, Doyle’s intent to deceive the Patent Office is also
demonstrated by comparing what he told an audience of web developers on or about March 27,
1995, to what he told the Patent Office on or about May 27, 1997.
213.
On information and belief, on or about March 27, 1995, Doyle responded to a
post on the publicly-accessible WWW-talk e-mail distribution list in which another author had
written, under the heading “HotJava is here! And it *rocks*,” “It’s the most exciting thing to
happen to the Web since viola.” On information and belief, Doyle’s response included the
following statements:
If you take a close look at Java, you’ll realize that it bears a close
similarity to Viola, since the “applets” must be coded from a
predefined language, downloaded and locally interpreted.
214.
On information and belief, on or about May 27, 1997, Doyle signed a declaration
that was submitted to the Patent Office. Doyle’s declaration included the following statements:
The three exemplary products which incorporate the
features of the claimed invention include Netscape Navigator 2.0
(or newer versions), Java, from Sun Microsystems, and ActiveX,
from Microsoft. . . . [T]he success of these products is directly
attributable to the claimed features of the invention.
....
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A good indicator that Sun Microsystems felt that enabling
interactivity in Web pages was the key feature of Java is given in
the first chapter of “Hooked on Java,” which was written by
members of the original Java development team. They say, “With
applets written in the Java programming language, Web users can
design Web pages that include animation, graphics, games, and
other special effects. Most important, Java applets can make
Web pages highly interactive.”
This statement shows that the developers of Java felt that
the most important feature of the Java technology was the ability
of Java to allow an embed text format (the applet tag) within a
Web document to be parsed by a Web browser to automatically
invoke an external executable application to execute on the client
workstation in order to display an external object and enable
interactive processing of that object within a display window
created at the applet tag’s location within the hypermedia
document being displayed in the browser-controlled window. The
book’s authors further emphasize the novelty and nonobviousness
of this technology when they say, “Quite simply, Java-powered
pages are Web pages that have Java applets embedded in them.
They are also the Web pages with the coolest special effects
around .... Remember, you need a Java-compatible Web
browser such as HotJava to view and hear these pages and to
interact with them; otherwise, all you'll access is static Web
pages minus the special effects.”
....
The above citations, as well as the additional details given
in Appendix A, provide ample evidence of the commercial success
of products incorporating features of the claimed invention, as well
as evidence of the widespread acclaim that these products have
garnered for the technical innovations which the features of the
claimed invention allowed them to provide. They further show
that the successes of these products was a direct result of the
features of the claimed invention, which they incorporated through
implementation of an embed text format that is parsed by a Web
browser to automatically invoke an external executable
application to execute on the client workstation in order to display
an external object and enable interactive processing of that object
within a display window created at the embed text format’s
location within the hypermedia document being displayed in the
browser-controlled window.
215.
The declaration Doyle signed on or about May 27, 1997, made no mention of
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 42
Viola or the ViolaWWW browser.
216.
On information and belief, Doyle’s and Krueger’s disclosure of Java for purposes
of commercial success, but not the ViolaWWW browser which Doyle knew was prior art that
existed over one year before the application for the ’906 patent was filed, demonstrates an intent
to deceive the Patent Office, especially given Doyle’s belief that Viola was similar to Java and
that Java embodied the claimed invention.
217.
Between 1999 and 2003, a third party disputed the validity of the ’906 patent.
218.
On information and belief, Doyle personally guided Eolas through the litigation
concerning the validity of the ’906 patent.
219.
On information and belief, throughout the litigation, the third party asserted that
the plotting demo involving the ViolaWWW browser anticipated the asserted claims of the ’906
patent.
220.
On information and belief, the plotting demo relied on by the third party to prove
anticipation of the asserted claims of the ’906 patent was the same plotting demo that Pei Wei
had repeatedly described to Doyle, and which the Federal Circuit has held was a “public use” on
May 7, 1993, 399 F.3d 1325, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 2005), and which Doyle himself came across from
his own research into Viola.
221.
On information and belief, in its contentions that the plotting demo involving the
ViolaWWW browser anticipated the asserted claims of the ’906 patent, the third party
specifically identified the VOBJF tag, the plot.v file, and the vplot executable application.
222.
On information and belief, on or about December 14, 2001, the third party served
an expert report by Dr. John P.J. Kelly, that included the following statements:
When
ViolaWWW
encountered
the
tag
/usr/work/viola/apps/plot.v, an embed text
format specifying the location of an object, it looked in the
specified path for at least part of the object, parsed the path, and
automatically loaded the object into the program. The file (plot.v)
also contained type information associated with the object, such as
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 43
the name and location of an external executable application, vplot,
that also was automatically invoked to enable display of and user
interaction with the object at a location within a display area within
the document being displayed in the browser-controlled window
corresponding to the location of the embed text format in the
document. Subsequently, when the user interacted with the object,
ViolaWWW sent messages to vplot based on the user input and
received output from vplot, thus updating the display of the object.
223.
On information and belief, at a trial in 2003 concerning the validity of the ’906
patent, Dr. Kelly testified that the plotting demo involving the ViolaWWW browser anticipated
the asserted claims of the ’906 patent, and he specifically identified the VOBJF tag, the plot.v
file, and the vplot executable application for purposes of his anticipation analysis.
224.
On information and belief, Pei Wei also testified at the trial in 2003 about the
ViolaWWW browser and the plotting demo.
225.
On information and belief, at the trial, exhibit DX34 included source code for the
ViolaWWW browser dated May 12, 1993.
226.
On information and belief, at the trial, exhibit DX37 included source code for the
ViolaWWW browser dated May 27, 1993.
227.
On information and belief, DX34 contains the code for the plotting demo that Pei
Wei demonstrated to Sun Microsystems on May 7, 1993, in Northern California.
228.
On information and belief, DX37 contains code for a plotting demo similar to the
plotting demo in DX34.
229.
On information and belief, on May 31, 1993, Pei Wei posted DX37 on a publicly-
accessible Internet site hosted by the University of California (xcf.berkeley.edu) and notified an
engineer at Sun Microsystems that DX37 was available for downloading.
230.
On information and belief, under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b), DX37 was a “printed
publication” over one year before the application for the ’906 patent was filed.
231.
On information and belief, Dr. Kelly testified that the plotting demo in DX34 and
DX37 anticipates the asserted claims of the ’906 patent. Dr. Kelly specifically identified the
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VOBJF tag, the plot.v file, and the vplot executable application for purposes of his anticipation
analysis of DX37.
232.
The Federal Circuit has held that Dr. Kelly’s testimony would allow a reasonable
jury to conclude that DX37 anticipates at least claims 1 and 6 of the ’906 patent. See 399 F.3d
1325, 1335 (Fed. Cir. 2005).
233.
On information and belief, neither Dr. Kelly nor the third party ever relied on
anything other than the plotting demo involving plot.v and vplot to prove anticipation by the
ViolaWWW browser.
234.
On information and belief, Dr. Kelly never discussed clock.v during the trial in
July and August 2003.
235.
On information and belief, Doyle and the University attended the trial involving
the third party held in July and August 2003.
236.
On information and belief, by the end of the trial in August 2003, Doyle and the
University knew about and understood the third party’s contention that the plotting demo
involving the ViolaWWW browser in DX37 anticipated the asserted claims of the ’906 patent.
237.
On information and belief, by the end of the trial in August 2003, Doyle and the
University knew about and understood Pei Wei’s testimony that on May 31, 1993 — over one
year before the application for the ’906 patent was filed — he posted DX37 on a publiclyaccessible Internet site hosted by the University of California (xcf.berkeley.edu) and notified an
engineer at Sun Microsystems that DX37 was available for downloading.
238.
On or about October 30, 2003, the Director of the Patent Office initiated a
reexamination of the ’906 patent. The control number for this reexamination was 90/006,831.
239.
On information and belief, during the 2003 reexamination, Doyle, the University,
and Krueger withheld information about the ViolaWWW browser with the specific intent to
deceive the Patent Office.
240.
On information and belief, Doyle and the University had a financial interest in the
patentability of the claimed inventions in the ’906 patent.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 45
241.
On information and belief, the ViolaWWW browser threatened the patentability
of the claimed inventions in the ’906 patent, and thus threatened Doyle’s and the University’s
financial interests.
242.
On information and belief, Doyle and Krueger were personally involved in the
2003 reexamination of the ’906 patent.
243.
On information and belief, on or about April 27, 2004, Doyle and Krueger
participated in an examiner interview in an effort to confirm the patentability of the claims of the
’906 patent application. On information and belief, Doyle gave the examiner a presentation
supported by approximately 22 slides prepared by Doyle and Krueger, none of which discussed
DX37 or the ViolaWWW browser. On information and belief, neither Doyle nor Krueger
mentioned the ViolaWWW browser during the interview.
244.
On or about May 6, 2004, Doyle signed a declaration that was submitted to the
Patent Office in an effort to confirm the patentability of the claims of the ’906 patent application.
This declaration made no mention of DX37 or the ViolaWWW browser.
245.
On information and belief, on or about August 18, 2005, Doyle and Kreuger
participated in an examiner interview in an effort to confirm the patentability of the claims of the
’906 patent application. On information and belief, Doyle gave the examiner a presentation
supported by approximately 36 slides, none of which discussed DX37 or the ViolaWWW
browser.
246.
On information and belief, during the 2003 reexamination, Doyle and Krueger
submitted selected information from the litigation with the third party concerning the validity of
the ’906 patent, but they withheld information that would have identified for the examiner the
key features of the prior art ViolaWWW browser and how they matched up to the asserted
claims of the ’906 patent. On information and belief, this proved critical during the 2003
reexamination because when the examiner decided to look at the source code for the
ViolaWWW browser, he missed the key points.
247.
On information and belief, on or about December 30, 2003, Doyle and Krueger
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submitted to the Patent Office a CD containing two compressed zip files, one for the “DX34”
version of the ViolaWWW source code dated May 12, 1993, and the other for the “DX37”
version of the ViolaWWW source code dated May 27, 1993.
248.
On information and belief, the compressed zip file for DX34 that Doyle and
Krueger submitted to the Patent Office was named viola930512.tar.gz.zip. When unzipped, it
contained 1,027 files in 35 folders consisting of 8 total megabytes in size.
249.
On information and belief, the compressed zip file for DX37 that Doyle and
Krueger submitted to the Patent Office was named violaTOGO.tar.Z.zip. When unzipped, it
contained 1,030 files in 34 folders consisting of 7.7 total megabytes in size.
250.
On information and belief, DX34 and DX37 contained source code for the
ViolaWWW browser.
251.
Source code cannot be executed by a computer. Source code must be compiled
into binary code before it can be executed by a computer.
252.
On information and belief, without the compiled binary code, and without a
suitable computer capable of executing that binary code (such as a Sun SPARCstation from the
early 1990s), the Patent Office had no practical way to see the ViolaWWW browser in operation.
253.
On information and belief, given the voluminous nature of the contents of DX34
and DX37, and the practical inability of the Patent Office to run the ViolaWWW browser on a
computer, it was especially important for Doyle and Krueger to be candid with the Patent Office
about the contents of DX34 and DX37 so that the Patent Office could focus on the relevant files.
254.
On information and belief, the University, Doyle and Krueger were not candid
and instead withheld material information that would have assisted the Patent Office in
understanding the contents of DX34 and DX37 with the specific intent to deceive the Patent
Office and to advance their own financial gain.
255.
On information and belief, the University, Doyle and Krueger did not disclose the
full contents of DX34 and DX37 in their entirety to the Patent Office during the first
reexamination of the ‘906 patent.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 47
256.
On information and belief, the full contents of DX34 and DX37 were not
submitted in their entirety until the Invention Disclosure Statement filed during the second
reexamination on November 1, 2006.
257.
On information and belief, during the 2003 reexamination, neither Doyle,
Krueger, or the University disclosed to the Patent Office the trial testimony of Pei Wei, who
testified about the plotting demo in DX34 and DX37; did not disclose the trial testimony of Dr.
Kelly, who testified that the plotting demo in DX34 and DX37 anticipated the asserted claims of
the ’906 patent; and did not disclose that Dr. Kelly specifically identified the VOBJF tag, the
plot.v file, and the vplot executable application for purposes of his anticipation analysis.
258.
On March 2, 2005 — while the 2003 reexamination was still pending — the
Federal Circuit held that Dr. Kelly’s testimony would allow a reasonable jury to conclude that
DX37 anticipates at least claims 1 and 6 of the ’906 patent. 399 F.3d 1325, 1335 (Fed. Cir.
2005).
259.
Even after the Federal Circuit’s decision, however, Doyle, Krueger, and the
University still did not disclose Dr. Kelly’s testimony to the Patent Office during the 2003
reexamination, nor did they disclose to the Patent Office that Dr. Kelly’s anticipation analysis
relied upon the VOBJF tag, the plot.v file, and the vplot executable application.
260.
On or about September 27, 2005, the examiner issued a statement for reasons of
patentability in which the examiner confirmed the patentability of claims 1–10 of the ’906
patent.
261.
On information and belief, the examiner’s statement never discussed the plotting
demo that Dr. Kelly had testified anticipated the asserted claims of the ’906 patent.
262.
On information and belief, when the examiner considered DX37, the examiner
did not know where to look or what to look for. There were too many files in DX37 for the
examiner to read himself. Thus the examiner was forced to resort to running text searches across
all the files in DX37 in the hope of stumbling across relevant information.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 48
263.
The examiner used the “dtSearch” program to index and text search all DX37
files that contained textual content. See http://www.dtsearch.com/.
264.
It is unclear what words the examiner searched for or how he came up with his
search terms.
265.
On information and belief, Doyle knew precisely what to look for, but he never
told the examiner. On information and belief, for example, if Doyle or Krueger had told the
examiner to look for plot.v, the examiner’s text searches would have quickly found the plotting
demo that Dr. Kelly had testified anticipated the asserted claims of the ’906 patent.
266.
On information and belief, the examiner’s text searches did not lead him to the
plotting demo, but instead led him to a clock application that used the file clock.v.
267.
On information and belief, the file clock.v is a script file that displays the image
of a clock. On information and belief, the clock application does not involve any separate
executable application. On information and belief, it just involves a webpage and the clock.v
script file.
268.
The examiner reasoned that a script file like clock.v does not satisfy the
“executable application” requirement of the claims of the ’906 patent, and thus the examiner
concluded that DX37 does not anticipate the asserted claims of the ’906 patent.
269.
On information and belief, the ViolaWWW source code teaches two ways of
creating interactive webpages using embedded applications. On information and belief, one way
is by using a simple script file, such as clock.v. On information and belief, all that is required is
a webpage (such as violaApps.hmml) and the script file (such as clock.v). On information and
belief, no binary executable application is involved. On information and belief, the other way
taught by the ViolaWWW source code does use a binary executable application (such as vplot)
in addition to a webpage and a file that contains the object (such as plot.v). On information and
belief, the examiner did not consider this second way during the 2003 reexamination; he only
considered the first way, and thus erroneously confirmed the patentability of the asserted claims
of the ’906 patent.
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270.
The examiner’s reasons for patentability included the following statements:
The Viola system uses “C-like” Viola scripts that must be
INTERPRETED by the browser and then TRANSLATED or
CONVERTED into binary native executable machine code that
can be understood by the CPU. Alternately, the Viola script is
precompiled into intermediate byte-code form and the byte-code is
interpreted (i.e., translated) into binary native executable machine
code at runtime. This extra step of translation results in an
unavoidable performance penalty, as interpreted applications run
much slower than compiled native binary executable applications.
Accordingly, the “C-like” Viola scripts (or corresponding bytecode representations) are not “executable applications” . . . .
271.
On information and belief, the examiner’s reasoning overlooked the fact that the
plotting demo in DX37 does use a separate executable application: vplot.
272.
On information and belief, Doyle, Krueger, and the University knew that the
plotting demo used a separate executable application, but Doyle and Krueger did not bring this
fact to the examiner’s attention and instead allowed the examiner to confirm the patentability of
the claims of the ’906 patent on the basis of an incomplete understanding of DX37.
273.
On information and belief, Doyle, Krueger, and the University knew that the
plotting demo used a separate executable application for at least the following reasons:
•
On information and belief, the August 1994 Viola paper, which states “This
next mini application front-ends a graphing process (on the same machine as
the viola process)” and which shows the plot of a fighter jet in a window titled
“XPlot.”
•
On information and belief, Pei Wei’s message to Doyle on September 1, 1994,
which included the following statements: “[A]s for the plotting demo, it
actually is really just a front-end that fires up a back-end plotting program
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(and the point is that that back-end could very well be running on a remote
super computer instead of the localhost). For that demo, there is a simple
protocol such that the front-end app could pass an X window ID to the backend, and the back-end draws the graphics directly onto the window
violaWWW has opened for it.”
•
On information and belief, the source code listed in the “Viola stuff” file
included the file plotDemo.html, which states, “This is a demo of ViolaWWW
embedding a viola front-ending object that is programmed to start up and
communicate with a plot process. The front-end tells the plot program the
window ID to draw to, and gives it the camera coordinate changes.” When
the file plotDemo.html is parsed, it shows the plot of a fighter jet in a window
titled “XPlot.”
•
On information and belief, Pei Wei’s presentation at Stanford in September
1994, which included the following statements: “The next example is a frontend application to a backend. And the back-end is what actually does the
computation and the drawing.” On information and belief, included with the
presentation was a screenshot of the ViolaWWW browser after parsing the
file plotDemo.html.
The screenshot shows the plot of a fighter jet in a
window titled “XPlot.” The text in the webpage states, “This is a demo of
ViolaWWW embedding a viola front-ending object that is programmed to
start up and communicate with a plot process. The front-end tells the plot
program the window ID to draw to, and gives it the camera coordinate
changes.”
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 51
•
•
274.
On information and belief, the trial testimony of Pei Wei.
On information and belief, the expert opinion of Dr. Kelly.
On information and belief, Doyle’s, Krueger’s, and the University’s failure to tell
the examiner about the vplot and plot.v files, and failure to disclose documents from the
litigation that identified how Dr. Kelly matched up the plotting demo in DX37 with the claims of
the ’906 patent, both alone and in combination with Doyle’s, Krueger’s, and the University’s
prior failure to disclose the ViolaWWW browser during the original prosecution of the ’906
patent, constituted a knowing and intentional violation of their duty of candor and good faith in
dealing with the Patent Office.
275.
On information and belief, the Patent Office would not have confirmed the
patentability of the claims of the ’906 patent that were the subject of the 2003 reexamination if
Doyle, Krueger, and the University had not engaged in inequitable conduct and instead had
fulfilled their duty of candor and good faith in dealing with the Patent Office.
276.
On or about December 22, 2005, a third party filed a request to reexamine the
’906 patent.
277.
On or about February 9, 2006, the Patent Office granted the request to reexamine
the ’906 patent. The control number for this reexamination was 90/007,858.
278.
On information and belief, Doyle and the University had a financial interest in the
patentability of the claimed inventions in the ’906 patent.
279.
On information and belief, the ViolaWWW browser threatened the patentability
of the claimed inventions in the ’906 patent, and thus threatened Doyle’s and the University’s
financial interests.
280.
On information and belief, Doyle and Krueger were personally involved in the
2005 reexamination of the ’906 patent.
281.
For example, on or about September 6, 2007, Doyle and Krueger participated in
an examiner interview in an effort to confirm the patentability of the claims of the ’906 patent
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 52
application.
282.
On or about October 1, 2007, Doyle submitted a declaration to the Patent Office
in an effort to establish an earlier date of invention for the claims of the ’906 patent application.
283.
On or about May 9, 2008, Doyle and Krueger participated in another examiner
interview in an effort to confirm the patentability of the claims of the ’906 patent application.
284.
On or about June 3, 2008, Doyle and Krueger participated in another examiner
interview in an effort to confirm the patentability of the claims of the ’906 patent application.
285.
On information and belief, Doyle’s and Krueger’s inequitable conduct during the
2003 reexamination infected the 2005 reexamination.
286.
On information and belief, although Doyle and Krueger disclosed material
information about the ViolaWWW browser to the Patent Office during the 2005 reexamination,
by that time it was too late.
287.
On information and belief, Doyle and Krueger disclosed the August 1994 Viola
paper to the Patent Office on or about August 21, 2006.
288.
On information and belief, this was the first time Doyle and Krueger had
disclosed the August 1994 Viola paper to the Patent Office.
289.
On information and belief, Doyle knew about the Viola paper no later than
August 31, 1994, but Doyle waited over 10 years — and two prosecutions of the ’906 patent —
to disclose that paper to the Patent Office.
290.
On information and belief, Krueger knew about the August 1994 Viola paper no
later than August of 1998, but waited 8 years – and two prosecutions of the ’906 patent – to
disclose that paper to the Patent Office.
291.
On information and belief, shortly after Doyle and Krueger disclosed the August
1994 Viola paper to the Patent Office during the 2005 reexamination, the Patent Office rejected
all claims of the ’906 patent.
292.
On information and belief, in particular, on or about July 30, 2007, the Patent
Office rejected all claims of the ’906 patent as being anticipated by DX95, which includes a copy
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 53
of the text found in Pei Wei’s August 1994 Viola paper.
293.
On information and belief, the rejection based on the August 1994 Viola confirms
that the ViolaWWW browser was material prior art.
294.
Doyle and Krueger did not respond to the merits of the rejection based on the
August 1994 Viola paper, however. Instead Doyle filed a declaration asserting that his date of
invention was before August 16, 1994.
295.
In response to Doyle’s declaration, the examiner withdrew the rejection based on
the August 1994 Viola paper.
296.
On information and belief, the 2005 examiner could have entered a new rejection
based on DX37, which was a printed publication before the alleged conception of the inventions
claimed in the ’906 patent, but the 2005 examiner did not independently examine DX37 because
the 2003 examiner had already concluded that DX37 did not invalidate the asserted claims of the
’906 patent.
297.
On information and belief, the conclusions about DX37 reached in the 2003
reexamination were erroneous due to Doyle’s, Krueger’s, and the University’s inequitable
conduct during that reexamination.
298.
Thus, Doyle’s, Krueger’s, and the University’s inequitable conduct during the
2003 reexamination infected the 2005 reexamination.
299.
During the original prosecution of the ’906 patent, Doyle submitted a declaration
to the Patent Office containing false and misleading statements in an effort to obtain allowance
of the claims.
300.
Specifically, on or about June 2, 1997, Doyle submitted to the Patent Office a
sworn declaration executed on or about May 27, 1997, for the purpose of overcoming the
examiner’s rejection on March 26, 1997.
301.
On page 12 of the declaration, Doyle asserted that his claimed invention would
not have been obvious over the cited prior art in view of “secondary considerations, including, in
part, commercial success of products incorporating features of the claimed invention and
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 54
industry recognition of the innovative nature of these products.”
302.
In support of his assertion, Doyle declared to the Patent Office that Sun
Microsystems and Netscape had incorporated his invention into their Java software and
Navigator Web browser, respectively. He stated: “Approximately 12 to 18 months after the
applicants initially demonstrated the first Web plug-in and applet technology to the founders of
Netscape and engineers employed by Sun Microsystems in November and December of 1993, as
described in reference #4 from Appendix A (Dr. Dobb’s Journal, 2/96), both Netscape and Sun
released software products that incorporated features of the claimed invention. . . .”
303.
On information and belief, this statement was false. On information and belief,
neither Doyle nor any of the other named inventors of the ’906 patent demonstrated Web plug-in
technology to any of the founders of Netscape in November or December of 1993.
304.
On information and belief, when Doyle made these statements under oath, he also
did not know whether any engineer employed by Sun Microsystems ever saw any of his
demonstrations in November or December of 1993.
305.
On information and belief, Doyle made these same false assertions in slides that
he prepared and presented to the examiner in a personal interview on or about February 24, 1997.
On information and belief, on a slide entitled “Relevant History of DHOE” (Doyle’s name for
his invention), Doyle included as a bullet point: “1993 Demos to Sun & Netscape’s Founders.”
306.
On information and belief, Doyle’s false statements in his declaration were
material to the patentability of the pending claims. These statements purported to provide
evidence of copying by others and thus objective evidence of non-obviousness, a factor to be
considered in determining whether an alleged invention is patentable over the prior art. On
information and belief, without these false assertions, Doyle had no support for his argument that
Netscape and Sun copied his alleged invention or that his technology was responsible for their
commercial success.
307.
On information and belief, by making these false statements under oath to the
Patent Office, Doyle intended to mislead the Patent Office to believe that responsible persons at
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 55
Netscape and Sun saw his alleged invention, appreciated its supposed merits, and therefore
incorporated it into the Navigator browser and Java. On information and belief, moreover, by
making these false statements, Doyle was trying to convince the Patent Office that the Netscape
and Sun products succeeded because they incorporated his alleged invention.
308.
On information and belief, Doyle’s submission of false statements under oath in
his declaration to the Patent Office constituted a knowing and intentional violation of his duty of
candor and good faith in dealing with the Patent Office.
309.
Because Doyle, Krueger, and the University committed inequitable conduct
during prosecution reexamination of the ’906 patent (reexamination application number
90/006,831), every claim of the ’906 patent is unenforceable in its entirety. The inequitable
conduct also renders unenforceable all claims that issue as a result of any reissue and
reexamination proceedings, including claims that issued from the reexaminations of the ’906
patent (reexamination application numbers 90/006,831 and 90/007,858).
310.
The ’985 patent is likewise unenforceable in its entirety due to Doyle’s,
Krueger’s, and the University’s inequitable conduct during the prosecution of the application that
the issued as the ’906 patent and Doyle’s, Krueger’s, and the University’s inequitable conduct
during the first reexamination of the ’906 patent (reexamination application number 90/006,831).
311.
Doyle’s, Krueger’s, and the University’s inequitable conduct during prosecution
of the application that issued as the ’906 patent relates, both immediately and necessarily, to the
claims of the ’985 patent.
312.
Doyle’s, Krueger’s, and the University’s inequitable conduct during the first
reexamination of the ’906 patent (reexamination application number 90/006,831) relates, both
immediately and necessarily, to the claims of the ’985 patent.
313.
The ’985 patent issued from an application that was a continuation application of
a continuation application of the application that issued as the ’906 patent, and the ’985 patent
claims priority to the ’906 patent.
The ’906 patent and the ’985 patent share the same
specification.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 56
314.
On July 20, 2004, the PTO determined that the claims pending in the application
that issued as the ’985 patent were identical in scope to or were obvious variations of the thenissued claims of the ’906 patent, which were confirmed in the first reexamination of the ’906
patent (reexamination application number 90/006,831) on June 6, 2006. Accordingly, the PTO
rejected the pending claims under the doctrines of statutory double-patenting and obviousnesstype double-patenting.
315.
On March 11, 2005, to overcome the double-patenting rejections, the owner of the
’985 patent cancelled one pending claim and filed a terminal disclaimer for the remaining claims.
It was not argued that the pending claims were patentably distinct from the then-issued claims of
the ’906 patent.
Based upon the foregoing background and facts, Amazon’s affirmatives defenses are
alleged below:
Failure To State A Claim
316.
The Complaint fails to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.
Non-Infr ingement
317.
Amazon does not and has not directly or indirectly infringed any valid claims of
the ’906 patent or the ’985 patent, either literally or under the doctrine of equivalents, willfully or
otherwise.
Invalidity
318.
The claims of the ’906 patent and the ’985 patent are invalid for failure to comply
with the requirements of Title 35 of the United States Code, including but not limited to
Sections 101, 102, 103, and/or 112.
Inequitable Conduct
319.
Amazon restates its responses set forth above in Paragraph 1 through 318 as if
separately set forth herein.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 57
320.
Although Plaintiffs allege in the Complaint that both the ‘906 and '985 patents
were duly and legally issued by the United States Patent and Trademark Office after full and fair
examination, each and every claim of both the ‘906 and '985 patents are unenforceable due to the
Plaintiffs’ inequitable conduct before, and fraud upon, the Patent Office.
321.
If the University, Doyle and/or Krueger had submitted the material information
regarding the ViolaWWW browser to the Patent Office during the initial examination of the ‘906
patent, neither the ‘906 nor the ‘985 patent would have issued. As such, information concerning
the printed publication, prior public use, and/or prior inventorship of the Viola browser and
system was material invalidating prior art.
322.
Doyle, Krueger and the University possessed a specific intent to deceive the
Patent Office into issuing the ‘906 and ‘985 patents.
323.
The University is a government institution, and therefore, held to a higher
standard of conduct.
As a government institution, the University’s intentional secreting of
material invalidating prior art evidence in order to advance its ability to obtain exclusive rights
for its own financial gain to the detriment of any University student is untenable. Further, under
these specific facts, the University’s request for exclusive right from another governmental
institution should not be allowed. As such, each claim of the ‘906 and ‘985 patents should be
held invalid and unenforceable.
Laches
324.
Plaintiffs’ claims for relief are barred in whole or in part by the doctrine of laches.
Statute of Limitations
325.
To the extent Plaintiffs seek damages for alleged infringement more than six years
prior to filing of this action, the relief sought by Plaintiffs is barred by 35 U.S.C. §§ 286 and/or
287.
License
326.
Plaintiffs’ claims against Amazon are barred to the extent that any of the allegedly
infringing products are directly or indirectly provided to Amazon from or by an entity, including
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 58
without limitation Microsoft Corp. and/or Apple, Inc., that has an express or implied license to
the ’906 patent or the ’985 patent.
Inter vening Rights
327.
Plaintiffs’ claims are improper to the extent that Plaintiffs assert infringement of
claims that are subject to the intervening rights of Amazon.
Patent Exhaustion
328.
Plaintiffs’ claims against Amazon are barred by the doctrine of patent exhaustion
to the extent Plaintiffs have already relinquished their rights to the ’906 patent or the ’985 patent.
Third-Party Beneficiary
329.
Plaintiffs’ claims against Amazon are barred to the extent that Amazon is a third-
party beneficiary to a license/agreement granting rights to the ’906 patent or the ’985 patent.
Equitable Estoppels
330.
Plaintiffs’ claims against Amazon are barred by the doctrines of equitable
estoppel, unclean hands and/or waiver.
Limitation of Damages
331.
Plaintiffs’ claims for damages, if any, against Amazon for alleged infringement of
the asserted patents are limited by 35 U.S.C. §§ 286, 287, and 288.
COUNTERCLAIMS
Par ties
332.
Amazon is a corporation organized under the laws of the State of Delaware and
having a principal place of business at 1200 12th Avenue South, Suite 1200, Seattle, Washington
98144.
333.
Eolas alleges that it is a corporation organized and existing under the laws of
Texas and having a principal place of business at 313 East Charnwood Street, Tyler, Texas
75701.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 59
334.
The University alleges that it is organized and existing under the laws of the
California, pursuant to Article IX § 9 of the California Constitution.
Jur isdiction and Venue
335.
These counterclaims arise under Title 35 of the United States Code. The Court
has subject matter jurisdiction over these counterclaims pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 1331, 1338(a),
2201, and 2202.
336.
Plaintiffs are subject to personal jurisdiction in this district because Plaintiffs filed
this action in this district.
337.
Venue is not is appropriate in this district and Amazon filed a motion to transfer
venue. However, Plaintiffs claim that venue is proper in this judicial district under 28 U.S.C.
§ 1391 because Plaintiffs filed this action in this district and Eolas purports to have a place of
business in this district.
Fir st Counter claim: Declar ator y Judgment
(Non-Infr ingement)
338.
Amazon restates its responses and allegations set forth above in Paragraphs 1
through 337 as if separately set forth herein.
339.
Amazon counterclaims against Plaintiffs pursuant to the patent laws of the United
States, Title 35 of the United States Code, and the Declaratory Judgments Act, 28 U.S.C.
§§ 2201 and 2202.
340.
An actual and justiciable controversy exists between Amazon and Plaintiffs with
respect to the non-infringement of the ’906 patent and/or the ’985 patent because Plaintiffs have
brought this action against Amazon alleging that Amazon is now and has been directly and/or
indirectly infringing the ’906 patent and/or the ’985 patent and that the ‘906 and ‘985 patents are
valid, enforceable and were “duly and legally issued.” Amazon denies this allegation. Absent a
declaration of non-infringement, Plaintiffs will continue to wrongfully assert the ’906 patent
and/or the ’985 patents against Amazon, and thereby cause Amazon irreparable injury and
damage.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 60
341.
Amazon has not directly or indirectly infringed, contributed to or induced
infringement of any claim of the ’906 patent or the ’985 patent either directly or indirectly,
literally or under the doctrine of equivalents, willfully, or otherwise. Amazon is therefore
entitled to a declaratory judgment to that effect pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 2201-2202
Second Counter claim: Declar ator y Judgment
(Invalidity)
342.
Amazon restates its responses and allegations set forth above in Paragraphs 1
through 341 as if separately set forth herein.
343.
Amazon counterclaims against Plaintiffs pursuant to the patent laws of the United
States, Title 35 of the United States Code, and the Declaratory Judgments Act, 28 U.S.C.
§§ 2201 and 2202.
344.
An actual and justiciable controversy exists between Amazon and Plaintiffs with
respect to the invalidity of the ’906 patent and/or the ’985 patent because Plaintiffs have brought
this action against Amazon alleging that it infringes the ’906 patent and/or the ’985 patent, and
Amazon denies this allegation and asserts that the ’906 patent and/or the ’985 patent are invalid.
The ’906 patent and the ’985 patent are invalid for failing to meet the conditions of patentability
as set forth in 35 U.S.C. §§ 101, 102, 103, and 112. The ’906 patent and the ’985 patent are also
unenforceable due to inequitable conduct as alleged in paragraphs 319-323 above, which are
incorporated here by reference.
Absent a declaration of invalidity, Plaintiffs will continue to
wrongfully assert the ’906 patent and the ’985 patent against Amazon, and thereby cause
Amazon irreparable injury and damage
345.
Amazon is therefore entitled to judgment that the ’906 patent or the ’985 patents
are invalid, and that both patents are unenforceable pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 2201-2202.
Exceptional Case
351.
This is an exceptional case warranting an award of attorneys’ fees to Defendant
under 35 U.S.C. § 285.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 61
Demand For Jury Trial
352.
Defendant Amazon hereby demands a jury trial as to all issues triable by jury.
RELIEF REQUESTED
Amazon respectfully requests the following relief be granted on Plaintiffs’ Complaint and
on Amazon’s Answer, Affirmative Defenses, and Counterclaims:
A.
That Plaintiffs’ Complaint be dismissed with prejudice and that Plaintiffs take
nothing;
B.
That judgment be entered in favor of Amazon against Plaintiffs;
C.
For entry of a Judgment declaring each and every claim of the ’906 patent and the
’985 patent invalid, unenforceable, and/or not infringed by Amazon or by the use
of its products or services;
D.
That pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 285 and/or other applicable laws, Plaintiffs’ conduct
be found to render this an exceptional case and that Amazon be awarded its
attorneys’ fees in connection with this action;
E.
That Plaintiffs and each of its officers, employees, agents, alter egos, attorneys
and any persons in active concert or participation with them be restrained from
further prosecuting or instituting any action against Amazon claiming that the
’906 and ’985 patents are valid, enforceable, or infringed, or from representing
that Amazon’s products or services, or that the use thereof, infringes the ’906 or
’985 patents; and
F.
That Amazon be awarded such other and further relief as the Court may deem just
and proper.
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 62
Respectfully submitted,
/s/ Jennifer H. Doan ________
Jennifer H. Doan
Texas Bar No. 08809050
Joshua R. Thane
Texas Bar No. 24060713
HALTOM & DOAN
Crown Executive Center, Suite 100
6500 Summerhill Road
Texarkana, TX 75503
Telephone: (903) 255-1000
Facsimile: (903) 255-0800
Email: jdoan@haltomdoan.com
Email: jthane@haltomdoan.com
Edward R. Reines
Jared Bobrow
Sonal N. Mehta
Aaron Y. Huang
Andrew L. Perito
WEIL, GOTSHAL & MANGES LLP
201 Redwood Shores Parkway
Redwood Shores, CA 94065
Telephone: (650) 802-3000
Facsimile: (650) 802-3100
Email: edward.reines@weil.com
Email: jared.bobrow@weil.com
Email: sonal.mehta@weil.com
Email: aaron.huang@weil.com
Email: andrew.perito@weil.com
ATTORNEYS FOR DEFENDANT
AMAZON.COM, INC.
CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE
The undersigned certifies that the foregoing document was filed electronically in
compliance with Local Rule CV-5(a). All other counsel of record not deemed to have consented
to electronic service were served with a true and correct copy of the foregoing by certified mail,
return receipt requested, on this the 11th day of October, 2011.
/s/ Jennifer H. Doan
Jennifer H. Doan
AMAZON’S ANSWER, AFFIRMATIVE DEFENSES, AND COUNTERCLAIMS TO 3RD AMENDED COMPLAINT – Page 63
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