WI-LAN Inc. v. Alcatel-Lucent USA Inc. et al

Filing 341

ORDER denying 305 Sealed Motion for Clarification of the Construction of a Single Term in the Court's Claim-Construction Order. Signed by Judge Leonard Davis on 03/05/13. cc:attys 3-05-13 (mll, )

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS
TYLER DIVISION
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WI-LAN INC.,
Plaintiff,
vs.
ALCATEL-LUCENT USA INC.,
ET AL.,
Defendants.

CASE NO. 6:10-CV-521

ORDER
Before the Court is Defendants’ Motion for Clarification of the Construction of a Single
Term in the Court’s Claim-Construction Order (Dkt. No. 305). The Court DENIES the Motion.
The Court held a Markman proceeding and issued an order construing the claims of the patentsin-suit. Memorandum Opinion and Order, 6:10-cv-521, Dkt. No. 200 (May 16, 2012). In that
opinion, the Court construed time division multiplexing (“TDM”) techniques as “techniques for
allocating an interval of time within a predetermined frame period to a data item, based on one or
more characteristics associated with the data item.” Defendants now ask the Court to clarify this
construction so as not to exclude TDM techniques that allocate data items based on user identity
associated with the data items. Thus, Defendants ask the Court to either modify its construction
of TDM techniques to “all techniques for allocating an interval of time within a predetermined
frame period to a data item, based on one or more characteristics associated with the data item,”
or to hold that user identity is a characteristic associated with the data item.
Defendants argue that the term TDM technique, as used in the patent and advocated by
Plaintiffs, encompasses a broad array of techniques and is not limited to a particular technique.

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Specifically, Defendants argue that the Court’s construction did not exclude well-known
techniques, such as time division multiple access (“TDMA”), where time slots are allocated to
users in a defined, repeated sequence. Defendants contend that Plaintiffs first argued a broad
construction of TDM techniques during claim construction, but now assert that the Court’s
construction, which adopted Plaintiff’s proposal, limits TDM techniques to just one specific type
of TDM, in which a data item is assigned a time slot based on the data item’s size or importance.
Plaintiff responds that Defendants’ request for clarification to include all types of TDM
techniques would essentially enlarge the scope of the term by removing the limitation “based on
one or more characteristics associated with the data item.” Plaintiff also contends that
Defendants’ proposal that user identification constitutes “characteristics associated with the data
item” is not supported by the intrinsic record. Instead, the Court’s construction is supported by
the examples in the specification that allocate time intervals based on the type or size of the data
item.
The Court declines to adopt Defendants’ proposed revised construction. Adding “all” to
the Court’s construction neither adds clarity, nor resolves the Parties’ disputes. Instead, adding
“all” might create confusion as to whether the term TDM techniques includes every TDM
technique in existence. The Court previously rejected Defendants’ proposed construction of:
“methods in which a communication channel is shared among multiple wireless links by
allowing each to use the channel for a given period of time in a defined, repeated sequence”
because “[t]he specification and claims themselves do not limit TDM techniques to partitioning
based on ‘defined, repeated’ divisions. Instead, the specification discusses that the invention can
be used flexibly to address the individual needs of subscriber terminals on demand.”
Memorandum Opinion and Order, Dkt. No. 200 at 10,11. Although the Court’s construction of

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TDM techniques is broader than the construction Defendants advocated for during claim
construction, it is not limitless. Thus, adding “all” does not clarify the Court’s construction.
Accordingly, the Court maintains the construction of TDM techniques as “techniques for
allocating an interval of time within a predetermined frame period to a data item, based on one or
more characteristics associated with the data item.”
Furthermore, the Court will not define which specific characteristics are associated with
the data item. However, since the Court’s construction relied on the specification in rejecting
Defendants’ proposed construction, the Court clarifies that its construction of TDM techniques
cannot be interpreted to exclude characteristics described in the specification. Specifically, the
Court’s construction is not exclusively limited to data size or type as a particular characteristic
associated with the data item. As an example, the specification discloses in Figure 9B the use of
predefined repeated sequences as a TDM technique. 6,088,326 Patent col. 15:40-45. Therefore,
interpreting “characteristics associated with the data item” to be limited to data size or type
would be inconsistent with the patent’s specification.
For the foregoing reasons, the Court DENIES Defendants’ Motion for Clarification of a
Single Term in the Court’s Claim Construction Order.
So ORDERED and SIGNED this 5th day of March, 2013.

__________________________________
LEONARD DAVIS
UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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