Music streaming platform Pandora filed a motion for judgment on the pleadings in a case brought by Targeted Radio. The plaintiff alleged that Pandora infringed upon U.S. Patent Nos. 8,644,756 (“the ’756 patent”) and 8,948,684 (“the ’684 patent”). The patents cover the “abstract idea of delivering location-based advertising during a break in a program.” Pandora states that “[n]either claims any inventive concept to transform this abstract idea into patent-eligible subject matter.” Pandora states that the patented claims are ineligible for patent protection.
Pandora stated that the patents are abstract because they cover something that “is a conventional activity long performed by content providers, such as television and radio broadcasters.” Further, Pandora asserted that Targeted Radio’s patents “recite nothing other than routine computer functionality to carry out this abstract idea over the Internet on a mobility device.” They do not have “specific technical improvement” “that transforms this abstract idea into a patent-eligible application.” Since the “asserted patents are directed to nothing more than an abstract idea, they are directed to patent-ineligible subject matter.”
Pandora argued using the Alice two-step approach for abstract ideas regarding the scope of patent eligibility; “[a]n idea of itself is not patentable.” Using this two-step approach, “[f]irst the court determines whether the claims are directed to a patent-ineligible abstract idea, such as longstanding commercial or human activities. In making this inquiry, courts often consider ‘whether the claims focus on ‘the specific asserted improvement in computer capabilities…or, instead, on a process that qualifies as an ‘abstract idea’ for which computers are invoked merely as a tool.’’” The second is “if the claims are directed to an abstract idea, the court must then consider whether the claims include additional elements – contain an ‘inventive concept’ – sufficient to ‘transform the nature of the claim’ into a patent-eligible application.” This step is to “ensure that the patent in practice amounts to significantly more than a patent upon the [abstract idea] itself.”
Pandora argued “the asserted patents are directed to an abstract idea and nothing more.” They claimed the “focus of the claims of the asserted patents is…delivering location-based advertising during a break in a program. This is an abstract idea.” The patents follow these steps: “(1) receiving a location report for a mobile device; (2) detecting an advertising break marker; (3) streaming an advertisement selected for the reported location and break duration; and (4) resuming the Internet radio stream after the advertising break.” Pandora said these are the “logical and conventional steps required to execute the basic idea of inserting location-based advertising during a break in program delivered over the Internet.” Further, this has been used by radio and television for “decades, and thus predates the Internet and modern computing.”
Turning to the second step of Alice, Pandora argued that “the asserted patents’ claims lack an inventive concept.” They said the claims “add nothing inventive to the abstract idea. At most, they recite implementing the abstract idea using admittedly generic computer components and function and add other insignificant features – which the Supreme Court and Federal Circuit have found insufficient to confer patent eligibility.”
Pandora has requested that the court grants its motion for judgment on the pleadings and to hold that the asserted patent and claims are invalid.
The suit is filed in the Northern District of Texas. Pandora is represented by Fenwick & West LLP and Lynn Pinker Cox & Hurst LLP.