by Dennis Crouch
In Tuxis Tech v. Amazon, Delaware District Court Judge Andrews has invalidated asserterted claim 1 of Tuxis Tech’s Patent No. 6,055,513 – finding that the claim lacks eligibility under 35 U.S.C. 101. 2014 WL 4382446 (D.Del September 2014) (TuxisDecisionOnPleadings). Like other decisions this week, this case was decided on the pleadings.
The patent claim is related to a computerized method for individualizing up-selling based both on the identity of the purchaser and the original product being purchased. This generalized idea (the ‘gist’) is quite old in our market economy with sellers first obtaining a commitment for an initial purchase and then use that anchor to seek to add-on purchases based upon what the seller thinks might work for the buyer. Amazon does this regularly and thus was an obvious target for infringement allegations.
Of course, the ‘gist’ as described above is not what was particularly claimed, rather the claim walks through a multi-step algorithm of electronic communication and data processing. Those steps are at a fairly high level of abstraction — using action verbs such as “obtaining … transaction data”, “generating an upsell offer”, “utilizing … transaction data”, etc.
Here, Tuxis agreed that the mere notion of “upselling” is an abstract idea and with that in-hand, the court moved forward with the question of whether the claims offer an inventive concept that goes beyond upselling — answering that in the negative.
None of the limitations recited by Tuxis, however, are “meaningful.” Although the claim elements have some narrowing effect on the scope of claim 1, the practical effect is insubstantial. . . .
Claim 1 requires nothing more than suggesting an additional good or service, in real time over an electronic communications device, based on certain information obtained about the customer and the initial purchase. Shrewd sales representatives have long made their living off of this basic practice.
A simple hypothetical is instructive: A man enters a clothing store to purchase a new pair of dress slacks (“a user initiated primary transaction for the purchase of a good or service”). The sales representative assists the man in finding a pair of pants, and in the process learns that the man is a banker (“a second data element relating to the [identity of the customer]”). Knowing that suspenders are fashionable in the banking profession, the sales representative offers the banker a pair of suspenders that match his pants (“utilizing at least in part the primary transaction data including the identity of the good or service of the primary transaction and the second data element [related to the customer] and determining at least one item for a prospective upsell”). The customer agrees with the sales representative and purchases the suspenders (“receiving an acceptance of the offer … in real time”). This type of marketing strategy is at the heart of claim 1 and has been practiced as long as markets have been in operation. Conduct this transaction on “an electronic communications device” instead of in a physical store and it would be an infringing sales practice if claim 1 were valid. This cannot be permitted, as it would “tend to impede innovation more than it would tend to promote it.” Mayo.
Claim invalid.
One thing is clear – the short-circuiting of the litigation process here is a powerful tool in the hands of defendants.
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Claim 1 is as follows:
1. A method for providing offers in real time of an item constituting a good or a service in the form of offers for purchase of the item to prospective customers as users of the system, utilizing an electronic communications device, comprising the steps of:
establishing a communication via the electronic communications device between the user and the system for purpose of a user initiated primary transaction for purchase of a specific good or service,
obtaining primary transaction data with respect to the primary transaction, including the identity of the prospective customer and of the good or service for purchase in the primary transaction,
generating an upsell offer as a result of the user initiated primary transaction by:
utilizing the identity of the prospective customer to obtain at least a second data element relating to the user,utilizing at least in part the primary transaction data including the identity of the good or service of the primary transaction and the second data element and determining at least one item for a prospective upsell transaction with the prospective customer, and
offering the item to the prospective customer and receiving an acceptance of the offer from at least one user in real time during the course of the user initiated communication.