Background
Craig L. Linden owns U.S. Patent No. 9,639,150, which concerns interactive powered displays and claims a method for remotely treating a patient. Representative claim 1 describes using networked electronic devices to conduct an audio-video conference, collect and transmit patient information and a vital-sign measurement, form a diagnosis, determine treatment, and send a signal that causes a physical interaction between a display and the patient.
Linden sued ResMed for infringement in the Southern District of California. The district court dismissed the original complaint under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), allowed amendment, and then dismissed the amended complaint with prejudice after concluding that the asserted claims were patent-ineligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101. Linden appealed.
The Court’s Holding
In a nonprecedential per curiam opinion, the Federal Circuit affirmed. It first held that Linden waived his challenge to the district court’s use of claim 1 as representative because his counsel had agreed below that claim 1 was representative, the parties had focused exclusively on that claim, and the complaints described it as exemplary.
At the first step of the Alice analysis, the court held that the claims were directed to the abstract idea of conducting remotely what amounts to an in-person doctor visit, a conventional organized human activity. The recited internet-capable devices, physical output display, and input transducer were generic hardware and did not reflect an improvement in computer technology.
At the second step, the court found no inventive concept. The claimed sequence of gathering patient data, transmitting it, receiving treatment-related signals, and using a powered device merely restated the abstract idea of remotely treating a patient. Linden’s amended allegations that the arrangement was unconventional were conclusory, while the remaining allegations and the patent itself lacked technical details explaining how the asserted improvements were achieved.
Key Takeaways
- A party may waive a challenge to representative-claim treatment by expressly agreeing in the district court that a claim is representative.
- Performing an ordinary doctor visit remotely with generic networked devices does not, without a claimed technological improvement, make the method patent-eligible.
- Conclusory allegations that claim elements are unconventional cannot prevent dismissal; allegations of an inventive concept must be plausible, technically specific, and grounded in the claims or specification.
Why It Matters
The decision illustrates that courts may resolve patent eligibility at the pleading stage when the complaint presents no plausible factual allegation that would change the legal analysis. Adding generic communications hardware or remote functionality to a conventional human activity may be insufficient under § 101.
Patent owners seeking to survive a motion to dismiss should tie any asserted technological improvement to concrete claim language and implementation details in the specification. Features absent from the claims or specification cannot supply the inventive concept.