Another Bites the Dust Under § 101 – N.D. Cal. Axes Patent on Wireless Tag Tracking System

In July 2020, Linquet Technologies, Inc. filed a patent infringement action against Tile, Inc., accusing Tile of infringing U.S. Patent No. 10,163,318, a patent directed towards a system for detecting the location of items using a wireless tag. On September 15, 2021, the Court dismissed Linquet’s First Amended Complaint on the ground that the ’318 patent was directed to patent-ineligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101, but granted Linquet leave to amend. Linquet filed a Second Amended Complaint on October 8, 2021, which Tile again moved to dismiss. On July 18, 2022, the Court granted Tile’s motion to dismiss Linquet’s Complaint on the same basis.

In its decision, the Court applied the standard two-step test for determining patent-eligibility under 35 U.S.C. § 101 that the Supreme Court set forth in Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank International, 573 U.S. 208 (2014): (1) “whether the claims at issue are directed to a patent-ineligible concept”; and (2) whether the claims directed to a patent-ineligible subject matter otherwise include an “inventive concept.” The Court’s analysis focused on Claim 1 of the ’318 patent as a representative claim.

For Alice step one, the Court cited its prior dismissal, ruling that Claim 1 of ’318 patent is directed to the “abstract and time-honored concept of using markers and identifiers to avoid losing things,” and held that the claim embodies a “quintessential abstract idea.” In its ruling, the Court rejected Linquet’s argument that the claims are patentable because they are “limited to rules with specific characteristics,” finding instead that the set of signal-detecting instructions of Claim 1 describes “nothing more than carrying out the fundamental process of tracking objects.”  The Court also found unconvincing Linquet’s argument that the ’318 patent presents a “technological solution to a technical problem.” The Court explained that Linquet’s Second Amended Complaint and accompanying expert declaration included only conclusory statements that Claim 1 improved tracking systems but otherwise provided no evidence that there was a technical problem with the tracking systems that needed a solution. Further, the Court found that the ’318 patent itself is also “silent on whether such problems existed and needed solving.”

The Court turned next to Alice step two and ultimately found that the patent lacks an inventive concept because the “claims used conventional elements and components ordered in a conventional way.” In so ruling, the Court found that Linquet again relied only on conclusory statements in its Second Amended Complaint and expert declaration for its allegations that the ’318 patent improved the tracking system in a non-conventional manner, focused too narrowly on identifying alleged problems in the prior art, and failed to provide any explanation on how the claimed system is configured or used in unconventional ways.

In light of the ’318 patent’s patent-ineligible subject matter and lack of an inventive concept, the Court dismissed Linquet’s Second Amended Complaint with prejudice.