Scientific Applications & Research Associates v. International

Background

SARA sued Zipline for alleged infringement of U.S. Patent No. 7,606,115, titled “Acoustic Airspace Collision Detection System,” and for alleged trade-secret misappropriation. The patent claims a system for piloted and unmanned aircraft that uses acoustic data to detect approaching aircraft, assess potential collisions, and avoid them. SARA alleged that Zipline infringed at least claim 1 by making, using, selling, or offering to sell unmanned aerial vehicles incorporating acoustic detect-and-avoid technology, and that Zipline used SARA’s trade-secret information in developing and testing its products.

Zipline moved for judgment on the pleadings, arguing that the asserted patent claims covered subject matter ineligible for patent protection under 35 U.S.C. § 101. SARA moved to dismiss Zipline’s counterclaims and to strike Zipline’s affirmative defense alleging inequitable conduct—an allegation that someone involved in obtaining the patent withheld material information from the Patent and Trademark Office with an intent to deceive.

Patent Eligibility

The court treated claim 1 as representative of the other patent claims for purposes of the two-step framework established in Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank. At the first step, the court concluded that the patent was directed to an abstract concept: collecting, filtering, extracting, and analyzing acoustic information to detect potential collisions. The court rejected SARA’s argument that the claim focused on a specific technological improvement. It found that the patent used acoustic information instead of optical or electromagnetic information to detect collisions, but did not specify a nonconventional arrangement or operation of the acoustic probes.

At the second step, however, the court found that claim 1 contained an inventive concept. The claim did not merely state the goal of acoustic collision detection; it described a specific combination of operations in which an array of acoustic probes and a digital signal processor receive acoustic data, filter noise and the processor’s own signals, extract signals from an approaching target, calculate the target’s intensity, bearing, and bearing-angle rate of change, and determine whether a collision course exists. The court held that Zipline had not shown at this stage that this ordered combination was conventional or routine. The patent therefore survived the second Alice step, and the court denied Zipline’s motion for judgment on the pleadings.

Inequitable-Conduct Counterclaims and Defense

Zipline asserted six counterclaims and an affirmative defense seeking to render the patent unenforceable based on SARA’s alleged failure to disclose six prior-art references: Cline I, Cline II, Muller, Milkie, Wes, and Cline III. To plead inequitable conduct, Zipline had to allege with particularity both materiality—why the references mattered to patentability—and specific intent to deceive the Patent and Trademark Office.

The court found Zipline’s allegations sufficient on both points. Zipline alleged that the patent’s named inventors and SARA’s chief executive officer knew about the references and their materiality, including because SARA employees authored all six references, the inventors authored five, and the chief executive officer allegedly participated in patent matters. Zipline also alleged that SARA designated Cline II as highly confidential even though it had been publicly presented and published, and that Cline I had also been publicly presented and published.

For materiality, Zipline supplied charts connecting the elements of claim 1 to disclosures in each reference. The court held that these allegations adequately identified which claim limitations were implicated, where the information appeared, and how an examiner could have used the references in evaluating patentability. The court held that Zipline adequately pleaded materiality and specific deceptive intent, denied SARA’s motion to dismiss the counterclaims, and denied SARA’s motion to strike its 21st affirmative defense.

Disposition

The court denied Zipline’s motion for judgment on the pleadings and denied SARA’s motion to dismiss and strike. The order disposed of Docket Nos. 92 and 95.