[00:00:00] Speaker 02: The third and final case for argument this morning is 24-1657, Technology in a Risk Scale versus Razor USA. [00:00:12] Speaker 00: Mr. Fitzgerald, please proceed. [00:00:15] Speaker 01: Hello, Your Honors. [00:00:15] Speaker 01: May it please the court? [00:00:17] Speaker 01: My name is Brian Fitzgerald. [00:00:18] Speaker 01: I'm representing Plaintiff Appellant Technology and Aeroscale LLC. [00:00:22] Speaker 01: Appellant submits that the district court erred in holding asserted claims 1 and 14 of the 652 patent invalid under the Alex test. [00:00:32] Speaker 01: Regarding ALICE step one, the asserted claims are not directed to an abstract idea, but are instead directed to an improvement in computer networking realized by improving a computer's ability to accurately decode a specifically formed wireless signal through error correction of the important downlink frame prefix information. [00:00:52] Speaker 02: Council, do you disagree with the district court's characterization for claims as being directed to receiving, manipulating, and decoding data? [00:01:01] Speaker 01: uh... yes uh... that characterization of the claims uh... couches the uh... [00:01:09] Speaker 01: focus of the claims under step one of the Alice test as using a computer as a tool to perform an abstract process. [00:01:18] Speaker 01: This is not what the claims are directed to. [00:01:20] Speaker 01: The claims are directed to improving the computer's ability to function as a tool and improving the computer's ability. [00:01:28] Speaker 03: Is this a specialized computer of any kind? [00:01:32] Speaker 01: No, this is not a specialized computer. [00:01:34] Speaker 03: It's an off-the-shelf computer that you can configure and you can have it do different things, right? [00:01:39] Speaker 01: Yes. [00:01:41] Speaker 01: Yes, Your Honor. [00:01:45] Speaker 01: The invention is to improve the computer's ability to accurately decode the wireless transmission signal. [00:02:00] Speaker 01: When the specifically recited signal is transmitted through a channel, it will inevitably be exposed to noise interference. [00:02:07] Speaker 01: This noise interference will introduce errors into the symbols of downlink frame prefix information and their corresponding repeated symbols. [00:02:16] Speaker 01: These errors could result in the symbols having their values altered, causing the symbols to be incorrectly decoded when they're utilized as inputs at the decoder. [00:02:27] Speaker 01: Right? [00:02:27] Speaker 02: Council, do you have access to the appendix? [00:02:31] Speaker 01: Yes. [00:02:31] Speaker 02: Or an access to your brief as well, your blue brief? [00:02:34] Speaker 01: Yes. [00:02:39] Speaker 02: Can you turn to page 20? [00:02:41] Speaker 01: 20 of the brief? [00:02:42] Speaker 02: Yes, please. [00:02:47] Speaker 02: So at the bottom of the blue brief, which your side would have authored, do you agree with this sort of recitation of the description of Claim 1, where it talks about Claim 1 reciting combined and decoding repeatedly transmitted DFP information? [00:03:05] Speaker 01: Yes, I believe that Claim 1 does recite the combining and decoding of the downlink frame prefix information. [00:03:15] Speaker 01: So the downlink frame prefix information as the specification recites is important information [00:03:24] Speaker 01: that is arranged at the beginning of a transmitted frame. [00:03:28] Speaker 01: And it includes important control information for the subsequent data in the frame. [00:03:33] Speaker 01: And if it's not properly received, the whole signal could be adversely affected. [00:03:42] Speaker 01: The reception of the whole signal could be adversely affected because the information in the downlink frame prefix is important for the decoding of all the subsequent data. [00:03:53] Speaker 01: So, essentially, by combining the symbols of downlink frame prefix information with repeated symbols of downlink frame prefix information, it improves the signal-to-noise ratio of the intended signal versus the introduced errors by noise interference, and it allows for the computer to accurately decode the downlink frame prefix information. [00:04:17] Speaker 01: So it's providing a concrete improvement to the computer's ability to receive and decode the wireless signal rather than simply using the computer merely as a tool to decode an otherwise abstract decoding process. [00:04:35] Speaker 03: What's the advantage here? [00:04:36] Speaker 01: The advantage, Jetrena, is that the computer is more likely to accurately decode a signal, so it's an improvement in the computer's wireless signal reception. [00:04:50] Speaker 03: In its reception? [00:04:50] Speaker 03: Yes. [00:04:57] Speaker 01: So in the claim, it says. [00:05:00] Speaker 01: Which claim, one? [00:05:02] Speaker 01: Claim one. [00:05:03] Speaker 01: There's similar language in claim 14. [00:05:05] Speaker 01: In claim one, it says, combining, using a computer processor, symbols at the same positions of deinterleaved encoding blocks among the repeated symbols in the deinterleaved transmission signal. [00:05:17] Speaker 01: The repeated symbols have an antecedent basis in the preceding paragraph. [00:05:21] Speaker 01: And it says repeating symbols, including downlink frame prefix information. [00:05:25] Speaker 01: So, the repeated symbols include at least the downlink frame prefix information, and then it requires the decoding the combined symbols. [00:05:33] Speaker 01: So, reading from the specification, this could be found in Appendix 51. [00:05:41] Speaker 03: So right there, show me the improvement in technology. [00:05:46] Speaker 01: So the improvement, and this is what I was getting at, Judge Raina, in appendix 51, which refers specifically to column two, lines 42 through 48 of the 652 pat. [00:05:56] Speaker 03: I want to see it in the claim. [00:05:58] Speaker 01: Yeah, in the claim. [00:06:00] Speaker 01: It's the fact that you're combining the repeated symbols, and then you're decoding the combined symbols. [00:06:06] Speaker 01: That's the technical solution, because by combining the symbols, you're strengthening the intended value of those symbols in relation to any noise interference that has been introduced into the signal. [00:06:23] Speaker 02: Do you agree that the combining step only encompasses conventional methods? [00:06:27] Speaker 01: No, Your Honor, I disagree. [00:06:30] Speaker 02: Why do you disagree? [00:06:31] Speaker 02: Because you point me to something that would show that encompasses something other than conventional medicine. [00:06:36] Speaker 01: Yes, I disagree for two reasons. [00:06:38] Speaker 01: First, the combining step requires the combining of specific symbols of a specific portion, the Daly-Frank prefix, of a specifically formed signal. [00:06:48] Speaker 01: And that's the first reason, individually, that's an oversimplification of the combining step. [00:06:56] Speaker 01: The second reason is that the combining step can't be analyzed as like a disparate individual element, it has to be analyzed in view of the ordered combination. [00:07:07] Speaker 01: It is actually combined and then decoded that that's the From what I was getting at I'm reading reading from the specification. [00:07:17] Speaker 01: It says it is not this is [00:07:20] Speaker 01: Okay, this is going to be on appendix 51, Judge Cunningham. [00:07:25] Speaker 01: Column 2, lines 42 through 48. [00:07:28] Speaker 01: So it says, it is an object of the present invention to improve reception performance of the frame control header, including downlink frame prefix information, by combining and decoding the downlink frame prefix information repeatedly transmitted through the frame control header. [00:07:45] Speaker 01: as compared to a conventional decoding method and to improve system performance by preventing the loss of information important to the data reception. [00:07:55] Speaker 01: So by combining the symbols of the downlink-frame prefix information, which includes important control information for the whole signal, with repeated symbols of the specifically formed signal where the symbols are repeated, you are strengthening the intended signal in relation to the noise, the signal-to-noise ratio. [00:08:15] Speaker 02: In answering our questions, you're using the word specific a lot and specificity. [00:08:19] Speaker 02: But frankly, I don't see that same specificity in the claim or even in the portions of specification you're pointing us to. [00:08:27] Speaker 02: So is there something that you could actually show us that [00:08:31] Speaker 02: has the specificity that you're referring to? [00:08:34] Speaker 01: Yes. [00:08:34] Speaker 01: So there's a specifically generated signal. [00:08:39] Speaker 01: It says, the very first paragraph of claim one, Your Honor, it says, receiving using a computer processor the transmission signal, which is formed by, one, repeating symbols, including downlink-frame prefix information, two, encoding the repeated symbols into encoding blocks, and three, interleaving the encoding blocks. [00:09:00] Speaker 01: So that's a specifically formed signal. [00:09:03] Speaker 01: Then in the combining step, it specifically says, you're combining symbols at the same positions of d-entities and coding blocks among the repeated symbols, which include the downlink frame prefix information. [00:09:14] Speaker 01: And you're decoding the combined symbols. [00:09:17] Speaker 01: So the combining and decoding of the repeated symbols of the downlink frame prefix information, which is recited in Appendix 51, is captured in the claims as well, Your Honor. [00:09:31] Speaker 02: You spent some time focused on step one. [00:09:34] Speaker 02: But what if we disagree with you on step one and pretend that it's actually directed to an abstract idea? [00:09:39] Speaker 02: What is your best argument in terms of step two and inventive concept? [00:09:43] Speaker 01: In terms of step two, I would say that the inventive concept is by combining and then decoding the downlink-frame prefix information as claimed, it improves the signal reception and the ability of the computer to accurately decode the signal. [00:10:04] Speaker 01: Because when the combined symbols are received as inputs of the decoder, [00:10:10] Speaker 01: They could be act that the signal to noise ratio is increased allowing that sounds like the same abstract idea that your expression in step one So you don't you don't get past step two by restating the abstract idea I'm sorry you're on it step two requires that For regarding step two [00:10:40] Speaker 01: The symbols of basically how it works is the specifically formed signal that has downlink for your prefix information and repeated symbols of downlink for your prefix information is transmitted through the channel. [00:10:58] Speaker 01: So it will be exposed to noise which interferes with the values of the symbols by combining the symbols prior to decoding [00:11:06] Speaker 03: The step two says, OK, under step one, we see that your claims are directed to an abstract idea. [00:11:16] Speaker 03: Under step two, is there anything else that renders that abstract idea into patent-eligible subject matter? [00:11:25] Speaker 03: And it seems to me that you're just simply expressing anew the abstract idea that you're arguing under step one. [00:11:34] Speaker 03: And if that's the case, you don't make it past step two. [00:11:37] Speaker 01: Your Honor, under step two, essentially you're combining the symbols in order to reduce the signal to noise ratio, which is a concrete improvement over the conventional art. [00:12:00] Speaker 03: We're into your better times, so why don't we hear from the other side? [00:12:12] Speaker 00: Good morning, Your Honors, the Police Court. [00:12:14] Speaker 00: Chris Cow with Pillsbury-Winthrop-Shaw-Pittman on behalf of the defendant, Razor USA. [00:12:20] Speaker 00: The district court in this case got it right. [00:12:24] Speaker 00: And got it right twice, in fact, because the court considered an initial motion to dismiss the claims on a finding that the 652 patent was patent-ineligible under Section 101. [00:12:38] Speaker 00: but allowed the plaintiff the opportunity to amend the complaint to add further detail from the specification in an attempt to establish that the invention was patent eligible. [00:12:50] Speaker 00: On a second motion to dismiss the court again on full briefing and oral argument, considered the plaintiff's arguments and dismissed the case again. [00:13:00] Speaker 00: The invention, the claimed invention here is directed just to the transmission of data using conventional error correction techniques. [00:13:14] Speaker 00: And there are three techniques described in the patent that are all well known and conventional and have been used for decades. [00:13:24] Speaker 00: They're so well known that the patent specification, if you look at it, doesn't even really describe these techniques or any specific ways to conduct the techniques because they're known. [00:13:33] Speaker 00: People know how to do this. [00:13:35] Speaker 00: So there's interleaving of data. [00:13:39] Speaker 00: And again, there's no description of it. [00:13:42] Speaker 00: It just says you shall do this interleaving. [00:13:44] Speaker 00: And then when you're downloading and decoding the transmission, you deinterleave. [00:13:49] Speaker 00: That's a technique for ensuring the integrity of a signal that's been well known. [00:13:53] Speaker 00: It essentially means, at a high level, if you have a file that you're transmitting wirelessly, rather than transmit it consecutively, you just break it up and randomize it. [00:14:05] Speaker 00: And that's to prevent against errors in transmission that typically happen at one segment. [00:14:11] Speaker 00: So rather than have a file be corrupted on one part of the file, if you interleave it, there's a greater chance that only minor portions of that data will be affected. [00:14:24] Speaker 02: What about the compiling stuff? [00:14:26] Speaker 00: Yes, so the combining step is, again, conventional. [00:14:30] Speaker 00: And again, it's not described in great detail in the patent, but essentially in the combining step, all that this patent is saying is you take an average of repeated symbols. [00:14:42] Speaker 00: And a good way to think about that is, [00:14:45] Speaker 00: Let's say you want to measure the height of somebody who is 60 inches tall. [00:14:52] Speaker 00: And instead of doing it once, you do it five times. [00:14:59] Speaker 00: Because that way, in coding and decoding, you basically repeat the signals to make sure, again, if there's transmission errors, you have additional copies of it. [00:15:09] Speaker 00: So if you take the measurement of somebody who's 60 inches tall five times, sometimes you might measure him at 59, sometimes you might measure them at 60, sometimes you might measure them at 61. [00:15:19] Speaker 00: If you do that five times, you divide it by five, you get the average, and in theory that average should be more accurate than if you were just to take the 59 measurement. [00:15:32] Speaker 00: Translate that into data transmission. [00:15:35] Speaker 00: That's all that's going on here. [00:15:36] Speaker 00: That's all the patent is saying by the combining step. [00:15:39] Speaker 00: It says, when you encode and decode data, this is conventional, you will repeat the signal. [00:15:46] Speaker 00: You will repeat a certain symbol within a transmission. [00:15:50] Speaker 00: And in this case, let's just make it easy two times. [00:15:54] Speaker 03: If you address the other side, what we have here is, say, [00:16:01] Speaker 03: claims that provide a technological answer to the technological problem. [00:16:11] Speaker 00: Yes, there is no technological problem that's being solved here. [00:16:15] Speaker 00: There's no technological solution, an unconventional technological solution that's being proposed. [00:16:24] Speaker 00: Again, with respect to the combining step, the only thing that this is saying is when there are repeated symbols, instead of just taking one. [00:16:33] Speaker 00: So if a symbol, let's say a symbol, stands for the number five, rather than just taking that symbol five the first time, [00:16:43] Speaker 00: If it's repeated, and let's just say it's repeated twice here, you add it up, five plus five, 10, and you divide it by two, which is the average, and there's your five again. [00:16:53] Speaker 00: But this is accounting for, if there's errors in the transmission, one of those transmissions would be the number four, one would be six. [00:17:01] Speaker 00: If you average them, your five, you're closer to the original signal. [00:17:04] Speaker 00: That's not a technological solution to a problem. [00:17:08] Speaker 00: That's just literally a mathematical function [00:17:12] Speaker 00: of taking an average which is elementary school math. [00:17:16] Speaker 00: This is not a complicated algorithm or some new formula to improve data transmission or encoding or decoding. [00:17:24] Speaker 00: This is literally just taking the average of repeated numbers. [00:17:28] Speaker 03: Would it be akin to making sure you don't put all your eggs in one basket? [00:17:32] Speaker 00: Correct. [00:17:34] Speaker 00: which is what all of these other, which is what encoding is. [00:17:38] Speaker 00: So again, the patent also talks about encoding and decoding. [00:17:43] Speaker 00: Encoding and decoding for error correction, and this court has considered this many times and looked at it in other contexts. [00:17:50] Speaker 00: All that means, really, when you're encoding for error correction is you're having multiple copies of the data sent to the transmission. [00:17:59] Speaker 00: So if you lose some, you still have it. [00:18:02] Speaker 00: These are well-known conventional principles. [00:18:05] Speaker 00: And I should say, it's instructive to look at the cases that are cited by the plaintiff where this court has found patentable inventions in this same area of data transmission, because those cases are distinguishable. [00:18:21] Speaker 00: Because in each of those cases, there really was an unconventional idea, an unconventional application of data transmission. [00:18:30] Speaker 02: So I think opposing counsel, at least in the briefing, was relying on cases like Enfish. [00:18:35] Speaker 02: Do you want to go ahead and distinguish that case? [00:18:38] Speaker 00: Yeah. [00:18:39] Speaker 00: So with respect to Enfish, that case involves sort of specific changes to the technology at issue, to like the database technology at issue there that is an improvement to what existed previously. [00:18:57] Speaker 00: Here, there's no improvement. [00:19:00] Speaker 00: It's simply using different conventional techniques and applying them to specific data in this case. [00:19:07] Speaker 00: This patent in particular concerns data transmitted according to the 802.16 standard, which is a standard which was colloquially known as WiMAX. [00:19:19] Speaker 00: It doesn't really exist anymore, but that's what the patent concerns. [00:19:23] Speaker 00: And with respect to the other cases, so good cases to distinguish is the Caltech case that is cited by the plaintiff, which also involves error correction actually in data transmission. [00:19:37] Speaker 00: And we talked about the fact that traditionally in error correction, you send multiple copies of a data file as a way of error correction to make sure if you lose some, you have another copy of it. [00:19:49] Speaker 00: In the Caltech case, the invention there was also using math, but the notion there, the unconventional idea there that makes that patentable in the Caltech case was that there, rather than sending three copies all the time or four copies all the time, which was the norm, you picked however many copies. [00:20:11] Speaker 00: In the Caltech case, the patent said, [00:20:13] Speaker 00: We can save data, we can improve data transmission by not always sending four copies all the time. [00:20:21] Speaker 00: We can vary it and it'll still be as effective. [00:20:23] Speaker 00: So sometimes we might only send two copies. [00:20:26] Speaker 00: Sometimes we might send three copies. [00:20:29] Speaker 00: That's just as good as sending three copies all the time. [00:20:31] Speaker 00: So you're improving error correction. [00:20:34] Speaker 00: You're improving data transmission. [00:20:36] Speaker 00: That's what was an issue at Caltech. [00:20:38] Speaker 00: Another case that is cited is the Gamalto case. [00:20:42] Speaker 00: It was only cited in [00:20:43] Speaker 00: the appellant's reply brief. [00:20:47] Speaker 00: But again, very similarly, there was an improvement. [00:20:51] Speaker 00: There was an unconventional technique being used there. [00:20:54] Speaker 00: In the Gamalto case, so in error correction, it turns out that we talked about you make multiple copies. [00:21:03] Speaker 00: The way you do that is actually you apply some algorithm, which are called error correcting codes. [00:21:09] Speaker 00: None of this is discussed in the patent. [00:21:11] Speaker 00: This is all just well known. [00:21:13] Speaker 00: And the notion in the Gamalto case is similar to what happened in Caltech, rather than just using the same algorithm every time. [00:21:23] Speaker 00: So if I'm gonna make three copies and I use one algorithm to, typically what you would do, conventionally, you use the same algorithm to create three copies of your original data. [00:21:34] Speaker 00: That's error correction. [00:21:36] Speaker 00: In the Gamalto case, this court looked at the patented issue there, [00:21:41] Speaker 00: And in that case, the inventor said, well, you don't have to always use that same algorithm three times to produce the three copies. [00:21:50] Speaker 00: You could vary that. [00:21:51] Speaker 00: And sometimes you might use a different algorithm to create one copy and a different algorithm to create another copy. [00:22:00] Speaker 00: And the assertion there was that this also improves data transmission and encoding and decoding. [00:22:08] Speaker 00: But those cases represent unconventional new techniques to improve data transmission Sure So I think as we cited in our brief the the ones that are closest are cases that talk about [00:22:33] Speaker 00: general encoding and decoding. [00:22:37] Speaker 00: And the fact of that, just claiming encoding and decoding, the conventional ways of doing it are not patent eligible. [00:22:45] Speaker 00: And so there is the Recognit Corp versus Nintendo Case. [00:22:52] Speaker 00: I'll get you the citation. [00:22:54] Speaker 00: 855, F3rd, 1322. [00:22:57] Speaker 00: The Recognacorp case itself also refers to the Digitech image technologies versus electronics for imaging case, which is 758, F3rd, 1344. [00:23:11] Speaker 00: Both of those cases stand for the proposition that just claiming encoding and decoding of data, transforming data in known ways, is not patent eligible. [00:23:22] Speaker 00: And then there are other cases that I think are relevant, one being the electric power group versus Alstom 830 F-1350 case, which generally holds that the [00:23:39] Speaker 00: manipulation of data and the presentation of data on its own, again, is not patent-eligible. [00:23:48] Speaker 00: And that's essentially what's going on here. [00:23:50] Speaker 00: This is just data that's being transmitted wirelessly. [00:23:53] Speaker 00: And the patent at issue here, the 652 patent, says just use known conventional ways of [00:24:02] Speaker 00: Ensuring the reliability of the the data transmission and the fact that it it uses multiple different ways interleaving and coding combining which is just taking the average [00:24:15] Speaker 00: using three different conventional, well-known ways of doing it does not create something patentable, right? [00:24:24] Speaker 03: It could create something patentable, depending on how you order those different ways. [00:24:30] Speaker 03: The fact that the technology is conventional does not by itself mean that it does not present an innovative concept of any kind. [00:24:40] Speaker 00: Yes, I agree, Judge Regan. [00:24:42] Speaker 00: And in this case, though, the ordering does not matter. [00:24:47] Speaker 00: This is an issue that the district court addressed correctly, in my view. [00:24:51] Speaker 00: And if you look at the specification at figures three and four, and in fact, it claims one and two of the patent, the patent describes [00:25:05] Speaker 00: two different orders that you could do this. [00:25:09] Speaker 00: In one embodiment, which is covered in claim one and in figure three, you de-interleave, so you restore the original order of the transmission, right? [00:25:21] Speaker 00: And then you do this averaging step, the double check. [00:25:26] Speaker 00: In figure four, it had claimed two of the patents. [00:25:31] Speaker 00: You actually do that in reverse. [00:25:32] Speaker 00: You do the combining. [00:25:35] Speaker 00: You do the averaging step to confirm the data that you received. [00:25:39] Speaker 00: And then you do the deinterleaving. [00:25:41] Speaker 00: So the order in this case doesn't matter at all. [00:25:43] Speaker 00: There's no benefit. [00:25:44] Speaker 00: There's no difference in how you do it. [00:25:46] Speaker 00: And that's explicitly disclosed in the patent. [00:25:50] Speaker 00: So none of the cases that are cited by the plaintiff with respect to the ordered combination making a difference or creating a patentable invention here apply. [00:26:02] Speaker 00: Thank you. [00:26:02] Speaker 00: Thank you. [00:26:08] Speaker 01: In this case, the order absolutely does matter. [00:26:11] Speaker 01: As stated in the specification, it's the combining and then decoding. [00:26:16] Speaker 01: Every single disclosed embodiment, including the ones from the unasserted claims that Appellee brings up, in every single disclosed embodiment without exception, the combining step and the interleaving step [00:26:32] Speaker 02: Performed before the decoding stuff the importance is that what opposing counsel mentioned in terms of the order? [00:26:39] Speaker 02: By pointing us to claims one and two of the pet where in one claim one deintervening happens before combining and then in claim two it's the reverse and [00:26:49] Speaker 01: The important thing is that the combining happens before the decoding as the specification sets forth in the Appendix 51. [00:26:59] Speaker 01: I'll explain a little bit about the unconventionality about the combining step. [00:27:05] Speaker 01: So the ordered combination of combining and then decoding. [00:27:09] Speaker 01: So as you can see, [00:27:12] Speaker 01: In wireless transmission configurations, typically you would expect to see the decoder perform an inverse order of operations to the encoder. [00:27:27] Speaker 01: So in our case, [00:27:28] Speaker 01: Every claim requires a specifically formed symbol at the encoder level of, one, repeating symbols, including delimiter and prefix information, two, encoding those repeated symbols into encoding blocks, and three, interleaving those encoding blocks. [00:27:45] Speaker 01: So you would expect in a conventional inverse order decoding scheme, it would be a reverse of that 1, 2, 3 order. [00:27:55] Speaker 01: It would be a 3, 2, 1 order. [00:27:56] Speaker 01: So you would have first the deinterleaving step, which is the sister step to interleaving. [00:28:01] Speaker 01: Then you would have the decoding step, which is the sister step to encoding. [00:28:06] Speaker 01: Then you would have the decoding. [00:28:09] Speaker 01: combining step, which is the sister step, to repeating. [00:28:12] Speaker 01: That's not what happens in any of the claims of the patent or any of the embodiment. [00:28:17] Speaker 01: In the assertive claims, for example, we have a 312 order of operations. [00:28:23] Speaker 01: So we have at first it's deinterleaved. [00:28:27] Speaker 01: then it's combined, and then it's decoded. [00:28:31] Speaker 01: So what we have here is a very unconventional order of operations, because we're encoding repeated symbols. [00:28:39] Speaker 01: No, we're repeating symbols in the unencoded domain. [00:28:43] Speaker 01: So the symbols are repeated before they get encoded. [00:28:46] Speaker 01: However, we're combining symbols in the encoded domain. [00:28:50] Speaker 01: So we're combining encoded symbols. [00:28:54] Speaker 01: I'd further say that the specification itself recognizes that the ordered combination of combining and decoding, that also gets, this ordered combination also gets to the ALICE step two question Judge Rayna had earlier. [00:29:07] Speaker 01: That even if you find the combining step to be conventional, the ordered combination of the combining of these specific symbols and then decoding those combined symbols is unconventional. [00:29:22] Speaker 01: I would say that the specification itself does not admit the conventionality of this combination or admit that the combination doesn't matter. [00:29:32] Speaker 01: The specification specifically asserts that it is novel and non-obvious [00:29:38] Speaker 01: which is independently validated by the USPTO's grant of this patent over 35 USC 102 and 103, and as recognized by the Federal Circuit in Berkheimer versus HP, that simply because something [00:29:55] Speaker 01: is simply because a claim element is disclosed in a piece of prior art, that is, it's not novel, doesn't mean that it's well-understood routine or conventional. [00:30:04] Speaker 01: So the Federal Circuit has recognized novelty and obviousness as a higher bar to meet than even conventionality, which is like widespread use. [00:30:14] Speaker 03: OK. [00:30:14] Speaker 03: We're beyond our time. [00:30:16] Speaker 03: Thank you, Your Honor. [00:30:17] Speaker 03: Thank both sides. [00:30:19] Speaker 03: The case is submitted.