Cisco Technology, Inc.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Sep 29, 2020

14155957 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Sep. 29, 2020)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450
www.uspto.gov
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
14/155,957 01/15/2014 Christopher Pearce 0370.1584C/986648-US.01 5465
99499 7590 09/29/2020
Edell, Shapiro, & Finnan, LLC
9801 Washingtonian Blvd.
Suite 750
Gaithersburg, MD 20878
EXAMINER
MCADAMS, BRAD
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2456
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/29/2020 ELECTRONIC
Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding.
The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication.
Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the
following e-mail address(es):
epatent@usiplaw.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte CHRISTOPHER PEARCE, JONATHAN D. ROSENBERG, and
SCOTT A. HENNING
Appeal 2019-006023
Application 14/155,957
Technology Center 2400
Before JAMES R. HUGHES, JOYCE CRAIG, and
MATTHEW J. McNEILL, Administrative Patent Judges.

HUGHES, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Claims 1, 3–11, 13–19, and 21–26 are pending, stand rejected, are
appealed by Appellant,1 and are the subject of our decision under 35 U.S.C.
§ 134(a). See Final Act. 1–2; Appeal Br. 10.2 We have jurisdiction under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We AFFIRM.

1 We use the word Appellant to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.42(a) (2015). Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Cisco
Technology Inc. Appeal Br. 3.
2 Throughout our decision we refer to Appellant’s Specification (“Spec.”)
filed Jan. 15, 2014; Appeal Brief (“Appeal Br.”) filed Feb. 21, 2019; and
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Application 14/155,957

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CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER
The invention generally “relates to hosting real-time communications
between clients over a cloud based multimedia system.” Spec. ¶ 1. More
particularly, the invention stores “event stream information pertaining to
communication sessions between clients maintained by a cloud networking
platform” and generates a graph “that identifies participants, at respective
clients, involved in a real-time communication session, where each
participant . . . is represented as a node in the graph.” Id. ¶ 4.
Claim 1 is reproduced below, and is illustrative of the claimed subject
matter:
1. A method comprising:
storing event stream information pertaining to
communication sessions between clients maintained by a cloud
networking platform, wherein the event stream information for
each client includes information in relation to communication
services participated in by clients, the communication services
including hosting of real-time communications between two or
more clients;
in response to an originator participant requesting to
engage in a real-time communication comprising a phone call
with one or more invited participants via clients of the
participants, the phone call comprising an audio component
and/or a video component:
sending to clients of the originator participant and
the one or more invited participants rendezvous
information that facilitates a connection for each client to
the real-time communication;

Reply Brief (“Reply Br.”) filed Aug. 10, 2019. We also refer to the
Examiner’s Final Office Action (“Final Act.”) dated Aug. 10, 2018; and
Answer (“Ans.”) dated June 12, 2019.
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generating a graph that identifies the originator and
invited participants, at respective clients, associated with
the real-time communication session, wherein each
participant associated with the real-time communication
session is represented as a node in the graph, at least one
node includes information about two or more clients
registered to a single participant associated with the node,
and the generated graph identifies participants in the nodes
as any participant that is actively engaged in the real-time
communication session, any participant that was invited to
join but is not yet actively engaged in the real-time
communication session, and any participant that was
engaged in but has disengaged from the real-time
communication session, wherein the graph is further
updated during the real-time communication session based
upon changes in information associated with the real-time
communication session; and
in response to at least two participants selected from
the originator participant and the one or more invited
participants requesting to join the real-time
communication session, hosting the real-time
communication session between the at least two
participants via the clients of the at least two participants;
and
maintaining, via the cloud networking platform,
conversation information between the at least two
participants, the conversation information comprising a
container providing a history of previous real-time
communications between the at least two participants, the
previous real-time communications comprising one or
more different types of real-time communications via one
or more different types of clients of the at least two
participants.
Appeal Br. 22–23 (Claims App.).

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REFERENCES
The prior art relied upon by the Examiner as evidence is:
Name Reference Date
DelHoyo et al.
(“DelHoyo”)
US 7,010,108 B2 Mar. 7, 2006
Kuhlke et al.
(“Kuhlke”)
US 2008/0320082 A1 Dec. 25, 2008
Ramanathan et al.
(“Ramanathan”)
US 2010/0199320 A1 Aug. 5, 2010
Howard et al.
(“Howard”)
US 2012/0260189 A1 Oct. 11, 2012
Mikan et al.
(“Mikan”)
US 2013/0259217 A1 Oct. 3, 2013
REJECTIONS3
1. The Examiner rejects claims 1, 3, 5–7, 9–11, 13, 15–17, 19, 21,
and 23–25 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over DelHoyo,
Howard, Mikan, and Ramanathan. See Final Act. 3–8.
2. The Examiner rejects claims 4, 8, 14, 18, 22, and 26 under
35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over DelHoyo, Howard, Mikan,
Ramanathan, and Kuhlke. See Final Act. 8–9.

3 The Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (“AIA”), Pub. L. No. 112-29, 125
Stat. 284 (2011), amended 35 U.S.C. § 103 renaming 35 U.S.C. § 103’s
subsections. Because the present application has an effective filing date
subsequent to the AIA’s effective date for applications, this decision refers
to the AIA version of 35 U.S.C. § 103.
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ANALYSIS
Obviousness Rejections of Claims 1, 3, 5–7, 9–11, 13,
15–17, 19, 21, and 23–25
The Examiner rejects independent claim 1 as being obvious in view of
DelHoyo, Howard, Mikan, and Ramanathan. See Final Act. 3–8. Appellant
contends the Examiner’s combination fails to teach the claim 1 limitation of
“maintaining, via the cloud networking platform, conversation information
between the at least two participants.” Appeal Br. 11–13. Appellant also
contends the combination fails to teach the claim 1 limitation of “generating
a graph,” specifically,
the generated graph identifies participants in the nodes as any
participant that is actively engaged in the real-time
communication session, any participant that was invited to join
but is not yet actively engaged in the real-time communication
session, and any participant that was engaged in but has
disengaged from the real-time communication session, wherein
the graph is further updated during the real-time communication
session based upon changes in information associated with the
real-time communication session.
Id. at 14–18. Appellant further contends the combination fails to teach the
claim 1 limitations of “sending to clients of the originator participant and the
one or more invited participants rendezvous information that facilitates a
connection for each client to the real-time communication” and “hosting the
real-time communication session between the at least two participants via
the clients of the at least two participants.” Id. at 19.
We concur with the findings and conclusions reached by the
Examiner, and we provide the following analysis for emphasis. With respect
to Appellant’s first contention of error, Appellant argues that “[t]here is no
motivational or predictable reasons to provide the feature of maintaining
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conversation information to the system and techniques described by
DelHoyo” because “DelHoyo is concerned with the ‘back end’ or physical
infrastructure associated with establishing a video conference” and does not
have “any interest or concern in monitoring, maintaining and/or controlling
any features associated with the video conference.” Appeal Br. 12; see also
Reply Br. 2–3. Accordingly, Appellant argues that “[i]t is unclear how any
teaching by Howard would be applied to the teachings of DelHoyo.” Appeal
Br. 13.
DelHoyo, however, is not solely concerned with “the ‘back end.’”
See Appeal Br. at 12–13; Reply Br. 2. DelHoyo relates to “scheduling
telecommunication conferencing having audio and video presentation”
(DelHoyo, 1:5–7), where “the system data supplied includes specific
information about the conference, which the user enters at the time of
scheduling” (id. at 3:59–61), including “Persons in Conference” (id. at 4:13–
14. Moreover, as part of the process of “allocat[ing] the most efficient route
between endpoints” (id. at 4:60–61), DelHoyo “determines whether each
room and person included in the conference is available at the specified date
and time” (id. at 5:53–55) and “indicates that the persons, rooms, devices,
ports, and channels associated with the conference are reserved for the
conference’s scheduled time” (id. at 12:62–64). In short, DelHoyo
determines and maintains information about video conference participants or
the persons on a scheduled conference.
Howard “enable[s] a user 104 to initiate communication with a
contact from within a contact card or panel of a user interface 107,” for
example, “via a conversation history 117 displayed within the contact
panel.” Howard ¶ 10. “The conversation history 117 spans a plurality of
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communication or transport modes 114 or channels and represents a unified,
aggregated set of communication items corresponding to a running
conversation between the user 104 and one or more of the contacts.” Id.
We see no error in the Examiner’s combination of Howard with
DelHoyo. Howard’s teachings of providing a user interface for initiating a
communication with a contact (Howard ¶ 10) and selecting a transport mode
for the communication (id. ¶ 25) provide a self-evident motivation for
combining Howard with DelHoyo. That is, Howard teaches another useful
way to initiate a conversation in a communication system. See Final Act. 5
(“The motivation would have been to provide [a] conversation for users.”).
Thus, the combination of Howard with DelHoyo would have been an
obvious undertaking of applying a known communication system technique
to improve DelHoyo’s conferencing system. See KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex
Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 417 (2007) (“[I]f a technique has been used to improve
one device, and a person of ordinary skill in the art would recognize that it
would improve similar devices in the same way, using the technique is
obvious unless its actual application is beyond his or her skill”). Moreover,
Appellant has not specifically explained why—given DelHoyo’s storage of
participant information (information on persons who participate in scheduled
conferences) (see DelHoyo, 12:62–64)—presenting a conversation history in
DelHoyo’s system would have been “uniquely challenging or difficult for
one of ordinary skill in the art” at the time of Appellant’s invention.
Leapfrog Enters., Inc. v. Fisher-Price, Inc., 485 F.3d 1157, 1162 (Fed. Cir.
2007) (citing KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 418 (2007)).
With respect to Appellant’s second contention, Appellant argues that
“[a]t best, the graph described by DelHoyo is a model of the
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hardware/software architecture to be used for the scheduled
videoconference, and . . . does not provide a ‘snapshot’ at any given time of
an ongoing communication session.” Appeal. Br. 14; see also Reply Br. 4.
Appellant also argues that DelHoyo’s model is “not associated with
individual participants and their status in relation to a real-time
communication session (e.g., actively engage, invited but not yet engaged, or
previously engaged but currently disengaged).” Appeal Br. at 15. Appellant
further argues “[t]here is no disclosure by Mikan that the status management
includes an identification of a participant that was invited to join in a real-
time communication session but is not yet actively engaging in the session.”
Id. at 17. Finally, Appellant argues that “it is not clear how it would have
been obvious to modify the teachings of a network model as described by
DelHoyo . . . based upon teachings of Mikan . . . since Mikan . . . relate[s] to
features associated with an ongoing communication session and not the
configuration of a system architecture to connect devices to a video
conference.” Id.; see also Reply Br. 4–5.
DelHoyo teaches a network model that “is a virtual representation of
the user’s real-world videoconferencing network and includes: all endpoints
and devices in the network.” DelHoyo, 4:26–29. Appellant’s argument that
DelHoyo fails to teach “a ‘snapshot’ at any given time of an ongoing
communication session” (Appeal Br. 14) is unavailing because the Examiner
relies on Mikan for providing the updated statuses of conference
participants, i.e., “wherein the graph is further updated during the real-time
communication session based upon changes in information associated with
the real-time communication session,” as recited in claim 1. See In re Merck
& Co., 800 F.2d 1091, 1097 (Fed. Cir. 1986) (one cannot show non-
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obviousness by attacking references individually where the rejections are
based on combinations of references).
Mikan relates “to managing the status of participants of a tele-
networking meeting.” Mikan ¶ 2. Specifically, Mikan teaches that “[e]ach
participant may be assigned one or a plurality of statuses,” including “active,
mute, unmute, standby, listen only, subconference, disconnect, or any other
term representative of or used to denote a participant’s status or level of
participation in a tele-networking meeting.” Id. ¶ 35. Mikan further teaches
that “display 214 may also display the status of the participants.” Id. ¶ 41.
We agree with the Examiner that Mikan’s displayed statuses active, standby,
and disconnect at least suggest the claim 1 limitations of “actively engaged,”
“invited to join but is not yet actively engaged,” and “was engaged in but has
disengaged,” respectively. See Final Act. 5. In particular, one of ordinary
skill in the art would have understood Mikan’s standby status to mean a
participant waiting to join a conference, which at least suggests the claim 1
limitation of “invited to join but is not yet actively engaged.”
We see no error in the Examiner’s combination of Mikan with
DelHoyo and Howard. As discussed above with respect to Appellant’s first
contention, DelHoyo determines and maintains information on persons
scheduled for conferences (see DelHoyo 3:59–61, 4:13–14, 5:53–55, 12:62–
64), and is not only interested in “the hardware/software architecture to be
used for the scheduled videoconference” (see Appeal Br. ). It would have
been an obvious modification to apply Mikan’s display of the statuses of
conference participants to DelHoyo’s network model of a videoconferencing
network, particularly where DelHoyo already has available information
regarding the participants to a conference. See KSR, 550 U.S. at 417 (“[I]f a
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technique has been used to improve one device, and a person of ordinary
skill in the art would recognize that it would improve similar devices in the
same way, using the technique is obvious unless its actual application is
beyond his or her skill”). In particular, one of ordinary skill in the art would
have wanted “to enable users to know and control the activity status of the
participants.” Final Act. 6. Further, Appellant has not shown that it would
have been “uniquely challenging or difficult for one of ordinary skill in the
art” to combine the references in this way at the time of Appellant’s
invention. Leapfrog, 485 F.3d at 1162.
With respect to Appellant’s third contention, we are not persuaded
that the combination of DelHoyo, Howard, Mikan, and Ramanathan fails to
teach the claim 1 limitations of “sending to clients of the originator
participant and the one or more invited participants rendezvous information
that facilitates a connection for each client to the real-time communication”
and “in response to at least two participants selected from the originator
participant and the one or more invited participants requesting to join the
real-time communication session, hosting the real-time communication
session between the at least two participants via the clients of the at least two
participants.”
DelHoyo teaches that “[o]nce the device and endpoint information has
been set up properly, the automated schedule and control system is capable
of automatically starting all the devices in the conference.” DelHoyo,
28:34–37. Specifically, “[a]fter creating the conference shell, the automated
schedule and control system automatically invites all rooms designated as
Dial-out to the conference using special SNMP commands, including the
correct zone prefix order and dial plan numbers.” Id. at 28:61–65. That is,
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DelHoyo teaches using certain commands for sending the necessary
information for connecting to the conference (i.e., “sending . . . rendezvous
information”), and actually starting a conference (i.e., “hosting the real-time
communication session”). Further, as discussed above, Howard in
combination with DelHoyo teaches that a user (i.e., “originator participant”)
can initiate a conference. Accordingly, we find that the collective teachings
of at least DelHoyo and Howard teach the disputed limitations in
Appellant’s third contention.
Thus, Appellant does not persuade us of error in the Examiner’s
obviousness rejection of independent claim 1. Accordingly, we affirm the
Examiner’s obviousness rejection of independent claim 1, as well as
independent claims 11 and 19, and dependent claims 3, 5–7, 9, 10, 13, 15–
17, 21, and 23–25, not separately argued with particularity. See 37 C.F.R.
§ 41.37(c)(1)(iv).
Obviousness Rejections of Claims 4, 8, 14, 18, 22, and 26
The Examiner rejects dependent claim 4 as being obvious in view of
DelHoyo, Howard, Mikan, Ramanathan, and Kuhlke. See Final Act. 8–9.
Appellant contends that “Kuhlke describes techniques for monitoring
participant attention level to a presenter in a meeting conference,” but that
“[t]here is no reasonable basis for alleging that such features of Kuhlke
could be added to the network model described by DelHoyo.” Appeal
Br. 21; see also Reply Br. 6.
Claim 4 recites “updating the information for the graph in response to
one of the addition of a new participant to the real-time communication
session, a change of an active participant to an inactive participant in the
real-time communication session, or a change of an inactive participant to an
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active participant in the real-time communication session.” Kuhlke teaches,
in a web-based media conference, “receiv[ing] presence monitoring
information 94 from the presence server 14, including . . . whether the
participant reconnects with the conference call.” Kuhlke ¶ 39. We find
Kuhlke’s presence monitoring feature, such as identifying a participant who
reconnects to a conference, at least suggests the claimed updating of
information, including “a change of an inactive participant to an active
participant.” Moreover, one of ordinary skill in the art would have
understood Kuhlke’s presence monitoring feature to be combinable with the
DelHoyo-Howard-Mikan-Ramanathan system, particularly where Mikan
teaches displaying conference participant status. See Mikan ¶¶ 35, 41. That
is, in view of Kuhlke, one would have also been motivated to update the
display of a conference participant’s status, for example, when the
participant reconnected, for the straightforward reason “to enable users to
know the activity status of the participants.” Final Act. 9. Appellant does
not specifically explain why the desire of conference participants to know
the updated statuses of other participants is an insufficient motivation to
combine Kuhlke with the other references. See Appeal Br. 20–21.
Thus, Appellant does not persuade us of error in the Examiner’s
obviousness rejection of dependent claim 4. Accordingly, we affirm the
Examiner’s obviousness rejection of dependent claim 4, as well as
dependent claims 8, 14, 18, 22, and 26 not separately argued with
particularity. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv).
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CONCLUSION
For the reasons discussed above, we conclude that claims 1, 3–11, 13–
19, and 21–26 are obvious in view of the cited prior art. We therefore affirm
the Examiner’s rejections of claims 1, 3–11, 13–19, and 21–26.
DECISION SUMMARY
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/
Basis
Affirmed Reversed
1, 3, 5–7, 9–
11, 13, 15–17,
19, 21, 23–25
103 DelHoyo,
Howard,
Mikan,
Ramanathan
1, 3, 5–7, 9–11,
13, 15–17, 19,
21, 23–25

4, 8, 14, 18,
22, 26
103 DelHoyo,
Howard,
Mikan,
Ramanathan,
Kuhlke
4, 8, 14, 18, 22,
26

Overall
Outcome
1, 3–11, 13–19,
21–26

No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv). See
37 C.F.R. § 41.50(f).
AFFIRMED