Electric Power Group, LLC v. Alstom S.A.

United States Court of Appeals

for the Federal Circuit

______________________

ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC,

Plaintiff-Appellant

v.

ALSTOM S.A., ALSTOM GRID, INC., PSYMETRIX,

LTD., ALSTOM LIMITED,

Defendants-Appellees

______________________

2015-1778

______________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Central District of California in No. 2:12-cv-06365-JGB-

RZ, Judge Jesus G. Bernal.

______________________

Decided: August 1, 2016

______________________

SYED A. HASAN, Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie LLP,

Glendale, CA, argued for plaintiff-appellant. Also repre-

sented by DAVID A. DILLARD, KYLE WAYNE KELLAR.

ANGELA DAWN MITCHELL, Shook, Hardy & Bacon,

LLP, Kansas City, MO, argued for defendants-appellees.

Also represented by PETER EMANUEL STRAND, CHRISTINE

A. GUASTELLO; JAMIE KITANO, San Francisco, CA.

______________________

Before TARANTO, BRYSON, and STOLL, Circuit Judges.

2 ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC v. ALSTOM S.A.

TARANTO, Circuit Judge.

This case involves the eligibility for patenting, under

35 U.S.C. § 101, of certain claims of three of Electric

Power Group, LLC’s patents, U.S. Patent Nos. 7,233,843;

8,060,259; and 8,401,710. Those patents describe and

claim systems and methods for performing real-time

performance monitoring of an electric power grid by

collecting data from multiple data sources, analyzing the

data, and displaying the results. See ’710 patent, col. 1,

lines 27–30; id., col. 2, lines 43–49. Electric Power Group

sued Alstom S.A., Alstom Grid, Inc., Psymetrix Limited,

and Alstom Limited (collectively, Alstom) in the Central

District of California, alleging infringement of various

claims of the three patents. The district court granted

Alstom summary judgment that the subject matter of

Electric Power Group’s asserted patent claims fails the

tests for patent eligibility under governing precedent.

We affirm. Though lengthy and numerous, the claims

do not go beyond requiring the collection, analysis, and

display of available information in a particular field,

stating those functions in general terms, without limiting

them to technical means for performing the functions that

are arguably an advance over conventional computer and

network technology. The claims, defining a desirable

information-based result and not limited to inventive

means of achieving the result, fail under § 101.

I

Claim 12 of the ’710 patent is representative of the

asserted claims. 1 It reads:

1 The claims asserted are claims 4, 7, 9, 12, 19, and

24 of the ’843 patent; claims 1, 5, 18, 21, 38, 49, and 53 of

the ’259 patent; and claims 9, 12, and 17 of the ’710

patent. See J.A. 32–39 (setting out claims).

ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC v. ALSTOM S.A. 3

12. A method of detecting events on an inter-

connected electric power grid in real time over a

wide area and automatically analyzing the events

on the interconnected electric power grid, the

method comprising:

receiving a plurality of data streams, each of the

data streams comprising sub-second, time

stamped synchronized phasor measurements

wherein the measurements in each stream are

collected in real time at geographically distinct

points over the wide area of the interconnected

electric power grid, the wide area comprising

at least two elements from among control are-

as, transmission companies, utilities, regional

reliability coordinators, and reliability jurisdic-

tions;

receiving data from other power system data

sources, the other power system data sources

comprising at least one of transmission maps,

power plant locations, EMS/SCADA systems;

receiving data from a plurality of non-grid data

sources;

detecting and analyzing events in real-time from

the plurality of data streams from the wide ar-

ea based on at least one of limits, sensitivities

and rates of change for one or more measure-

ments from the data streams and dynamic

stability metrics derived from analysis of the

measurements from the data streams includ-

ing at least one of frequency instability, volt-

ages, power flows, phase angles, damping, and

oscillation modes, derived from the phasor

measurements and the other power system da-

ta sources in which the metrics are indicative

of events, grid stress, and/or grid instability,

over the wide area;

4 ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC v. ALSTOM S.A.

displaying the event analysis results and diag-

noses of events and associated ones of the met-

rics from different categories of data and the

derived metrics in visuals, tables, charts, or

combinations thereof, the data comprising at

least one of monitoring data, tracking data,

historical data, prediction data, and summary

data;

displaying concurrent visualization of measure-

ments from the data streams and the dynamic

stability metrics directed to the wide area of

the interconnected electric power grid;

accumulating and updating the measurements

from the data streams and the dynamic stabil-

ity metrics, grid data, and non-grid data in re-

al time as to wide area and local area portions

of the interconnected electric power grid; and

deriving a composite indicator of reliability that

is an indicator of power grid vulnerability and

is derived from a combination of one or more

real time measurements or computations of

measurements from the data streams and the

dynamic stability metrics covering the wide

area as well as non-power grid data received

from the non-grid data source.

’710 patent, col. 30, line 66, through col. 31, line 50. The

district court treated claim 12 as representative, and so

may we. On appeal, Electric Power Group’s opening brief

neither argues for the validity of any other claim if claim

12 is invalid nor presents any meaningful argument for

the distinctive significance of any claim limitations other

than those included in claim 12.

On Alstom’s motion for summary judgment, the dis-

trict court held that the asserted claims do not define

subject matter that is eligible for patenting under § 101.

ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC v. ALSTOM S.A. 5

The court concluded that the claims are directed to “the

abstract idea of monitoring and analyzing data from

disparate sources.” J.A. 27. The court then determined

that the asserted claims lack an inventive concept in the

application of that abstract idea, observing in particular

that the “most significant additional limitations . . . are

those that limit the claim[s] to monitoring and analyzing

data in the context of electric power grids.” J.A. 28.

We have jurisdiction over this appeal under 28 U.S.C.

§ 1295(a)(1). We review the district court’s grant of

summary judgment of ineligibility de novo. Enfish, LLC

v. Microsoft Corp., 822 F.3d 1327, 1334 (Fed. Cir. 2016).

II

Section 101 provides that “[w]hoever invents or dis-

covers any new and useful process, machine, manufac-

ture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful

improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor,

subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.”

35 U.S.C. § 101. The provision, however, “contains an

important implicit exception: Laws of nature, natural

phenomena, and abstract ideas are not patentable.” Alice

Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l, 134 S. Ct. 2347, 2354 (2014). The

Supreme Court, setting up a two-stage framework, has

held that a claim falls outside § 101 where (1) it is “di-

rected to” a patent-ineligible concept, i.e., a law of nature,

natural phenomenon, or abstract idea, and (2), if so, the

particular elements of the claim, considered “both indi-

vidually and ‘as an ordered combination,’” do not add

enough to “‘transform the nature of the claim’ into a

patent-eligible application.” Id. at 2355; see Mayo Collab-

orative Servs. v. Prometheus Labs., Inc., 132 S. Ct. 1289,

1297–98 (2012).

The Supreme Court’s formulation makes clear that

the first-stage filter is a meaningful one, sometimes

ending the § 101 inquiry. Alice, 134 S. Ct. at 2355; see

Rapid Litig. Mgmt. Ltd. v. CellzDirect, Inc., No. 2015-

6 ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC v. ALSTOM S.A.

1570, 2016 WL 3606624, at *6 (Fed. Cir. July 5, 2016);

Enfish, 822 F.3d at 1335. At the same time, the two

stages are plainly related: not only do many of our opin-

ions make clear that the two stages involve overlapping

scrutiny of the content of the claims, e.g., TLI Commc’ns

LLC Patent Litig., 823 F.3d 607, 611–15 (Fed. Cir. 2016);

Genetic Techs. Ltd. v. Merial L.L.C., 818 F.3d 1369, 1375

(Fed. Cir. 2016), but we have noted that there can be close

questions about when the inquiry should proceed from the

first stage to the second, Enfish, 822 F.3d at 1339; see

Rapid Litig., 2016 WL 3606624, at *6–7 (explaining that

stage-two analysis would reach same conclusion as

reached at stage one); Bascom Global Internet Servs., Inc.

v. AT&T Mobility LLC, No. 2015-1763, 2016 WL 3514158,

at *5 (Fed. Cir. June 27, 2016). Reflecting those points,

we have described the first-stage inquiry as looking at the

“focus” of the claims, their “‘character as a whole,’” and

the second-stage inquiry (where reached) as looking more

precisely at what the claim elements add—specifically,

whether, in the Supreme Court’s terms, they identify an

“‘inventive concept’” in the application of the ineligible

matter to which (by assumption at stage two) the claim is

directed. See Enfish, 822 F.3d at 1335–36; Internet Pa-

tents Corp. v. Active Network, Inc., 790 F.3d 1343, 1346

(Fed. Cir. 2015); cf. Bascom, 2016 WL 3514158, at *5

(“basic thrust”).

A

The claims in this case fall into a familiar class of

claims “directed to” a patent-ineligible concept. The focus

of the asserted claims, as illustrated by claim 12 quoted

above, is on collecting information, analyzing it, and

displaying certain results of the collection and analysis.

We need not define the outer limits of “abstract idea,” or

at this stage exclude the possibility that any particular

inventive means are to be found somewhere in the claims,

to conclude that these claims focus on an abstract idea—

and hence require stage-two analysis under § 101.

ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC v. ALSTOM S.A. 7

Information as such is an intangible. See Microsoft

Corp. v. AT & T Corp., 550 U.S. 437, 451 n.12 (2007);

Bayer AG v. Housey Pharm., Inc., 340 F.3d 1367, 1372

(Fed. Cir. 2003). Accordingly, we have treated collecting

information, including when limited to particular content

(which does not change its character as information), as

within the realm of abstract ideas. See, e.g., Internet

Patents, 790 F.3d at 1349; OIP Techs., Inc. v. Ama-

zon.com, Inc., 788 F.3d 1359, 1363 (Fed. Cir. 2015); Con-

tent Extraction & Transmission LLC v. Wells Fargo Bank,

Nat’l Ass’n, 776 F.3d 1343, 1347 (Fed. Cir. 2014); Digitech

Image Techs., LLC v. Elecs. for Imaging, Inc., 758 F.3d

1344, 1351 (Fed. Cir. 2014); CyberSource Corp. v. Retail

Decisions, Inc., 654 F.3d 1366, 1370 (Fed. Cir. 2011). In a

similar vein, we have treated analyzing information by

steps people go through in their minds, or by mathemati-

cal algorithms, without more, as essentially mental

processes within the abstract-idea category. See, e.g., TLI

Commc’ns, 823 F.3d at 613; Digitech, 758 F.3d at 1351;

SmartGene, Inc. v. Advanced Biological Labs., SA, 555 F.

App’x 950, 955 (Fed. Cir. 2014); Bancorp Servs., L.L.C. v.

Sun Life Assurance Co. of Canada (U.S.), 687 F.3d 1266,

1278 (Fed. Cir. 2012); CyberSource Corp. v. Retail Deci-

sions, Inc., 654 F.3d 1366, 1372 (Fed. Cir. 2011); SiRF

Tech., Inc. v. Int’l Trade Comm’n, 601 F.3d 1319, 1333

(Fed. Cir. 2010); see also Mayo, 132 S. Ct. at 1301; Parker

v. Flook, 437 U.S. 584, 589–90 (1978); Gottschalk v. Ben-

son, 409 U.S. 63, 67 (1972). And we have recognized that

merely presenting the results of abstract processes of

collecting and analyzing information, without more (such

as identifying a particular tool for presentation), is ab-

stract as an ancillary part of such collection and analysis.

See, e.g., Content Extraction, 776 F.3d at 1347; Ultramer-

cial, Inc. v. Hulu, LLC, 772 F.3d 709, 715 (Fed. Cir. 2014).

Here, the claims are clearly focused on the combina-

tion of those abstract-idea processes. The advance they

purport to make is a process of gathering and analyzing

8 ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC v. ALSTOM S.A.

information of a specified content, then displaying the

results, and not any particular assertedly inventive

technology for performing those functions. They are

therefore directed to an abstract idea.

The claims here are unlike the claims in Enfish.

There, we relied on the distinction made in Alice between,

on one hand, computer-functionality improvements and,

on the other, uses of existing computers as tools in aid of

processes focused on “abstract ideas” (in Alice, as in so

many other § 101 cases, the abstract ideas being the

creation and manipulation of legal obligations such as

contracts involved in fundamental economic practices).

Enfish, 822 F.3d at 1335–36; see Alice, 134 S. Ct. at 2358–

59. That distinction, the Supreme Court recognized, has

common-sense force even if it may present line-drawing

challenges because of the programmable nature of ordi-

nary existing computers. In Enfish, we applied the dis-

tinction to reject the § 101 challenge at stage one because

the claims at issue focused not on asserted advances in

uses to which existing computer capabilities could be put,

but on a specific improvement—a particular database

technique—in how computers could carry out one of their

basic functions of storage and retrieval of data. Enfish,

822 F.3d at 1335–36; see Bascom, 2016 WL 3514158, at

*5; cf. Alice, 134 S. Ct. at 2360 (noting basic storage

function of generic computer). The present case is differ-

ent: the focus of the claims is not on such an improvement

in computers as tools, but on certain independently ab-

stract ideas that use computers as tools.

B

When we turn to stage two of the Alice analysis and

scrutinize the claim elements more microscopically, we

find nothing sufficient to remove the claims from the class

of subject matter ineligible for patenting. Most obviously,

limiting the claims to the particular technological envi-

ronment of power-grid monitoring is, without more,

ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC v. ALSTOM S.A. 9

insufficient to transform them into patent-eligible appli-

cations of the abstract idea at their core. See Alice, 134 S.

Ct. at 2358; Mayo, 132 S. Ct. at 1294; Bilski v. Kappos,

561 U.S. 593, 610–11 (2010); Diamond v. Diehr, 450 U.S.

175, 191 (1981); buySAFE, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 765 F.3d

1350, 1355 (Fed. Cir. 2014). More particularly, a large

portion of the lengthy claims is devoted to enumerating

types of information and information sources available

within the power-grid environment. But merely selecting

information, by content or source, for collection, analysis,

and display does nothing significant to differentiate a

process from ordinary mental processes, whose implicit

exclusion from § 101 undergirds the information-based

category of abstract ideas.

The claims in this case do not even require a new

source or type of information, or new techniques for

analyzing it. See, e.g., ’710 patent, col. 8, lines 51–62

(referring to existing phasor data sources); J.A. 6969–71

(describing workings and history of phasor data use);

Electric Power Group Br. at 21–22; Reply Br. at 5 (new

algorithms not claimed). As a result, they do not require

an arguably inventive set of components or methods, such

as measurement devices or techniques, that would gener-

ate new data. They do not invoke any assertedly in-

ventive programming. Merely requiring the selection and

manipulation of information—to provide a “humanly

comprehensible” amount of information useful for users,

Reply Br. at 6; Electric Power Group Br. at 14–15—by

itself does not transform the otherwise-abstract processes

of information collection and analysis.

Inquiry therefore must turn to any requirements for

how the desired result is achieved. But in this case the

claims’ invocation of computers, networks, and displays

does not transform the claimed subject matter into pa-

tent-eligible applications. The claims at issue do not

require any nonconventional computer, network, or

display components, or even a “non-conventional and non-

10 ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC v. ALSTOM S.A.

generic arrangement of known, conventional pieces,” but

merely call for performance of the claimed information

collection, analysis, and display functions “on a set of

generic computer components” and display devices.

Bascom, 2016 WL 3514158, at *6–7.

Nothing in the claims, understood in light of the speci-

fication, requires anything other than off-the-shelf, con-

ventional computer, network, and display technology for

gathering, sending, and presenting the desired infor-

mation. That is so even as to the claim requirement of

“displaying concurrent visualization” of two or more types

of information, ’710 patent, col. 31, line 37, even if under-

stood to require time-synchronized display: nothing in the

patent contains any suggestion that the displays needed

for that purpose are anything but readily available. We

have repeatedly held that such invocations of computers

and networks that are not even arguably inventive are

“insufficient to pass the test of an inventive concept in the

application” of an abstract idea. buySAFE, 765 F.3d at

1353, 1355; see, e.g., Mortg. Grader, Inc. v. First Choice

Loan Servs. Inc., 811 F.3d 1314, 1324–25 (Fed. Cir. 2016);

Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Capital One Bank (USA),

792 F.3d 1363, 1370 (Fed. Cir. 2015); Internet Patents, 790

F.3d at 1348–49; Content Extraction, 776 F.3d at 1347–48.

Two of our decisions that rejected § 101 challenges are

materially different from this case. The claims at issue

here do not require an arguably inventive device or tech-

nique for displaying information, unlike the claims at

issue in DDR Holdings, LLC v. Hotels.com, L.P., 773 F.3d

1245, 1257 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (at JMOL stage finding in-

ventive concept in modification of conventional mechanics

behind website display to produce dual-source integrated

hybrid display). Nor do the claims here require an argua-

bly inventive distribution of functionality within a net-

work, thus distinguishing the claims at issue from those

in Bascom, 2016 WL 3514158, at *6 (at pleading stage

finding sufficient inventive concept in “the installation of

ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC v. ALSTOM S.A. 11

a filtering tool at a specific location, remote from the end-

users, with customizable filtering features specific to each

end user”). The claims in this case specify what infor-

mation in the power-grid field it is desirable to gather,

analyze, and display, including in “real time”; but they do

not include any requirement for performing the claimed

functions of gathering, analyzing, and displaying in real

time by use of anything but entirely conventional, generic

technology. The claims therefore do not state an arguably

inventive concept in the realm of application of the infor-

mation-based abstract ideas.

The district court in this case wrapped up its applica-

tion of the Supreme Court’s framework by invoking an

important common-sense distinction between ends sought

and particular means of achieving them, between desired

results (functions) and particular ways of achieving

(performing) them. The court identified the problem

addressed by the patents: “Here, the problem is the need

to monitor and analyze data from multiple distinct parts

of a power grid.” J.A. 30. But, the court reasoned, “there

is a critical difference between patenting a particular

concrete solution to a problem and attempting to patent

the abstract idea of a solution to the problem in general.”

Id. Electric Power Group’s asserted claims, the court

observed, do the latter: rather than claiming “some specif-

ic way of enabling a computer to monitor data from mul-

tiple sources across an electric power grid,” some

“particular implementation,” they “purport to monopolize

every potential solution to the problem”—any way of

effectively monitoring multiple sources on a power grid.

Id. Whereas patenting a particular solution “would

incentivize further innovation in the form of alternative

methods for achieving the same result,” the court con-

cluded, allowing claims like Electric Power Group’s claims

here would “inhibit[ ] innovation by prohibiting other

inventors from developing their own solutions to the

problem without first licensing the abstract idea.” Id.

12 ELECTRIC POWER GROUP, LLC v. ALSTOM S.A.

The district court did not set forth that description as

a freestanding basis for its ineligibility holding, independ-

ent of the framework for analysis established under the

Supreme Court’s authority. Moreover, the district court

phrased its point only by reference to claims so result-

focused, so functional, as to effectively cover any solution

to an identified problem. The court’s description is one

helpful way of double-checking the application of the

Supreme Court’s framework to particular claims—

specifically, when determining whether the claims meet

the requirement of an inventive concept in application.

Indeed, the essentially result-focused, functional charac-

ter of claim language has been a frequent feature of

claims held ineligible under § 101, especially in the area

of using generic computer and network technology to

carry out economic transactions. See Loyalty Conversion

Sys. Corp. v. American Airlines, Inc., 66 F. Supp. 3d 829,

837–38, 840, 843, 845 (E.D. Tex. 2014). In this case, the

district court’s wrap-up description confirms its, and our,

conclusion that the claims at issue fail to meet the stand-

ard for patent eligibility under § 101.

CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the judgment of

the district court.

AFFIRMED