FaceTec, Inc. v. iProov Ltd.

District Court, D. Nevada·Decided December 6, 2024·No. 2:21-cv-02252·Unknown

Opinion

1 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 2 DISTRICT OF NEVADA 3 * * * 4 FaceTec, Inc., Case No. 2:21-cv-02252-ART-BNW 5 Plaintiff, 6 AMENDED ORDER v. 7 iProov, Ltd., 8 Defendant. 9 10

11 iProov, Ltd.,

12 Counter-Claimant,

13 v.

14 FaceTec, Inc.,

15 Counter-Defendant.

16 17 This is a patent dispute over facial-recognition software in which both companies assert 18 patent-infringement claims against the other. Plaintiff FaceTec moves to compel Defendant 19 iProov to produce discovery based on FaceTec’s infringement contentions. ECF No. 89. iProov 20 opposes and moves the Court to strike, in part, those contentions. ECF No. 99. 21 This Court previously issued an order granting FaceTec’s motion to compel and denying 22 iProov’s motion to strike. ECF No. 122. Having considered iProov’s objections (ECF No. 126) to 23 the prior order, FaceTec’s response (ECF No. 129), and the parties’ surreplies (ECF Nos. 134 and 24 137-1), the Court construes iProov’s objections as a motion to reconsider and issues the following 25 amended order. Because the Court finds that FaceTec has not accused the mobile platform of 26 Liveness Assurance under Local Patent Rule 1-6, it grants iProov’s motion to strike. However, 27 the Court also gives FaceTec leave to amend its infringement contentions and thus denies 1 I. BACKGROUND 2 iProov is the developer and patent owner of Liveness Assurance, which is a software that 3 verifies whether an online user is real and the right person to access sensitive information through 4 facial-recognition technology. ECF No. 99 at 2. FaceTec alleges that this software infringes its 5 two patents. ECF No. 98 at 3. This amended order only concerns motions relating to FaceTec’s, 6 not iProov’s, infringement claims. 7 In August of 2022, FaceTec served its preliminary infringement contentions, in which it 8 defined the accused instrumentalities as all iProov products that included the Liveness Assurance 9 software. ECF 89 at 3. iProov asked FaceTec to supplement its contentions because it believed 10 that they did not show infringement of any accused instrumentality. ECF No. 98 at 4. The parties 11 conferred, and FaceTec agreed to amend its preliminary infringement contentions to include more 12 details about its infringement allegations. Id.; ECF No. 89 at 3. In July of 2023, FaceTec served 13 its amended infringement contentions, which contained the same definition of accused 14 instrumentalities as its prior contentions but added more information to its claim charts. ECF No. 15 89 at 4. 16 iProov argues that the information FaceTec added to its amended claim charts were 17 specific to the web platform of Liveness Assurance, and therefore, only accused the web 18 platform. ECF No. 98 at 4. Conversely, FaceTec argues that it accused both the web and mobile 19 platforms in its amended infringement contentions. ECF No. 89 at 3. The parties’ differing views 20 on this issue did not surface until approximately eight months later, when FaceTec requested that 21 iProov produce the source code of the mobile platform of Liveness Assurance. Id. at 4. iProov 22 refused to do so because it believed that FaceTec had not accused the mobile platform. Id. 23 Accordingly, FaceTec filed a motion to compel, in which it moved the Court to find that it had 24 accused the mobile platform and to compel iProov to produce the related source code. ECF No. 25 89. Subsequently, iProov filed a motion to strike, in which it sought an order from the Court 26 limiting FaceTec’s accused instrumentalities to the web platform of Liveness Assurance only. 27 ECF No. 99. 1 On September 10, 2024, this Court issued an order on the two motions. ECF No. 122. 2 This Court found that FaceTec had accused the mobile platform of Liveness Assurance through 3 the representative-product rule, which allows a plaintiff to accuse a product by articulating how it 4 (here, the mobile platform) shares the same, or substantially the same, infringing qualities as an 5 accused product (here, the web platform). Id. at 7. Given the caselaw and argument before it, the 6 Court found that FaceTec articulated how the accused web platform was representative of the 7 mobile platform outside of its preliminary infringement contentions (i.e., in its briefings before 8 the Court). Id. at 8. This Court therefore determined that FaceTec had properly accused the 9 mobile platform through its representative-product analysis. 10 iProov objected to the order, and primarily argued that this Court erred in looking beyond 11 the preliminary infringement contentions to find that the web platform was representative of the 12 mobile platform. ECF No. 126 at 8. In its objection, iProov cited non-binding authority that 13 directly supported its argument that a plaintiff’s representative-product analysis must be 14 contained in its infringement contentions. Id. at 10. Because this Court is persuaded by iProov’s 15 argument and newly cited caselaw, as explained below, it issues the following amended order.1 16 II. MOTION TO STRIKE 17 A. FaceTec’s infringement contentions do not comply with LPR 1-6. 18 iProov moves the Court to strike FaceTec’s definition of accused instrumentalities. ECF 19 No. 99 at 13. iProov further requests that the Court enter an order limiting the definition to the 20 web platform of Liveness Assurance only. Id. In support of this request, iProov argues that 21 FaceTec did not accuse the mobile platform in accordance with this district’s local patent rules. 22 Id. at 4–12. 23 This district’s Local Rules of Practice for Patent Cases (“Local Patent Rules” or “LPR”) 24 set forth a series of disclosures that each party must make in a patent case. See generally LPRs. 25 As part of these disclosures, a party claiming patent infringement must serve infringement 26 27 1 This Court does not address iProov’s objection regarding claim construction (ECF No. 126 at 13–17) 1 contentions, which include a claim chart or charts that specifically identify how the accused 2 instrumentalities allegedly infringe each limitation of each patent. LPR 1-6(c). LPR 1-6 states that 3 the preliminary infringement contentions must contain: 4 Separately for each asserted claim, each accused apparatus, product, device, process, method, act, or other instrumentality (“Accused Instrumentality”) of each opposing 5 party of which the party is aware. This identification must be as specific as possible. Each product, device, and apparatus must be identified by name or model number, if 6 known. Each method or process must be identified by name, if known, or by any product, device, or apparatus which, when used, allegedly results in the practice of the 7 claimed method or process. . . . [And a] chart identifying specifically where each limitation of each asserted claim is found within each Accused Instrumentality . . . 8 9 LPR 1-6(b)–(c). 10 “All courts agree that the degree of specificity under [LPR 1-6] must be sufficient to 11 provide reasonable notice to the defendant why the plaintiff believes it has a reasonable chance of 12 proving infringement.” Geovector Corp. v. Samsung Elecs. Co., No. 16-CV-02463-WHO, 2017 13 WL 76950, at *3 (N.D. Cal. Jan. 9, 2017) (quoting Shared Memory Graphics LLC v. Apple, Inc. 14 812 F. Supp 2d 1022, 1025 (N.D. Cal. 2010)) (cleaned up).2 The Federal Circuit described this 15 notice requirement as putting “the opposing party and the court on notice of plaintiff’s position as 16 to ‘where each element of each infringed claim is found within the accused device.’” Golden v. 17 United States, 156 Fed. Cl. 623 (2021), aff’d, No. 2022-1196, 2022 WL 4103287 (Fed. Cir. Sept. 18 8, 2022) (quoting Iris Corp. Berhad v. United States, 84 Fed. Cl. 12, 16 (2008)). 19 Plaintiffs may show “where each limitation of each asserted claim is found within each 20 [accused product]” through a claim chart. See LPR 1-6(c).

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FaceTec, Inc. v. iProov Ltd., (D. Nev. 2024).

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