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ACT 23310/2024

—·EP3822805: APPARATUS, SYSTEM, AND METHOD FOR ADAPTIVE-RATE SHIFTING OF STREAMING CONTENT

Case details
Status
—
Action
Revocation
Category
Main Revocation Action
Parties
Claimants
Reps: Georg Anetsberger (Bardehle Pagenberg); Tilman Müller-Stoy (Bardehle Pagenberg); Maggie Huang (Bardehle Pagenberg); Conor McLaughlin (Mishcon de Reya LLP)
Respondents
Reps: Denise Benz (A&O Shearman); Jan Ebersohl (A&O Shearman); Celina Kuhn (A&O Shearman)
Division
Paris CD
Judges
Technology
Telecoms · Video Codecs · Computing & AI
Language
—
First decided
May 28, 2025
Claims
At issue1, 2, 9
Revokedall
Notes: Paris Central Division revoked the German part of EP 3 822 805 B1 in its entirety for added matter; independent claims 1 and 9 explicitly discussed; dependent claim 2 also addressed; all 16 auxiliary requests failed.
Decisions
  • 2025-05-28
    Partially revokedRevocation meritsRevocation Action

    Paris Central Division (28 May 2025) revoked the German national part of EP 3 822 805 B1 on grounds of added matter (Art. 100(c) EPC), as the patent's claim 1 extended beyond the content of the parent application. All auxiliary requests (AR1–AR16) were either refused admission or failed to overcome the invalidity. Costs were awarded against the patent proprietor (DISH Technologies).

    Legal issues:Added matter (Art. 100(c) EPC)Claim interpretationScope of revocation limited to national part (DE)Admissibility of auxiliary requests
Documents
  • 5BCAF6B8131AF9A126AF70154407CD63_en.pdf2025-05-28ENGLISH
Plain-English summary

Aylo Premium Ltd. (a Cyprus-based entity) brought a revocation action against DISH Technologies L.L.C.'s EP 3 822 805 B1 (adaptive-rate streaming patent) before the Paris Central Division, seeking revocation of the German national part. The court revoked the patent on the ground of added matter (Art. 100(c) EPC), finding that feature 1.7 of claim 1 — which refers to requesting 'the highest quality' streamlet determined sustainable — introduced an inadmissible generalisation not supported by the parent application's disclosure of step-wise quality adjustment. All 16 of DISH's auxiliary requests failed to overcome this defect and a late-filed second set of 16 requests was not admitted.

Accepted arguments
What the court agreed with — by party.

  • EP 3 822 805 B1 claim 1 feature 1.7 extends beyond the content of the parent application by introducing the concept of 'requesting the streamlets of the highest quality one of the copies determined sustainable at that time', enabling direct jumps to the highest quality and inadmissible generalisation over what the parent application discloses

    ClaimantLegal basis: Art. 100(c) EPC; added matter

    Note: Court found the term 'highest' in feature 1.7 introduced an inadmissible generalisation not supported by the parent application's flow diagram or description, as the parent only disclosed a step-wise quality adjustment approach.

  • Revocation can be limited to national parts of UPCA member states at the request of a party

    ClaimantLegal basis: UPCA provisions on scope of revocation

    Note: Court confirmed this as a general principle, applied by revoking only the German national part of EP 3 822 805.

Rejected arguments
What the court did not agree with — and why.

  • All 16 Auxiliary Requests (AR1 to AR16) filed by DISH Technologies to overcome the added matter invalidity

    RespondentLegal basis: Art. 100(c) EPC

    Reason: None of AR1 to AR16 introduced amendments capable of overcoming the invalidity arising from feature 1.7 (the 'highest quality' limitation); AR1' to AR16' were not admitted due to late filing.

  • Dependent claim 2 (streamlet cache module) survives even if claim 1 is revoked

    RespondentLegal basis: Art. 100(c) EPC

    Reason: Dependent claim 2 falls with claim 1 because it depends from the invalid claim 1 and the same added matter infects it.

Key legal principles
Doctrines and rules cited in the reasoning.
Added matter (Art. 100(c) EPC) — claim feature introducing concept not supported by parent application constitutes inadmissible generalisationScope of UPC revocation can be limited to national parts of UPCA member statesLate-filed auxiliary requests (AR1' to AR16') inadmissibleClaim construction — purpose of determining whether claimed feature 1.7 finds literal support in parent application

Browse other cases on this principle.

Claim construction notes

The court construed feature 1.7 of EP 3 822 805 claim 1 as claiming 'requesting the streamlets of the highest quality one of the copies determined sustainable at that time.' The parent application's flow diagram (Figure 7) and description only disclosed step-wise quality adjustment (evaluating performance factors at block 706 and generating new performance factors at step 708); it did not foresee or suggest direct 'jumps' to the highest sustainable quality. Introducing the word 'highest' in the granted claim therefore extended the claim beyond the parent application's disclosure, constituting added matter.