Real-Time Auction Patent Invalid Under Alice

The court granted defendant's motion for judgment on the pleadings that plaintiff's real-time auction patent was invalid for lack of patentable subject matter and found the claims did not contain an inventive concept. "The patent itself describes implementing an existing abstract idea — an auction — refined for implementation on the Internet. Two-modes does not change this. . . . Likewise, a partial update of the web page with only minimal information is also just Internet implementation of a 'real live auction'. . . . Individually and collectively these variations do not make the abstract idea described patent eligible. . . . [Plaintiff] claims its approach to an online auction minimizes server use. . . . [T]he [patent] does not identify server bandwidth as a problem to be solved by the Patent. However, even if it were, it is only a incidental benefit to generic implementation of the [patent] claims."

Advanced Auctions LLC v. eBay Inc., 3-13-cv-01612 (CASD March 27, 2015, Order) (Benitez, J.)