BIOS Security Patent Invalid Under 35 U.S.C. § 101 Despite Enfish

Following the Federal Circuit's decision in Enfish, LLC v. Microsoft Corp., --- F.3d ---- (Fed. Cir. May 16, 2016), the court denied plaintiff's motion to reconsider an earlier order granting defendants' judgment on the pleadings that plaintiff's BIOS security patent encompassed unpatentable subject matter. "As the [patent-in-suit] acknowledges, the [patent] does not disclose any of those mathematical algorithms that actually represent an application of the 'abstract' idea of securing the BIOS through authentication, nor a new concrete means of applying those algorithms. Unlike the patent in Enfish which apparently disclosed a new method of building a database, here, no aspect of the [patent-in-suit] does enough to remove to claims from the realm of the abstract. . . . The [patent] purports to simply combine the 'conventional' system of security through the use of private/public keys with the conventional computer component of a BIOS. As discussed extensively in [the prior] Order, this is insufficient to elevate the at-issue claims to a concrete application of the abstract concept of authentication." Kinglite Holdings Inc. v. Micro-Star International Co. Ltd. et al, 2-14-cv-03009 (CACD July 6, 2016, Order) (Selna, J.)