IP Law Daily, PATENT—Fed. Cir.: Licensing entity’s media routing patents largely invalidated; Akamai did not infringe the surviving claims, (Dec 1, 2025)

By Saurabh Kashyap, B.A., M.A., LL.B., LL.M.

District court correctly found that the asserted claim terms were ambiguous and properly held that Akamai's system did not receive requests for media content as required by the surviving claims.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed the Central District of California’s declaratory judgment in favor of Akamai Technologies, Inc., concluding that all asserted claims of the patents at issue were either invalid or not infringed. The court ruled that key claims were indefinite under 35 U.S.C. § 112(b) due to vague language of degree, such as "best" and "optimal." For the surviving claims of one patent, the Federal Circuit upheld the grant of summary judgment of noninfringement, finding that Akamai’s system did not meet the claim limitation requiring a management center to receive a request for media content (Akamai Technologies, Inc. v. Mediapointe, Inc., No. 24-1571 (Fed. Cir. Nov. 25, 2025)).

Background. The plaintiff/appellee, Akamai Technologies, Inc., is a global provider of cloud services specializing in content delivery network (CDN) systems that optimize web content routing and media streaming. The defendant/appellant, MediaPointe, Inc., and its parent, AMHC, Inc., are patent licensing and holding entities.

The patents at issue included U.S. Patent No. 8,559,426 (the '426 patent) and its continuation U.S. Patent No. 9,426,195 (the '195 patent). Titled "System and Method for Distribution of Data Packets Utilizing an Intelligent Distribution Network," the patents cover systems and methods for routing streamed media using a management center and multiple intermediary nodes. The technology centers on mapping "trace routes" to evaluate Internet pathways based on metrics such as latency, hop count, and reliability, and selecting the "best performing" nodes and routes for delivery to geographically dispersed clients.

Akamai initiated a declaratory judgment action in September 2022, seeking a noninfringement ruling on both patents. MediaPointe responded with counterclaims for infringement, and Akamai subsequently sought a declaratory judgment of invalidity. The district court held that all independent claims of the ’426 patent and several claims of the ’195 patent were invalid. The remaining claims of the ’195 patent survived claim construction but were later dismissed on summary judgment for noninfringement. MediaPointe appealed both decisions.

Indefiniteness. The Federal Circuit upheld the district court’s finding that the “optimal” and “best” claim terms rendered several claims indefinite. Citing Nautilus, Inc. v. Biosig Instruments, Inc., 572 U.S. 898 (2014), the court emphasized that claims must inform those skilled in the art of their scope with reasonable certainty. While MediaPointe argued that the claims derived sufficient clarity from the trace-route data (such as latency and hop counts), the court found that the specification lacked guidance on how to weigh conflicting metrics or select among multiple possible routes.

Drawing from Interval Licensing LLC v. AOL, Inc., 766 F.3d 1364 (Fed. Cir. 2014), and Datamize LLC v. Plumtree Software, Inc., 417 F.3d 1342 (Fed. Cir. 2005), the panel held that subjective standards like “optimal” without an algorithm or objective boundary invite arbitrary interpretation. The court emphasized that the specification explicitly allowed the operator to consider various subjective factors, such as time of day, cost, and "quality of service" indicators, further undermining any claim of definiteness. The court also rejected MediaPointe’s belated argument—raised only in its reply brief—that any mapping and comparison of trace routes would satisfy the claim term, noting that such an interpretation would read the “optimal” qualifier out of the claim entirely.

Summary judgment of noninfringement. The court separately upheld summary judgment of noninfringement for the surviving claims of the ’195 patent (claims 1, 3–4, and 6–7). These claims lacked the problematic “best” or “optimal” language but required that a “management center” receive an “initial request for media content” from a client. MediaPointe’s expert, Dr. Aviel Rubin, argued that Akamai’s Mapper—an internal functionality operating within its DNS servers—satisfied this requirement because it received DNS queries that were allegedly connected to a user’s attempt to stream content.

The Federal Circuit disagreed. It held that the plain language of the claim, requiring the “request” to be “received by a management center,” unambiguously refers to a discrete computer message identifying media content. Mapper received only DNS queries, which did not include any specific content information. Actual requests for media content, transmitted via HTTP, were sent directly to Akamai’s edge servers—not to Mapper. The court emphasized that MediaPointe’s interpretation—equating a user typing a URL into a browser with a “request” received by Akamai—was untenable and unsupported by the record.

The court applied VLSI Tech. LLC v. Intel Corp., 87 F.4th 1332 (Fed. Cir. 2023), and Avid Tech., Inc. v. Harmonic, Inc., 810 F.3d 1040 (Fed. Cir. 2016), to hold that while a jury may construe claim terms with ordinary meaning, the claim language in context could not reasonably be interpreted to include user-side behavior not received by the management center. Thus, even accepting MediaPointe’s expert opinion, no reasonable jury could find infringement under the correct claim scope.

Additional considerations. The court also noted that it need not reach the district court’s alternative ground for summary judgment: the exclusion of Dr. Rubin’s testimony for procedural delay under Rule 37(c). Since MediaPointe could not establish a triable issue even with that testimony, the issue was rendered moot.

The Case is No. 24-1571.

Judge: Taranto, R.

Attorneys: Thomas Saunders (Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP) for Akamai Technologies, Inc. Larry Y. Liu (Susman Godfrey LLP) for MediaPointe, Inc. and AMHC, Inc.

Companies: Akamai Technologies, Inc.; MediaPointe, Inc.; AMHC, Inc.

Cases: Patent TechnologyInternet FedCirNews CaliforniaNews