IP Law Daily, PATENT—N.D. Cal.: Google and YouTube’s motion to dismiss software company’s complaint for failure to state a claim granted, (Oct 3, 2025)

By Carolin Dennis, B.Sc., LL.B., LL.M.

A software company’s media “clipping” and “stitching” technology was unpatentable for being directed at an abstract idea without a necessary transformative inventive idea added to it.

In a patent infringement dispute, Google, LLC and YouTube, LLC (collectively, defendants) moved to dismiss ART Research and Technology LLC’s (ART’s) complaint in its entirety for failure to state a claim. The federal district court in San Francisco granted the defendants motion to dismiss with leave to amend. The district court found that the two-step Alice test showed that the claims of each asserted patent failed as ineligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101 (ART Research and Technology LLC v. Google, LLC, No. 24-cv-04898-AMO (N.D. Cal. Sept. 29, 2025)).

Background. ART, a software company, was assigned a portfolio of four patents (together, Asserted Patents) through which it sought to improve options for video sharing. ART’s patent portfolio included U.S. Patent No. 9,451,001 (’001 Patent), titled “Social Networking with Video Annotation,” issued on September 20, 2016; U.S. Patent No. 10,084,840 (’840 Patent), titled “Social Networking with Video Annotation,” filed as a continuation-in-part of the ’001 patent, and issued on September 25, 2018; U.S. Patent No. 10,609,442 (’442 Patent), titled “Method and Apparatus for Generating and Annotating Virtual Clips Associated with Playable Media File,” issued on March 31, 2020; and U.S. Patent No. 10,681,103 (’103 Patent), titled “Social Networking with Video Annotation,” filed as a divisional of the ’840 Patent, and issued on June 9, 2020. The patent portfolio provided the ability to create short-form videos on social media platforms via clipping features that can host short-form videos virtually, without taking up valuable gigabytes of storage space separate and apart from the original video and stitching features, which involve combining multiple virtual clips together.

In October 2006, Google purchased YouTube. YouTube generates a significant amount of advertisement revenue through normally-uploaded videos as well as through its “Clips” and “Shorts” features. “Clips” are short portions (five to 60 seconds) of a long-form YouTube video. “Shorts” are short-form videos created by content creators. ART alleged that the defendants’ Shorts and Clips products infringed and induced infringement of the Asserted Patents. ART also alleged that the defendants’ were fully aware of ART’s Patent Portfolio prior to offering the Clips and Shorts features. ART argued that the defendants had constructive notice of ART’s patented technologies, and that Google had actual formal notice of its infringement from letters ART sent on January 4, 2023, and August 22, 2023. Therefore, ART filed a complaint asserting patent infringement claims as to each of the Asserted Patents.

The defendants moved to dismiss ART’s complaint on the basis that ART’s Patents all claim ineligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. § 101 and ART failed to plausibly plead willful infringement. The district court applied the two-step Alice test.

Abstract idea. On step one of the Alice test, the district court found that the defendants focused their challenge on the first claim of each of the Asserted Patents, arguing they are representative. Because ART only discussed the first claim of each patent in its complaint, and because it did not dispute the defendants’ position, the district court considered the first claim of each patent to be representative. The district court found that the representative claims were directed to a patent-ineligible abstract idea because they recited generalized steps of collecting, analyzing, and presenting information, using nothing other than the conventional operations of generic computer components. However, ART did not contest this in its opposition, instead it argued that the Asserted Patents improve computer functionality. ART also argued that its Patents improve storage and network resources for the functionality of a computer. The district court noted that this does not amount to a specific, technological solution to a technological problem. Accordingly, the district court found that the Asserted Patents are directed to abstract ideas.

Inventive concept. On step two of the Alice test, the district court held that Claim 1 of each Asserted Patent failed as ineligible under 35 U.S.C. § 101, and, because they were representative, so did the remaining claims. The district court found that ART failed to articulate an inventive concept in any of its Patents that transformed the abstract ideas into a patent-eligible application of the abstract idea. ART alleged that the “techniques and technology” of its Patents “were not conventional and not well-understood.” However, the complaint lacked supporting factual allegations sufficient to defeat the motion to dismiss. ART acknowledged that the processes relevant to its patents existed previously, but there was no inventive concept sufficient to survive Alice step two where the “improved efficiency” of an existing process is attained “not from an improvement in the computer but from applying the claimed abstract idea” on a computer. ART failed to advance any nonconclusory allegations of inventiveness.

Claim construction. ART argued that dismissal prior to claim construction is improper. However, to delay determining eligibility until after claim construction, the patentee must propose a specific claim construction and explain why those circumstances must be resolved before the scope of the claims that can be understood for Section 101 purposes. However, as ART did not do this, the district court declined to hold a claim construction hearing and defer its decision on the motion to dismiss.

Accordingly, the district court granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss with leave to amend.

The Case is No. 3:24-cv-04898-AMO.

Judge: Olguín, A.

Attorneys: Sean James O'Hara (Kercsmar & O'Hara PLLC) for ART Research and Technology LLC. Nathaniel Bryan Sabri (Perkins Coie LLP) for Google, LLC and YouTube, LLC.

Companies: ART Research and Technology LLC; Google, LLC; YouTube, LLC

Cases: Patent TechnologyInternet CaliforniaNews