Invalidity dossier
US 6181867
Video storage and retrieval system
Current assignee: Intervu Inc
Added 9/23/2026, 12:28:02 PM
Active provider: DeepSeek · deepseek-flash
Patent summary
Title, assignee, inventors, filing/issue dates, abstract, and a plain-language overview of the claims.
Patent Overview: US6181867B1
Title: Video storage and retrieval system
Patent number: US6181867B1
Application number: US08/486,517
Inventors: Brian Kenner; Harry Gruber
Original/Current Assignee (per listing): Intervu Inc
Priority/Filing date: 1995-06-07
Publication (grant) date: 2001-01-30
Legal status listed: Expired – Lifetime (anticipated expiration 2018-01-30)
Purpose and plain-language scope (from the supplied excerpt): The patent concerns a system for storing and retrieving video. The excerpt's prior-art keywords — "video," "storage," "request," "sru," "index manager" — indicate the disclosed subject matter involves a storage/retrieval unit ("SRU") and an index manager handling video requests. The classifications place it in networked video delivery and retrieval: distributed/replicated servers with load balancing (server selection based on server parameters such as available memory or workload, network conditions, and client/server locations), proxy and caching arrangements for temporarily storing data at an intermediate stage, and video-on-demand server architectures including secondary/proxy servers, content caching, bandwidth/channel allocation, and monitoring available downstream bandwidth.
Notably, the excerpt does not describe the claimed steps, claim language, or specification in any substantive way; the "scope" above is inferred only from the listed CPC classifications and keyword fields, not from the claims.
Related-family filings listed: EP0834143A1, CA2228607A1, WO1996041285A1, AU716842B2/AU61139/96A, JPH11507456A, plus related US patents US5956716A, US6003030A, US6269394B1, US6154744A, US6496856B1, US6502125B1, US6665706B2.
What the excerpt does not establish:
- The actual text of any claim, or independent/dependent claim structure.
- The specification's detailed description, figures (images were not rendered), or specific embodiments.
- Any specific prior-art reference relied upon during prosecution, or examination history.
- The accuracy of the assignee, priority date, or legal status — the source itself states these are assumptions, not legal conclusions.
- Any litigation, ownership transfer beyond the noted assignment, or validity determination (excluded from this overview by instruction).
Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/[US6181867](/patent/US6181867)/en
Generated 10/1/2026, 9:53:38 PM
Cases on file (0)
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Litigation summary
Past and pending lawsuits — plaintiffs, defendants, jurisdictions, outcomes, and notable rulings.
Proceedings on file (0)
All PTAB activity →AIA trial proceedings (IPR / PGR / CBM) filed at the USPTO Patent Trial and Appeal Board against this patent. Sourced from the USPTO Open Data Portal and refreshed every six hours; each proceeding number deep-links to the PTAB E2E docket.
No PTAB proceedings on file. This patent has not been challenged via IPR, PGR, or CBM. The absence is itself a signal — well-asserted patents eventually attract IPRs. The LLM analysis below may surface filings the ODP feed hasn’t indexed yet.
PTAB challenges
AIA trial proceedings at the USPTO Patent Trial and Appeal Board — IPR, PGR, and CBM. Petitioners, judge panels, claim-level invalidation outcomes from Final Written Decisions, and Federal Circuit appeals. The single most important defensive datapoint after litigation history.
Assignment history
Inventors, original assignee, and the chain of ownership recorded with the USPTO — including the correspondent attorney who recorded each assignment, since shell-LLC chains often share one repeat-player attorney even when the entity names look unrelated. Surfaces NPE / patent-troll patterns: shell-entity transfers, known asserters in the chain, repeat correspondent fingerprints, pre-litigation assignments, and bankruptcy fire-sales.
Prior art
Earlier patents, publications, and products that may anticipate or render the claims unpatentable.
Obviousness
Combinations of prior art that suggest the claimed invention would have been obvious under 35 U.S.C. § 103.
Extensions
Patent term adjustments, term extensions, continuations, divisionals, family members, and expiration dates.
Derivative works
Defensive disclosure: derivative variations of each claim designed to render future incremental improvements obvious or non-novel.