US 6505032

I'll run targeted searches for this specific patent number, including checking for any CAFC 2026 activity.

Let me check for any litigation or post-grant proceedings involving this patent, and confirm there's no 2026 CAFC docket specifically.

Search results and confidence statement

CAFC 2026 dockets: I found no Federal Circuit docket from 2026 (or any year) identifying US 6,505,032 as a patent-in-suit or patent-on-appeal. A search of the Federal Circuit docketing material that surfaced in results returned unrelated matters (e.g., Contour IP Holding LLC v. GoPro, Inc., Fed. Cir. No. 2026‑2012, which involves different patents). I could not directly query PACER/CM‑ECF or the USPTO Patent Public Search UI; I relied on indexed web results. Treat the absence of a 2026 CAFC docket as "not found," not as a verified negative.

USPTO records: The only USPTO-hosted hit tying "6505032" to a proceeding was a PTAB petition exhibit (petition 1558596) containing keyword/PN search strings listing "6505032".pn. — i.e., prior-art searching, not a challenge to the '032 patent itself. I found no IPR/PGR/CBM with US 6,505,032 as the challenged patent.

Per your strict rule, I have not altered the identifier: the number is 6505032 (US 6,505,032 B1). Nothing in the search results contradicts the authoritative full text supplied.

---

Bibliographic summary (US 6,505,032 B1)

Abstract (verbatim): "A method for conveying application data via carrierless ultra wideband wireless signals, and signals embodied in a carrierless ultra wideband waveform. Application data is encoded into wavelets that are transmitted as a carrierless ultra wideband waveform. The carrierless ultra wideband waveform is received by an antenna, and the application data is decoded from the wavelets included in the waveform. The waveforms of the signals include wavelets that have a predetermined shape that is used to modulate the data. The signals may convey, for example, Web pages and executable programs between mobile devices. The signals are low power and can penetrate obstructions making them favorable for use with a wireless node of a network."

---

Plain-language overview of the independent claims

Claim 1 — Method (encoding/decoding carrierless UWB). Take application data and encode it into wavelets having predetermined shapes, where those shapes are at least one of: bi-phase modulated, quad-phase modulated, multilevel bi-phase modulated, or multilevel quad-phase modulated. Transmit a carrierless ultra wideband waveform (made of those wavelets) from an antenna, receive it at an antenna, and decode the original application data from the wavelets. Note: "carrierless" is the core limitation — no sinusoidal carrier is modulated; the data rides on the wavelets themselves. Claim 2 depends from it and recites each shape being a pulse suitable for a pulse-position-modulation scheme.

Claim 3 — Computer data signal (content-type claim). A computer data signal embodied in a carrierless ultra wideband waveform whose wavelets have the same four shape categories as claim 1, where the signal carries at least one of: (a) a Web page, (b) a computer executable program, (c) data, (d) software, (e) digitized voice, (f) video, (g) a graphical image, or (h) text. Claims 4–12 depend from it and narrow the payload type: markup-language Web page (HDML, HTML, or XML), a Java program, a scripting-language program (Perl or JavaScript), or an ActiveX control.

Claim 13 — Computer data signal (device-to-device exchange). Same carrierless UWB waveform and the same four shape categories, but the payload is characterized as "information being exchanged from one device to another device."

Claim 14 — Computer data signal (e-appliance status). Same waveform/shape limitations; payload is status information sent from an e-appliance.

Claim 15 — Computer data signal (network traffic). Same waveform/shape limitations; payload is network traffic to or from a wireless node of a network. Claim 16 depends from it and specifies that the node is a wireless repeater that bridges devices transmitting carrierless UWB signals onto a carrier-based communication channel.

Claim 17 — Computer data signal (hospital use). Same waveform/shape limitations; payload is information for communicating in a hospital environment without interfering with medical equipment.

Claim 18 — Computer data signal (aircraft use). Same waveform/shape limitations; payload is information for communicating in an aircraft without interfering with aircraft systems.

Claim 19 — Computer data signal (beacon). Same waveform/shape limitations; payload is location-specific information broadcast from a beacon.

Claim 20 — Computer data signal (monitored voice). Same waveform/shape limitations; payload is digitized voice information received by a monitoring device.

Structural observation: Every independent claim other than claim 1 (the method claim) is drafted as a "computer data signal embodied in a carrierless ultra wideband waveform." Claims 3 and 13–20 are therefore substantially identical in their technical scope and differ only in the recited use/field of the data. That pattern is relevant if you are assessing subject-matter eligibility (e.g., Alice/Mayo § 101 exposure) — many of these claims recite the signal's informational content rather than a technical improvement, unlike claim 1.

---

Related-family context (for completeness)

• The '032 patent is a continuation-in-part of US 09/209,460 (issued as US 6,700,939 B1, "Ultra wide bandwidth spread-spectrum communications system," priority Dec. 12, 1997).
• Continuations of the '032 application issued as US 6,850,733 B2 ("Method for conveying application data with carrierless ultra wideband wireless signals"), US 6,909,877 B2 ("Carrierless ultra wideband wireless signals for conveying data"), and US 6,912,372 B2 ("Ultra wideband signals for conveying data"). The '372 patent's claim 1 (per the Official Gazette text retrieved) recites encoding high-rate data onto two or more characteristics of wavelets — a broader formulation than the '032 claim 1.
• International counterparts: WO 2001/093482 A2, EP 1,302,001 A2, JP 4,810,050 B2, AU 2001/264573 A1.

---

Explicit uncertainties

1. No 2026 CAFC activity located. I cannot confirm any 2026 Federal Circuit docket involving 6505032; my tools were web search only, not direct PACER/CAFC or USPTO Patent Center queries.
2. Current ownership is contested by the source itself. Google Patents lists "North Star Innovations Inc" as current assignee while disclaiming accuracy; the recorded chain shows intervening NXP/Freescale releases. The true present owner as of 2026 is not established by what I found.
3. Priority date depends on what is claimed. The '032 patent's own priority for claim support traces to May 26, 2000 (provisional 60/207,225), with a Dec. 12, 1997 lineage only for subject matter shared with parent 09/209,460. Google's family data lists both dates; I did not independently verify which claims get which date.
4. Issue date formatting. Google Patents gives 2003-01-07; several third-party search reports give "07-01-2003," which is the same date under DD-MM-YYYY. I did not find a conflicting substantive date.

I'll research litigation involving US patent 6505032. Let me run several targeted searches.

Initial results only show PTAB prior-art search strings, not litigation. Let me dig deeper with different queries.

Let me try more targeted searches on litigation databases and the current assignee.

Bottom line

I found no litigation involving U.S. Patent No. 6,505,032. Based on the searches I was able to complete, there are no reported district court actions, CAFC appeals, ITC investigations, or PTAB proceedings in which US 6,505,032 is the patent at issue.

Because you asked for a per-case listing, the honest answer is:

What I searched and what came back

Search queries run: US patent 6505032 litigation; "6505032" patent lawsuit defendant case; "6,505,032" patent infringement case; "6505032" XtremeSpectrum OR "North Star Innovations" lawsuit complaint; unifiedpatents.com litigation "6505032"; portal.unifiedpatents.com litigation patent 6505032.

Results returned fell into three buckets, none of which is litigation over this patent:

1. PTAB petition exhibits containing prior-art search strings. Hits from ptacts.uspto.gov (petition artifact IDs for petitions 1558596 and 1532465) show search-string tables that include entries such as "6505032".pn. and ("6505032").URPN. alongside dozens of other UWB/impulse-radio patent numbers (e.g., 4641317, 5677927, 5832035, 6026125, 6497656, 6549567). These are prior-art search logs inside third-party IPR petitions — evidence the '032 patent was searched/considered as prior art in someone else's validity challenge, not evidence that the '032 patent was asserted. The 1532465 hit is unrelated subject matter (Niagara/Husky faucet litigation).
2. A false positive on a different patent. A "6,505,032"-style query surfaced Azure Networks LLC v. Texas Instruments, E.D. Tex. No. 6:15-cv-00032 — that case involves the Azure/UWB patents (8,582,570 et seq.), not 6,505,032. I am not reporting it as a hit for your patent.
3. Number-list collisions. An Italian corporate spin-off document (unipol.com) merely lists the string "6505032" among thousands of numeric identifiers — no relevance.

Key context from the patent record itself (US 6,505,032)

• Title: "Carrierless ultra wideband wireless signals for conveying application data"; inventors John W. McCorkle, Timothy R. Miller, Martin Rofheart; original assignee XtremeSpectrum, Inc.; filed 2000-10-10; granted 2003-01-07.
• Chain of title runs XtremeSpectrum → Motorola (2003) → Freescale Semiconductor (2004) → North Star Innovations Inc. (recorded 2016-02-04, per Google Patents' assignment listing; Google notes assignee listings may be inaccurate).
• Legal status: "Expired - Lifetime," with anticipated expiration recorded 2020-10-10. A patent that expired in October 2020 cannot support prospective injunctive relief; any claim would be limited to past damages within the 35 U.S.C. § 286 six-year lookback window from a complaint's filing date. That materially narrows the practical litigation window, consistent with the absence of any assertion I could find.
• Family members exist (continuations US 6,850,733; US 6,909,877; US 6,912,372, plus WO 01/93482, JP 4810050, EP 1302001). Per your instruction, I did not treat these as the same patent and did not report any litigation against them. Note that a plaintiff asserting a UWB portfolio often asserts multiple family members together — so if you need a complete picture, the family members (and the co-pending applications cited in the "CROSS-REFERENCE" section) should be run separately.

Confidence and caveats

• High confidence that no litigation was surfaced by these searches.
• Moderate-to-lower confidence that no litigation exists at all. My research was cut short by tool-step limits before I could complete the specific sources you named — the Unified Patents litigation caselist (https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/caselist), PACER, Docket Navigator, and RPX Insight — and Google-indexed search results only surface litigation documents that happen to be posted publicly. A negative finding here is therefore a negative finding on the indexed public web, not a certified clearance.
• I did not locate a caption, case number, or filing date for any suit, so I have not fabricated any. Everything above is either grounded in the patent text/URL you supplied or in the search-result URLs quoted.

Recommended verification steps (to close this out properly)

1. Search the Unified Patents Portal litigation caselist directly by patent number (the query-parameter form used by that portal, e.g. filtering by patents= on caselist pages) rather than by free-text web search.
2. Pull the USPTO Patent Center / Assignment "Litigation" or "Patent Trial" tabs for 09/685,201, and check PTAB for any IPR/PGR filed against the '032 patent (I found none; only citations of it).
3. Run Docket Navigator or Lex Machina on patent number 6,505,032, filtering to D. Del. (a common venue for North Star Innovations-type holders), C.D. Cal., E.D. Tex., and N.D. Cal.
4. If the earlier XtremeSpectrum era matters to you, check for 2003–2005 suits by XtremeSpectrum against UWB competitors — I saw no indexed complaint naming this patent.

If you can tell me which of those paid databases you have access to, I can structure a precise next-pass query list.

I'll verify the canonical no-activity finding with targeted searches before writing up.

AIA Trial Proceedings — US 6,505,032 B1

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on file: 0. The USPTO Open Data Portal returns no inter partes review, no post-grant review, and no covered business method review naming US 6,505,032 B1 as the challenged patent — so the breakdown is trivially: 0 active, 0 claims invalidated, 0 claims sustained, 0 settled, 0 institution denials. The bottom-line defensive posture is not "the patent survived and is hardened" and not "the claims are canceled"; it is "the patent was never tested at the PTAB, never asserted in any litigation I could locate, and expired on 2020-10-10" — which for a defendant facing a 2026 demand letter is a better posture than an IPR win, because the damages window is now essentially closed (see Strategic summary, below).

Verification of the absence

• Canonical source (weight given): the structured "PTAB proceedings on file" block supplied with this prompt, sourced from the USPTO Open Data Portal — no AIA trial proceedings.
• Independent confirmation attempted (web search only): searches for "6505032" PTAB petition IPR trial, "6,505,032" IPR petition PTAB final written decision, US 6,505,032 IPR inter partes review XtremeSpectrum McCorkle, and family/owner-based queries returned no petition, no institution decision, no FWD, and no termination naming the '032 patent. Every hit tying "6505032" to a PTAB document was a prior-art search-string exhibit inside someone else's petition (PTAB petition 1558596, page containing "6505032".pn. — a Westlaw/PatBase-style PN field query, i.e., the number was searched for, not challenged). That is not a proceeding against the '032 patent and should not be mistaken for one.
• Consistency check against prior sections: the previously generated summary found no 2026 (or earlier) Federal Circuit docket naming the '032 patent. Nothing found in this pass contradicts that. The two negative findings are mutually consistent: no PTAB trial → no PTAB appeal → no CAFC docket.

Proceeding-by-proceeding detail: not applicable. There are no proceeding numbers to report. I have deliberately omitted the ### {PROCEEDING_NUMBER} — {Petitioner} v. {Patent Owner} sections rather than populate them with invented case numbers. Inventing an IPR number is the single most damaging error possible in this deliverable, and the record contains none.

---

Strategic summary

Claim status: 1–20 are all UNCANCELED, all UNTESTED, and all EXPIRED. Because no AIA trial was ever instituted, no claim of the '032 patent has been canceled, disclaimed, or held unpatentable by the Board. The 20 claims (independents: 1, 3, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20) stand exactly as issued on 2003-01-07 — as a matter of PTAB record. But "uncanceled" ≠ "assertable": the structured legal-status data shows Expired – Lifetime, anticipated expiration 2020-10-10, i.e., the full 20-year term from the 2000-10-10 filing date ran out. A lapsed patent can still be sued on for past infringement, but it cannot be infringed on or after its expiration.

Estoppel landscape: there is none, and that cuts both ways. Because no petitioner ever filed an IPR, no party is subject to the § 315(e)(2) estoppel bar on grounds "raised or reasonably could have been raised." Every § 102/§ 103 ground based on patents and printed publications remains available to any defendant — the same art the PTAB never had a chance to reject. On the other side, there is no government-validated claim construction, no FWD narrowing or cancelling claims, and no Board finding a defendant can borrow. A defendant here must build its own invalidity case from scratch; there is no free PTAB scalp to cite in a Rule 12 or summary-judgment brief.

Why the absence of PTAB activity is explicable rather than suspicious. The '032 patent is pre-AIA (filed 2000-10-10), so a PGR was never available (PGR covers only post-2013 first-inventor-to-file patents) and CBM review was structurally unattractive and is now unavailable — the AIA § 18 transitional program sunset for petitions filed on or after 2020-09-16, and the '032 claims (directed to carrierless UWB signaling hardware/techniques) would likely have cleared the "technological invention" exclusion anyway. IPR was the only realistic AIA vehicle, and nobody used it. Combined with my inability to locate any district-court assertion of the '032 patent, the pattern is that of a patent that sat in a portfolio through the XtremeSpectrum → Motorola → Freescale → North Star Innovations chain of title (with intervening SVB/Granite/Citibank/Morgan Stanley security interests) rather than one that was monetized. That is a weak signal of demonstrable value — well-funded defendants do not usually spend $500K on an IPR against a patent nobody is asserting.

Timing is the dominant fact, not the PTAB record. Under 35 U.S.C. § 286, a patent owner can recover damages only for infringement occurring no more than six years before the complaint is filed. A complaint filed on or about 2026-09-30 reaches back only to 2020-09-30. The '032 patent expired 2020-10-10. The overlap — the entire remaining recoverable damages period for a newly filed suit — is roughly ten days (2020-09-30 through 2020-10-10). A defendant served with a 2026 demand letter on the '032 patent is therefore looking at a patent with no forward-going royalties, no injunctive leverage (eBay v. MercExchange), and a near-empty damages window. The practical value of an IPR-based defense here is close to nil, and that is the real answer to the question "what does the PTAB record mean for a defendant."

---

Recommended next steps

1. If you hold a 2026 demand letter citing US 6,505,032:

• Confirm the expiration date independently in USPTO Patent Center / Global Dossier (the structured data states anticipated expiration 2020-10-10 and "Expired – Lifetime"; verify no maintenance-fee-based early lapse and no terminal disclaimer shortening it, either of which would shorten the damages window further).
• Run the § 286 arithmetic against the first potential complaint date. If the only remaining window is 2020-09-30 → 2020-10-10, quantify it and consider whether the demand is worth anything beyond nuisance value. Note that laches is unavailable post-SCA Hygiene Products v. First Quality Baby Products (2017), so this must be framed as a § 286 damages limitation, not a laches defense.
• Check for earlier, unindexed assertions. If the patent owner filed suit in, say, 2019 or 2021, a different damages window attaches to that complaint, and the analysis changes. My search tools were web-only and may have missed a sealed or thinly reported 2013–2021 case; pull Docket Navigator / Lex Machina for the patent number and for North Star Innovations, Inc. as plaintiff.
• This analysis assumes no prior litigation. Flag explicitly: I did not verify litigation history from a court-records database.

2. If you nonetheless want invalidity on the merits (e.g., a declaratory-judgment posture, or to defeat a claim that pre-2020 conduct infringed):

• There is no PTAB shortcut and no estoppel constraint. Build the § 102/§ 103 case in district court from the full universe of patents and printed publications.
• Consider the very deep UWB/impulse-radio prior art already on the record in the '032 file history: the co-pending family applications and the references cited therein, plus the foundational impulse-radio art (the Fullerton/Siwiak-era patents that appear in the PTAB search-string exhibit mentioned above — 4,641,317 / 4,743,906 / 4,813,057 / 4,979,186 / 5,677,927 / 5,687,169 / 5,832,035 / 6,026,125, among others). Because no IPR was ever filed, none of this art has been adjudicated, and none of it is foreclosed.
• Note the § 101 exposure already flagged in the prior summary: claims 3 and 13–20 are "computer data signal" claims whose novelty resides largely in informational content (Web pages, HTML/XML, Java, e-appliances, hospital/aircraft use cases). That is a live Alice § 101 argument that the PTAB never reached and that is not subject to any estoppel.

3. If you were hoping for an IPR instead of litigation:

• An IPR petition against an expired patent is not categorically barred, but the Board has increasingly required petitioners to show they would suffer an injury-in-fact sufficient for Article III standing on appeal (Apple Inc. v. Vidal / the Federal Circuit's expired-patent standing line), and the patent owner cannot amend claims in an expired patent. More importantly, an IPR here would cost six figures to attack a patent with a ~10-day damages tail. Not recommended.
• Ex parte reexamination remains technically available and far cheaper, but it takes years, produces no estoppel, and again attacks a patent with no forward life. Also not recommended as a lead strategy.

4. Related-family note (for completeness, not verified proceeding-by-proceeding):

• The '032 family continuations — US 6,850,733 B2, US 6,909,877 B2, US 6,912,372 B2 — and the parent US 6,700,939 B1 all share the 1997-12-12/2000-05-26 lineage and the same XtremeSpectrum inventors. If you are clearing a UWB product, check each of these for PTAB activity and, critically, for unexpired term — the continuations have later expiration dates than the '032 patent, and none of this report's "no PTAB activity" finding extends to them. I did not independently confirm the PTAB status of the continuation patents in this pass; the structured block covers only 6505032.

---

Sources and links

• Canonical proceeding list: USPTO Open Data Portal (structured "PTAB proceedings on file" block supplied in this prompt) — returns no AIA trials for 6505032.
• USPTO PTAB public search / PTAB E2E: https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ (search by patent number 6505032) — no proceedings.
• CourtListener (for any CAFC/PTAB appeal): https://www.courtlistener.com/ — no order or opinion naming US 6,505,032 B1 located.
• The only PTAB-hosted document containing the string "6505032" that my searches surfaced is a prior-art search-log exhibit in petition 1558596 (fields "6505032".pn. and ("6505032").URPN.), confirming the number appeared as search input, not as a challenged patent: https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ptacts/public-informations/petitions/1558596/download-documents

Explicit caveats (do not over-read the negatives)

1. This is a "not found," not a certified negative. I relied on the structured ODP block plus web search. I could not query the PTAB E2E API, PACER, or Docket Navigator directly. A recently filed or unindexed petition is possible, though for an expired 2000-vintage patent it is very unlikely.
2. No proceeding numbers were invented, and the absence of the per-proceeding sections is intentional, not an omission.
3. Nothing in the search results contradicts the authoritative full text or the previously generated sections. The prior finding of "no 2026 CAFC docket" for '032 is consistent with the zero-PTAB finding here.
4. Litigation history was not verified from a court-records database. If the '032 patent was asserted in an earlier suit, the § 286 damages-window arithmetic above must be recomputed against that complaint's filing date.
5. Title is unsettled on the public record (Google lists North Star Innovations Inc while disclaiming accuracy; the recorded chain shows intervening NXP/Freescale releases). Who actually could sue in 2026 is not established by anything I found, and standing/ownership is worth probing early in any dispute.

I'll research the assignment chain and NPE signals with targeted searches before reconstructing the record.

Excellent — that surfaces a critical finding (North Star Innovations is a Wi-LAN subsidiary). Let me dig deeper on correspondence of record, the Freescale→North Star transaction, and whether the '032 patent was ever asserted.

I hit the tool-step ceiling mid-research, so I'll flag exactly what is verified versus not. The searches I completed did surface a decisive ownership fact that resolves one of the open uncertainties from the earlier section.

---

Assignment reconstruction — US 6,505,032 B1

Source note / caveat up front. The authoritative full text supplied for this patent contains the Google Patents legal-events listing (assignee, conveyance, assignors, and the date string for each event), but it does not contain the reel/frame number for most entries. The only reel/frame numbers recoverable from the supplied record are those recited inside the corrective-assignment and termination descriptions (reels 011880/0230, 013447/0515, 037518/0292, 037486/0517, 040928/0001, 040925/0001, 041703/0536). I could not query the USPTO Assignment Center UI directly (tool budget exhausted), so reel/frame is marked "not retrieved" for every entry where it is not literally present in the authoritative text. I have not invented any reel/frame numbers, correspondents, or execution dates.

---

Inventors

All three were XtremeSpectrum personnel; XtremeSpectrum was founded November 1998 and the '032 priority date is May 26, 2000, so all three were within the company's first ~18 months.

Departure pattern — noted, but it is NOT the classic "inventors leave within 12 months" tell. The inventors did not scatter shortly after filing; they rode the assets through the November 2003 Motorola asset purchase (≈50 XtremeSpectrum employees transferred to Motorola per Network World). Martin Rofheart is documented still running the technology at Freescale as "director of UWB Operations" in 2004 (Electronics Weekly). The distress signal here is at the corporate level, not the inventor level — see the assignment-timeline entry for 2003-12-23 and the "Original assignee" section.

---

Original assignee

XtremeSpectrum, Inc. — a fabless ultra-wideband chipset startup, Vienna, Virginia (founded Nov 1998; ~$42M raised). It shipped working UWB silicon: the "Trinity" chipset (announced June 2002, ~100 Mbps at <200 mW), and it submitted DS-UWB to IEEE 802.15.3a. So it was a product-shipping operating company as to the subject matter of the claims (impulse-radio UWB signaling).

Current status: ceased to exist independently. Motorola announced on 2003-11-10 that it would acquire the assets of XtremeSpectrum; reporting (Light Reading, Network World) states Motorola had extended a bridge loan and the deal was characterized as effectively a forced/distressed sale, with XtremeSpectrum's investors retaining only "the shell of the company and its name." That shell was not the continuing holder of this patent — the patent went to Motorola via the 2003 assignment below.

---

Assignment timeline

Dates below are the event dates as they appear in the authoritative legal-events record (Google Patents renders these as recordation-style dates; the execution date of each instrument is generally 0–3 months earlier and I have not independently verified which). Conveyance type, assignor and assignee are taken verbatim from the supplied text.

1. 2001-06-08 — Reel 011880 / Frame 0230

• Conveyance: Assignment of assignors' interest (initial)
• Assignor: McCorkle, John W.; Miller, Timothy R.; Rofheart, Martin
• Assignee: XtremeSpectrum, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved (record text does not identify one)
• Context: initial inventor→company assignment.

2. 2002-02-20 — Reel not retrieved (corrects Reel 011880/0230)

• Conveyance: Corrective Assignment — "to correct the execution dates of the 1st and 3rd assignors, previously recorded at Reel 011880 Frame 0230"
• Assignor: McCorkle; Miller; Rofheart
• Assignee: XtremeSpectrum, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: change of record only — no change in ownership. (Note: Reel 011880 is a high reel number for a document first recorded in 2001; a corrective re-recording in Feb 2002 at a fresh reel is consistent with what the text says.)

3. 2003-02-28 — Reel 013447 / Frame 0515 (this reel/frame is confirmed indirectly: the 2003-11-19 entry terminates "Reel 013447 Frame 0515")

• Conveyance: Security Interest
• Assignor: XtremeSpectrum, Inc.
• Assignee: Granite Ventures, LLC
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: securitization — venture-lender collateral over the portfolio.

4. 2003-02-28 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Security Agreement
• Assignor: XtremeSpectrum, Inc.
• Assignee: Silicon Valley Bank
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: securitization — bank collateral. (Two security interests recorded the same day is consistent with the reported bridge-loan distress.)

5. 2003-11-19 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Termination of Security Agreement (Reel 013447 Frame 0515)
• Assignor: Granite Ventures, LLC → Assignee: XtremeSpectrum, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: release — clearing the Granite Ventures lien just before the Motorola asset purchase.

6. 2003-12-23 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Assignment of interest
• Assignor: XtremeSpectrum, Inc. → Assignee: Motorola, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: acquisition / distressed asset sale — implements the Nov 2003 Motorola purchase of XtremeSpectrum's assets. This is the point the patent left the original assignee.

7. 2004-05-07 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Assignment of interest
• Assignor: Motorola, Inc. → Assignee: Freescale Semiconductor, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: internal corporate reorg — Motorola's semiconductor division spun off as Freescale (2004).

8. 2006-12-05 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Intellectual Property Security Agreement Termination
• Assignor: Silicon Valley Bank → Assignee: XtremeSpectrum, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: release — belated cleanup of the SVB lien (recorded under the original, now-shelleth assignee's name). Administrative only.

9. 2007-02-02 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Security Agreement
• Assignors: Freescale Acquisition Corporation; Freescale Acquisition Holdings Corp.; Freescale Holdings (Bermuda) III, Ltd.; Freescale Semiconductor, Inc.
• Assignee: Citibank, N.A., as Collateral Agent
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: securitization — LBO-era collateral pledge (Freescale taken private 2006).

10. 2010-05-13 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Security Agreement
• Assignor: Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. → Assignee: Citibank, N.A., as Collateral Agent
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: securitization / refinancing.

11. 2013-06-18 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Security Agreement
• Assignor: Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. → Assignee: Citibank, N.A., as Notes Collateral Agent
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: securitization / refinancing.

12. 2013-11-06 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Security Agreement
• Assignor: Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. → Assignee: Citibank, N.A., as Notes Collateral Agent
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: securitization / refinancing.

13. 2015-12-21 — Reel not retrieved (three separate release entries, same date)

• Conveyance: Patent Release
• Assignor: Citibank, N.A., as Collateral Agent → Assignee: Freescale Semiconductor, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: release — lien discharge as Freescale was absorbed by NXP. Pre-clearance for the portfolio transfer.

14. 2016-01-12 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Assignment and Assumption of Security Interest in Patents
• Assignor: Citibank, N.A. → Assignee: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: securitization — collateral-agent succession.

15. 2016-01-13 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Assignment and Assumption of Security Interest in Patents
• Assignor: Citibank, N.A. → Assignee: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: securitization — second collateral-agent succession record.

16. 2016-02-04 — Reel not retrieved ⭐ (the dispositive link)

• Conveyance: Assignment of assignors' interest
• Assignor: Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. → Assignee: North Star Innovations Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved (this is the one to obtain from Assignment Center — see signal 3)
• Context: transfer-to-asserter / monetization — this is the 3,300+ patent Freescale portfolio that WiLAN publicly announced on 2015-11-04 as its "acquisition … from Freescale Semiconductor" and that RPX/other sources date to October 2015. North Star Innovations is WiLAN's wholly-owned licensing subsidiary. Recording lag (deal Oct/Nov 2015 → recordation Feb 2016) is normal.

17. 2016-09-21 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Release of Security Interest
• Assignor: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc. → Assignee: NXP, B.V., f/k/a Freescale Semiconductor, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: release / cleanup of the Morgan Stanley collateral position.

18. 2016-11-07 — Reel not retrieved

• Conveyance: Release of Security Interest
• Assignor: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc. → Assignee: NXP B.V.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: release / cleanup.

19. 2017-02-01 — Reel not retrieved; corrects Reel 037518/0292

• Conveyance: Corrective Assignment ("correct the assignment and assumption of security interest in patents previously recorded on Reel 037518 Frame 0292")
• Assignor: Citibank, N.A. → Assignee: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: change of record only — corrects item 14/15.

20. 2019-02-20 — Reel not retrieved; corrects Reel 041703/0536

• Conveyance: Corrective Assignment ("correct the application no. from 13,883,290 to 13,833,290 … assignment and assumption of security interest")
• Assignor: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc. → Assignee: Shenzhen Xinguodu Technology Co., Ltd.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: change of record only — but note this is a batch/volume correction: the 041703/0536 record it corrects appears to be a large multi-patent security-interest instrument, and the named assignee is unrelated to this patent's technology. I flag this as a collateral-database housekeeping entry riding on a bulk mortgage-style recordation, not a real transfer of the '032 patent. Treat with caution.

21. 2019-12-10 — Reel not retrieved; corrects Reel 037486/0517

• Conveyance: Corrective Assignment (remove application 9915, replace with 11,759,935; "previously recorded on Reel 037486 Frame 0517")
• Assignor: Citibank, N.A. → Assignee: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: change of record only — another bulk correction.

22. 2020-01-17 — Reel not retrieved; corrects Reel 040928/0001

• Conveyance: Corrective Assignment ("release of security rest." — sic)
• Assignor: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc. → Assignee: NXP B.V.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: change of record only — bulk correction.

23. 2020-02-17 — Reel not retrieved; corrects Reel 040925/0001

• Conveyance: Corrective Assignment (same "release of security rest." boilerplate)
• Assignor: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc. → Assignee: NXP, B.V. f/k/a Freescale Semiconductor, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: change of record only — bulk correction.

Terminal event: 2020-10-10 — anticipated statutory expiration (Google Patents status "Expired – Lifetime").

Bottom line on the chain of title: XtremeSpectrum → Motorola (2003) → Freescale (2004) → North Star Innovations Inc. (recorded 2016-02-04; economic transfer Oct/Nov 2015). Everything else in the record is securitization collateral or record-keeping cleanup. There is no recorded post-2016 assignment out of North Star in the supplied text.

---

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 6505032
    2000 : Application filed by XtremeSpectrum
    2001 : Inventors assign to XtremeSpectrum
    2003 : SVB and Granite Ventures take security
         : Assets acquired by Motorola
    2004 : Spun off into Freescale Semiconductor
    2007 : Freescale pledges patents to Citibank
    2013 : Citibank security records refreshed
    2015 : Freescale releases Citibank liens
         : Portfolio sold to WiLAN unit North Star
    2016 : Security interest moved to Morgan Stanley
         : NXP releases security interest
    2020 : Patent expires

---

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — PRESENT.
Two concrete facts, not naming alone: (a) North Star Innovations Inc. is documented as "a subsidiary of publicly traded Wi-LAN, Inc. (WiLAN)" (RPX, North Star Draws Xilinx into Campaign, 2016-09-08) and "a wholly-owned subsidiary" of WiLAN/Quarterhill (WiLAN press releases, e.g. 2021-07-06 PSMC license). (b) Its own filings state a principal place of business at 600 Anton Blvd., Suite 1350, Costa Mesa, CA 92626 and a registered office at 2711 Centerville Road, Suite 400, Wilmington, Delaware 19808 — the latter being a registered-agent service address, and Delaware being the standard incorporation state for such licensing vehicles (North Star complaint against Microsoft, D. Del., quoted in RPX litigation documents). Backed by transfer-to-asserter below at the 2016-02-04 entry.

2. Known asserter in the chain — PRESENT (strong).
The current owner is a subsidiary of Wi-LAN Inc. — an entity named on your own comparator list — now within Quarterhill Inc. (TSX: QTRH). North Star "has sued more than 25 companies over patents acquired from Freescale," with defendants including Amazon, HTC, Sony, Canon, GoPro, Nikon, Sharp, Polycom, Cypress, UMC, Xilinx, Nanya, Toshiba, HP, Microsoft, Kingston, Micron (RPX, 2016-11-23 and 2016-08-01; D. Del. dockets). WiLAN's own 2015 annual report describes its business as patent licensing with "more than 60 litigations currently active." Caveat that matters for you: neither I nor the search results I obtained show the '032 patent itself among the asserted patents — North Star's campaign centered on memory/DRAM, semiconductor fabrication, camera and TV patents. So: known asserter owns it; this specific patent was not shown to be weaponized.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — UNCLEAR (not establishable from what I retrieved).
I could not retrieve the correspondent of record for any entry; the supplied record does not include it, and I did not reach the Assignment Center query. What I did find is litigation-side counsel, which is not the same thing and should not be conflated: The Simon Law Firm, P.C. (St. Louis, MO) "represents North Star in this campaign" (RPX Q4-2015 PAE Report); IP Law Leaders PLLC (Cameron H. Tousi, Andrew C. Aitken, Raymond J. Ho) filed North Star's IPR mandatory notices; Whitaker Chalk Swindle & Schwartz PLLC (David A. Skeels, Decker A. Cammack) and Brandon C. Fernald appear for North Star in D. Del. If the 2016-02-04 recording's correspondent is one of the WiLAN in-house or outside patent-recordation names that also appears on other WiLAN/North Star/Polaris/Cetus recordations, that would convert this to PRESENT — it is worth pulling specifically because WiLAN ran several parallel subsidiaries (North Star, Polaris Innovations, Cetus, Smart Wearable) off a single back office.

4. Cascading transfers — NOT PRESENT.
The chain is four principal hops across ~16 years (2000 → 2003 → 2004 → 2015/2016), each hop being an operating-company acquisition or spin-off, not a rapid LLC daisy-chain. The 2016–2020 entries are collateral/security recordings and bulk corrections, not ownership hops.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — PRESENT for the portfolio; NOT SHOWN for this patent.
The Freescale→North Star transfer (economic date Oct/Nov 2015) was immediately followed by assertion: first suit North Star v. Nanya, D. Del. 1:15-cv-01027, filed 2015-11-05 (per Nanya's IPR and the Stanford NPE database), i.e. within days of the deal. That is a textbook assertion-enablement sequencing. However, for US 6,505,032 specifically I found no infringement suit, so this signal fires on the portfolio, not on the patent.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — NOT PRESENT.
No Chapter 7/11 at XtremeSpectrum or Freescale appears in any source I retrieved. XtremeSpectrum's 2003 exit was a distressed asset sale (reported bridge loan / "forced sale," Light Reading 2003-11-10), not a bankruptcy proceeding; Freescale was acquired by NXP, not liquidated.

7. Privateering — UNCLEAR → PARTIALLY PRESENT.
Freescale transferred 3,300+ patents into WiLAN's "partnership model," under which (per WiLAN's 2015 annual report) WiLAN "generally make[s] little-to-no upfront payment to acquire the portfolio and … share[s] in the outcomes of our patent settlements," and it extends the partner model "to our litigators." That is a revenue-sharing monetization arrangement, and the seller (Freescale) was simultaneously being absorbed by NXP — so the classic "operating company pays an NPE to sue its competitors" framing is close but not confirmed; Freescale's own post-sale conduct as an asserter is not evidenced. Call it partial.

8. Defensive aggregator — NOT PRESENT.
The chain terminates at an active asserter, not at RPX, AST, LOT Network, Unified Patents, or OIN. Inverse signal does not apply.

---

Verdict

NPE — high confidence.

Two independent strong signals are documented: (i) the current owner of record, North Star Innovations Inc. (assignee on the 2016-02-04 assignment from Freescale Semiconductor, Inc.), is a wholly-owned licensing subsidiary of Wi-LAN Inc./Quarterhill, an entity expressly on the comparator NPE list, which had 25+ active infringement suits on this very Freescale portfolio; and (ii) that portfolio was pushed straight into litigation — first complaint 2015-11-05, D. Del. 1:15-cv-01027 — essentially contemporaneously with the Oct/Nov 2015 acquisition, i.e. a transfer-to-asserter sequencing. The operating-company phase of this patent's life ended at the 2003-12-23 Motorola assignment, so nothing in the record since supports an operating-company-assertion verdict.

Two important qualifications, stated so you don't over-read the verdict: (1) this verdict is about who owns the patent and what kind of entity that is — I found no suit in which US 6,505,032 is the patent-in-suit, and the patent expired 2020-10-10, so it cannot now be asserted prospectively; (2) signal 3 (repeat correspondent) is unresolved because the correspondent-of-record data was not in the supplied text and I could not reach the Assignment Center query.

Verification link: USPTO Assignment Center — search by patent number 6505032 (legacy interface: https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html). Pull in particular the 2016-02-04 Freescale→North Star record (reel/frame and correspondent not retrieved here) and the 2003-12-23 XtremeSpectrum→Motorola record.

---

Contradictions / updates to the earlier sections

1. Resolves prior uncertainty #2 ("current ownership is contested by the source itself"). North Star Innovations Inc. is confirmed as a Wi-LAN/Quarterhill licensing subsidiary. That is now evidence-backed, not a naming inference.
2. New open item: whether WiLAN/Quarterhill still holds North Star as of 2026. Quarterhill is now described as an intelligent-transportation-systems company (per the Marketscreener profile surfaced in search), which implies the licensing business may have been divested or wound down after the 2020 expiry. I could not verify a post-2016 assignment out of North Star, and the absence of one in the record may simply reflect a bulk portfolio transfer recorded against a master reel rather than per-patent. Do not assume continued WiLAN ownership for 2026 assertions without checking.
3. Reinforces, not contradicts, the litigation section above: no assertion of the '032 patent was found, consistent with the prior "no litigation" finding — but now with the explanation that the owner is a prolific asserter that simply picked other patents from the same portfolio.

I'll search for the prior-art references cited on the face of US 6,505,032, since the supplied full text did not include the "References Cited" section.

Let me try the patent PDF and other databases that list front-page references.

Prior-Art Analysis — US 6,505,032 B1 (application 09/685,201)

0. Critical threshold finding (read first)

The authoritative full text supplied for US6505032B1 does not contain a "References Cited" / "Patent Citations" section. The document as fetched runs abstract → specification → Claims (20) → long Cited By (155) table, with no front-page "U.S. Patent Documents" list and no "Other Publications" list. That is anomalous for a Google Patents fetch, but it is what the authoritative source contains, so I cannot read the examiner-cited art off the face of the patent.

My searches did not recover that list either. The SERP returns for patents.google.com/patent/US6505032B1 surfaced only bibliographic fields (Espacenet hu.espacenet.com biblio record, Justia) and "Cited By" tables from other patents (US20030235236, US20040174924, US5677927A), not a "References Cited" table for the '032 itself. I did not reach the max-step limit before attempting USPTO Patent Public Search directly (the second query batch was cut off by the tool step limit), so I cannot represent this as a USPTO-database result.

Strictness note: every identifier below is reproduced literally. The patent number you gave, 6505032, is US 6,505,032 B1 per the authoritative text. Near-miss numbers that appeared in search noise — US 5,206,505; US 6,351,652; US 6,497,656; US 6,549,567; US 6,700,939; US 6,850,733; US 6,909,877; US 6,912,372 — are different patents and are not reported as citations of, or anticipatory art to, 6505032 except where I explicitly say so and explain the family relationship.

---

1. References I can verify as cited within US 6,505,032

These are reproduced from the authoritative specification text you supplied (Background and CROSS-REFERENCE sections), so they are literally grounded in the patent.

1A. Non-patent literature expressly cited in the specification

1B. Related applications named in the CROSS-REFERENCE section (potential pre-AIA §102(e) art)

These are cited in the '032 text itself. I treat each literally and separately (per your rule, none is treated as 6505032).

---

2. Candidate art from the surrounding citation graph — unverified direction, do not rely on without checking

Soft signal worth recording: the Google Patents "Prior art keywords" field for the '032 reads "phase modulated, multilevel, quad, ultra wideband, data signal." That keyword set is derived by the source from the references cited in the document, which indicates the examiner-cited art was directed to phase-modulated/multilevel pulse signals — consistent with NPL-3 (Lathi) as the shape-taxonomy source and with at least one UWB pulse reference as the carrierless element. I could not name the specific patent(s) behind those keywords.

Also building on the earlier-generated litigation section: the third-party IPR petition search logs that co-list "6505032".pn. alongside 4,641,317; 5,677,927; 5,832,035; 6,026,125; 6,497,656; 6,549,567 are prior-art search strings inside someone else's petition, not the '032's own reference list. They are a lead list for Fullerton/Time Domain impulse-radio art, not evidence of what the '032 examiner cited. I have not verified titles or dates for those numbers here except US 5,677,927, whose title ("Ultrawide-band communication system and method") was confirmed by the search result.

---

3. Claim-by-claim anticipation assessment (on the record available)

---

4. Explicit negatives and exclusions (per your "no similar numbers" rule)

• No USPTO front-page reference list for 6505032 was retrieved. I am not filling that void with guesses.
• Near-miss numbers encountered and excluded as unrelated to 6505032: US 5,206,505 (Sprunt); US 6,351,652 (Finn et al.); US 6,497,656 (Evans et al.); US 6,549,567 (Fullerton); US 5,042,052 (Roberts); US 6,094,464 (Ebringer/Petler); US 6,301,294 (Hara). None is asserted as prior art to the '032.
• No IPR/PGR/CBM challenging 6505032 and no litigation was located — consistent with the earlier-generated sections; I did not repeat that analysis, only its output.

---

5. Contradictions, confidence, and what to run next

Contradictions with the previously generated sections: none on substance. There is one omission worth flagging: the earlier bibliographic summary lists "Claims 20" and classifications but no "References Cited" field — consistent with my finding that the authoritative fetch lacks that section. If an earlier pass or another source claims to state the '032's prior-art list, treat it as unverified against this authoritative text.

Confidence:

• High that NPL-1 (Sklar), NPL-2 (Webb), NPL-3 (Lathi) are cited in the '032 and are prior art by date — they are quoted in the supplied specification.
• High that none of them, alone, anticipates claim 1 or claims 3, 13–20.
• Low on whether US 5,677,927 (or any Fullerton/Time Domain patent) is on the '032's face — direction of the citation-graph snippet unconfirmed.
• Not established at all: the examiner's actual U.S.-patent citations for 6505032.

Verification steps to close the gap (in priority order):

1. USPTO Patent Public Search / Patent Center for application 09/685,201 → "References Cited" tab and the file-wrapper "References" list (Form PTO-892). This is the only authoritative source for the examiner-cited art.
2. The international search report for WO 01/93482 A2 (the PCT counterpart, PCT/US2001/014835, ISR published as WO 01/93482 A3 on 2002-06-06). The ISA's "Documents Considered to Be Relevant," with X/Y/A categories, is the best available proxy for the art the '032 was measured against.
3. Front pages of the three continuations (US 6,850,733; US 6,909,877; US 6,912,372) — continuation reference lists are usually near-identical to the parent's and would let us reconstruct the '032's list.
4. Google Patents' "References Cited" tab (distinct from the "Cited By" table in the authoritative fetch) at https://patents.google.com/patent/US6505032B1/en, section "Patent Citations."
5. Only after (1)–(4): pull the co-listed Fullerton/Time Domain numbers from the IPR petition search logs and check each against claim 1's "carrierless ultra wideband waveform" element.

If you can supply the PTO-892 or the WO 01/93482 ISR, I can produce the per-reference table you asked for with the same citation/date/description/§102-claim mapping format, and it will be grounded rather than reconstructed.

I'll pull the actual prior-art/citation record for this patent before analyzing, since the fetched page text includes the forward-citation ("Cited By") list but appears to have truncated the backward-citation ("Citations") section.

I now have the actual "References Cited" list from the patent's face (via uspto.report). Let me verify the substance of the key cited references so I don't mischaracterize them.

Obviousness Analysis — US 6,505,032 B1 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

0. Framework, and one sourcing correction up front

Governing law. The '032 application was filed October 10, 2000 and claims priority to May 26, 2000 (provisional 60/207,225). It is therefore governed by pre‑AIA § 103(a). The analysis below uses the Graham v. John Deere factors (scope/content of prior art, differences, PHOSITA level, secondary considerations) as refined by KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398 (2007) — particularly KSR's teaching that a known technique applied to a known device to yield predictable results, and combination of familiar elements according to known methods, is obvious.

Sourcing correction / flag. The patent text supplied to me from the Google Patents page includes the "Prior art keywords" line and the forward "Cited By (155)" list, but the backward-citation table was truncated out of the supplied text. The Google page's own prior-art keywords are: "phase modulated, multilevel, quad, ultra wideband, data signal" — i.e., the examiner's search was squarely in the four shape categories recited in claim 1. To recover the actual § 102/§ 103 art of record I used the granted patent's front-page "References Cited" list at https://uspto.report/patent/grant/[6505032](/patent/6505032), which I treat as the authoritative list for this patent. I flag this because a citation list from a different family member (e.g., US 6,909,877 at patents.searchlight.law/doc/US6909877) is not the '032 record, and I did not substitute it.

No contradictions to report. Nothing in the search results contradicts the authoritative full text in the user message. One unverified item from the earlier section rather than a contradiction: the prior summary characterized US 6,912,372 claim 1 as reciting "two or more characteristics of wavelets." I could not verify '372's claim text in this pass, so I do not rely on it. The '032 claims as I analyze them are the 20 claims in the supplied full text, unchanged.

---

1. The prior-art set of record (all from the '032 front page)

Timing caveat (important). Comerford (Aug. 2000) postdates the May 26, 2000 provisional and predates only the Oct. 10, 2000 actual filing. It is § 102(a) art only against claims not entitled to the provisional date. That matters for the content-type claims (3–12, 13–20), whose support in the provisional I did not verify. Every other reference above predates May 26, 2000.

---

2. Person having ordinary skill in the art (PHOSITA)

A PHOSITA here is a person with a B.S. in electrical engineering (or equivalent) plus roughly 2–4 years' experience in RF/ultra-wideband communications, or an M.S. plus 1–2 years; conversant with (i) impulse-radio/"carrier-free" transmission (the Fullerton and McEwan literature), (ii) digital modulation theory (M-ary, PSK, QAM, PPM, multilevel/antipodal signaling — Lathi/Sklar level), (iii) UWB antennas, and (iv) correlator-based UWB receivers. This is a high-skill, fast-moving art in 1997–2000, which cuts toward obviousness of incremental combinations.

---

3. Claim 1 (the method claim) — the key § 103 battleground

3.1 Element mapping

Observation: every element of claim 1 is disclosed in the art of record; the only real question is combinability.

3.2 Ground 1A — Fullerton '317 (carrierless impulse radio) in view of Drakul '892 (shape-coded pulses)

• Fullerton '317 supplies the complete carrierless transmit/receive/decode platform and even PPM.
• Drakul '892 supplies the precise missing element — encoding bits into the shape of the pulse, including polarity (bi-phase) and amplitude-level-distinguished shapes (multilevel), and expressly teaches more than one bit per pulse.
• Motivation: Drakul's own stated objective is exactly the problem a PHOSITA in UWB would have: "combines the good energy performance of the [single-shape] system with the good spectral efficiency or higher capacity" and "lower probability of error … at a given bandwidth." Fullerton '317 is bandwidth-rich but uses one pulse shape; grafting Drakul's shape alphabet onto Fullerton's carrierless burst predictably increases bits-per-pulse and spectral efficiency — a classic KSR-type "known technique to improve a known device" rationale. The combination is a two-reference, same-field (digital data transmission by shaped baseband pulses) combination with no teaching away.
• Expectation of success: high. Both references generate shaped electrical pulses at the transmitter and decode by time-domain observation at the receiver; a PHOSITA need only enlarge Fullerton's pulse-shaping filter/pulse generator to a multilevel/shape-selectable one, and correlate against a shape bank.

3.3 Ground 1B — Fullerton '317 / '927 / '169 in view of Larrick '125

• Larrick '125 expressly contemplates UWB-QAM and UWB M-ary phase modulation (UWB-PSK) on an ultra-wideband, carrier-free signal, plus a data encoder and pulse-by-pulse agility. This is not merely "quad-phase and multilevel quad-phase are known in narrowband radio" — it is quad-phase and multilevel quad-phase applied to UWB pulses, which is precisely claim 1's shape list.
• Motivation: Larrick itself frames the motivation — prior UWB/"carrier-free" systems were "limited to ON-OFF keying (binary ASK) or pulse position modulation (PPM) since amplitude and/or phase control of the waveform was extremely difficult or impossible to implement," and Larrick supplies the fix to reach "data rates in the hundreds of megabits per second." A PHOSITA seeking to raise Fullerton's data rate would look directly to Larrick.
• This ground is the strongest single-substitution argument for the quad-phase and multilevel-quad-phase alternatives.

3.4 Ground 1C — Win & Scholtz (2000) + Fullerton family (+ Aether Wire 1995)

• Win & Scholtz's April 2000 TH impulse-radio paper supplies the UWB multiple-access modulation framework and correlator reception; the Fullerton family supplies modulation alternatives "including AM, time shift (also referred to as pulse position) and M-ary versions"; Lathi (incorporated by reference in the '032 specification itself) supplies QPSK/QAM/multilevel signaling as standard textbook technique.
• Motivation: the '032 specification concedes the point — it says the invention "is applicable to variations of the above modulation schemes … (e.g., as described in Lathi …)". Where the applicant's own specification identifies the general modulation schemes as prior art and incorporated by reference, the burden of showing those schemes were non-obvious in the UWB context is a heavy one.

3.5 Why a PHOSITA would combine (common motivation narrative for all grounds)

1. Same field, same problem: all references are digital-data transmission over bandlimited/wideband channels; the '032 Background itself concedes modulation and pulse shaping were "well known."
2. Predictable result: increasing the per-pulse alphabet (bi-phase → quad-phase → multilevel) increases bits/symbol and spectral efficiency; this is the standard textbook tradeoff (Sklar/Lathi).
3. Explicit industry push toward higher UWB data rates (Larrick: "hundreds of megabits per second"; Aether Wire 1995's stated goal of miniature distributed UWB communication devices).
4. No teaching away: nobody in the record teaches that shaped/multilevel modulation must be avoided in UWB; the only caution — DC-offset/drift — was already addressed in Fullerton '927 via subcarrier, and is not a claim-1 limitation.

3.6 Anticipated rebuttals and their strength

Conclusion on claim 1: obvious under Ground 1B, and obvious under Ground 1A; on the strength of the record, claim 1 appears invalid under § 103 unless some unrecorded secondary consideration saves it.

---

4. Claim 2 (PPM-suitable pulses)

• Fullerton '317 literally practices PPM ("intelligence signal modulates the spacing of relatively narrow pulses of a fixed rate pulse train"); the Fullerton '927/'169 family teaches time-shift/PPM impulse radio; Larrick '125 expressly names PPM as the prior UWB modulation.
• Motivation: PPM is the simplest UWB modulation and is the baseline against which the '032 improved; combining shape modulation with PPM is a predictable aggregation of two known UWB modulation modes (the '032 specification itself claims combined time+shape modulation as an advantage).
• Claim 2: obvious.

---

5. Claims 3–12 (computer data signal carrying content)

Claim 3 = the independently-claimed signal, differing from claim 1's method only in that it recites a "computer data signal embodied in a carrierless ultra wideband waveform" whose payload is at least one of Web page / executable program / data / software / digitized voice / video / graphical image / text. Claims 4–12 narrow the payload format (markup language → HDML/HTML/XML; Java; scripting language → Perl/JavaScript; ActiveX).

§ 103 analysis:

• The structural/technical content of claim 3 is coextensive with claim 1's waveform limitations; all the claim 1 grounds apply verbatim, and adding a communications payload to a communications system adds nothing technical (a data link by definition carries data).
• The payload-identification limitations are, in substance, non-functional descriptive material. Under In re Ngai, 367 F.3d 1336 (Fed. Cir. 2004) and In re Gulack, 703 F.2d 1381 (Fed. Cir. 1983), a limitation whose only difference is the informational content printed/encoded on a known substrate does not confer patentability. Applied here, "carrying an HTML page" is not a patentable distinction over "carrying data."
• Motivation for the payload-specific dependent claims: by May–Aug 2000, HTML, XML, Java, Perl, JavaScript and ActiveX were ubiquitous wirelessly-transported content (Comerford, IEEE Spectrum, Aug. 2000, is of record and is directed to exactly this: handhelds exchanging Internet content). A PHOSITA seeking to apply the UWB link of claim 1 to real applications would trivially select these formats. Claims 4–12: obvious (each is a mere application-naming of a notorious format).
• Separate § 101 flag (not a § 103 point): the earlier-generated section correctly noted the Alice/§ 101 exposure here, and In re Nuijten, 500 F.3d 1346 (Fed. Cir. 2007), is the direct authority that a propagating signal is not statutory subject matter. I note it because it reinforces the § 103 posture: content-recited signal claims have both eligibility and obviousness problems, and the § 103 analysis should be run on the technical limitations alone.

---

6. Claims 13–16

• Claim 13 ("information being exchanged from one device to another device") — this is the definition of a two-way communications link and is disclosed by every Fullerton transmit/receive pair and by Win & Scholtz's multiple-access impulse radio. Obvious.
• Claim 14 ("status information sent from an e-appliance") — a payload characterization with no technical limitation. Motivation supplied by the known trend toward networked appliances and the low-cost, low-power nature of impulse radio (Aether Wire 1995's "low-power, miniature, distributed … devices"). Likely obvious, though this is one of the claims where the applicant's best argument is that the record contains no e-appliance-specific reference. I did not verify a specific e-appliance/home-network reference in this pass, so I state this as likely obvious on the printed-matter reasoning + general-knowledge trend, not as a proven two-reference combination.
• Claim 15 ("network traffic to or from a wireless node of network") — the '032 specification itself frames the UWB transceiver as a LAN/WPAN transport and MAC interface; a PHOSITA would apply the disclosed link to network traffic. Obvious.
• Claim 16 (wireless repeater bridging carrierless UWB devices onto a carrier-based channel) — the added limitation is a conventional network-bridging/repeater function: receive a first-format signal, retransmit it in a second format. Impulse-radio-plus-repeater art existed in the field (I located a PTAB petition record — Ganz + Larrick + Roese, petition 1558596 — arguing precisely that a waveform-adaptive UWB device (Larrick '125) combines with a wireless repeater, but that record concerns a different patent and I did not verify the Ganz reference number, so I do not assert it as the '032 ground). On the record I can verify (Larrick '125 for the UWB side), claim 16 is likely obvious as an application of the known repeater/bridge function to a known UWB link, but it is the claim where a specific bridging reference would most strengthen a rejection. Flagged as the least-well-grounded of my conclusions.

---

7. Claims 17–20 (hospital, aircraft, beacon, monitored voice)

These are the claims whose only distinctive content is the environment or use of the identical waveform.

• Claim 17 (hospital, without interfering with medical equipment) and claim 18 (aircraft, without interfering with aircraft systems). Both rest on the premise that low-power UWB is inherently non-interfering. That premise is already in the art of record and in the '032 specification's own background: the specification states that UWB power can be kept below the noise floor such that transmissions "do not need to be as broadcast devices," and Fullerton/Larrick/McEwan all describe very low duty-cycle, low average power emission. The claimed "without interfering" language is a statement of intended result/use, which carries little patentable weight absent a claimed structural difference (In re Pearson; In re Detroit/printed-matter line). Obvious/likely obvious.
• Claim 19 (beacon broadcasting location-specific information). The art of record includes US 6,054,950 (Fontana, "Ultra wideband precision geolocation system") and the Aether Wire 1995 report on "position location and communication devices." Broadcasting location information from an impulse-radio beacon is the predictable union of UWB ranging/geolocation with a data payload. Obvious.
• Claim 20 (digitized voice received by a monitoring device). Win & Scholtz (Apr. 2000) expressly analyze voice capacity for TH impulse radio; the Fullerton '317 embodiment literally transmits and reproduces voice through a loudspeaker ("assuming a voice transmission as illustrated here"). Obvious.

---

8. Summary of conclusions

Overall: On the art of record, the '032 patent's claims — especially claim 1 — are vulnerable under pre-AIA § 103. The decisive combination is (a) an early carrierless impulse-radio teaching (Fullerton '317, or the '927/'169 second generation) for the platform, plus (b) US 5,583,892 (Drakul) for shape-coded, multi-level, polarity-based pulse alphabets, plus optionally (c) US 6,026,125 (Larrick) for the express UWB-QAM/UWB-PSK implementation. Each secondary claim adds either a PPM mode already in Fullerton, a notorious content format, a use/result statement of no structural weight, or (claims 16/19) a conventional network or geolocation function present in the record.

---

9. What would move confidence in each direction

Strengthen a rejection: obtain the examiner's actual prosecution record for 09/685,201 (the Notice of Allowance and any § 103 rejections) — if the examiner never addressed Drakul '892 or Larrick '125 on the shape/quad-phase/multilevel point, that is a strong prima facie case of a missed combination. Confirm the filing-date status of the Comerford article against the provisional's § 112 support for claims 3–12 and 13–20.

Weaken a rejection: evidence that (i) the combination of carrierless impulse radio with multilevel/quad-phase shaped wavelets was believed inoperable in 1999–2000 (e.g., DC-offset/correlation-degradation commentary in the contemporaneous literature); (ii) the specific wavelets of Equations 3–5 produce a measurable, unexpected autocorrelation/cross-correlation advantage over Drakul/Larrick shapes (but such evidence would have to be tied to a claimed limitation, and '032 claim 1 contains none); or (iii) documented secondary considerations with nexus.

---

10. Explicit uncertainties and confidence

1. Citation source. The '032's backward-citation table was not present in the patent text supplied to me. I used the granted-patent front-page list at uspto.report. If Google Patents' own "Citations" tab for US6505032 differs (e.g., adds or removes entries), that would change the ground set. Confidence: high that the uspto.report list is the granted front-page list; moderate that it is identical to what Google displays.
2. "Substance" of several cited references. I verified the disclosures of US 4,641,317, US 5,583,892, and US 6,026,125 from full text/claims retrieved in this pass. I did not independently read US 5,533,046 (Lund), US 6,003,092 (Waters), or US 5,351,053 (Wicks), and I do not rely on them. Their characterizations above are deliberately omitted rather than guessed.
3. Claim 16 and claim 14 are the two claims where my grounds are weakest to the record. In particular, I did not verify the "Ganz" reference number that appeared in a PTAB petition record involving a different patent (petition 1558596, concerning a "337 patent"), and I have not used it as a ground.
4. No litigation or IPR located (consistent with the earlier-generated sections), so there is no adjudicated claim construction, no validity holding, and no secondary-considerations record to draw on. Everything above is a record-based prima facie analysis, not a prediction of any tribunal's outcome.
5. Priority allocation. I did not verify which claims obtain the May 26, 2000 provisional benefit. If claims 3–20 do not get the provisional date, the Aug. 2000 Comerford article becomes available art against them — which matters for the content-format dependent claims.