US 6891807

Let me run additional targeted searches for CAFC 2026 dockets and USPTO records.

US Patent 6,891,807 B2 — Summary

Bibliographic data (confirmed via Google Patents, USPTO.report, and Justia)

Abstract (verbatim)

"A method and apparatus is provided for the time-based provisioning of wireless devices. A network access point monitors operation of wireless devices within a service region. When provisioning logic is activated at the network access point, the access point determines if the tracked parameter (such as power on or the onset of signal transmission) of the wireless device occurs within a designated time interval from the time of the provisioning activation. If the tracked device qualifies, the network access point proceeds with provisioning the device. In one system embodiment, the network access point tracks the power on time of wireless devices. When a wireless device to be authorized is powered on, the provisioning logic at the network access point notes the power on time. The user then activates the provisioning access at the network access point, and the network access point provisions the wireless device if it is recently powered on."

Plain-language overview of independent claims

The patent has 71 claims; there are five independent claims (1, 17, 33, 46, 59):

• Claim 1 (process): A provisioning method in which an access point connected to a network has logic that determines when a wireless device powered on. The user powers on the device, activates a time interval (e.g., presses a button on the access point), and provisioning is initiated only if the device's power-on occurred within that interval. Devices powered on too long before activation are denied.
• Claim 17 (system): A time-based network access provisioning system with a network access point that tracks operation of a wireless device, plus provisioning logic that provisions the device only if the tracked operation falls within an activatable time interval.
• Claim 33 (process, broader variant): Similar to claim 1 — an access point determines the time of power-on, checks whether the device was powered within a specified interval, and initiates provisioning if the powering occurred within that interval.
• Claim 46 (process, signal-based variant): Covers a wireless device having a transmitted signal. The access point has an activatable provisioning time interval, and provisioning is initiated if the wireless device's signal transmission to the access point begins during that interval (i.e., the qualifying event is onset of transmission rather than power-on).
• Claim 59 (apparatus): A network access point comprising a network connection, a receiver for input signals from at least one wireless device, means for provisioning access, and a time-based interval that selectably allows provisioning if a received input signal occurs within the interval.

Common theme across all independent claims: access to the network is granted based on when the device powers on or begins transmitting relative to a user-activated time window at the access point, avoiding the need to manually enter a MAC address or use a device UI. Dependent claims add conventional limitations (device types such as IEEE 802.11/Bluetooth™ devices, MAC-address-based access control lists, encryption/key exchange, LAN/Internet connectivity). Note: claims 24 and 64 contain the apparent typographical error "greeter than the time interval" (clearly intended as "greater").

CAFC 2026 docket search — result and uncertainty

I searched for CAFC 2026 appeal dockets referencing 6,891,807 / 6891807 and found no CAFC 2026 docket entries. I cannot confirm any pending or decided Federal Circuit appeal for this patent in 2026. What I did find:

• District-court litigation is extensive but at the trial level, not CAFC. The Stanford NPE Litigation Database lists cases such as CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Ubee Interactive Holding Corp. (6:23-cv-00064, W.D. Tex., filed Feb. 1, 2023) and CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Consolidated Communications Holdings, Inc. (2:20-cv-00159, E.D. Tex., filed May 27, 2020).
• Google Patents' litigation feed (Unified Patents data) lists numerous 2020–2026 district court cases in Texas Eastern, Texas Western, Virginia Eastern, Delaware, New York Southern, California Central, and Alabama Northern involving this patent — but those are district-court filings, not CAFC matters.
• The patent is expired (April 2023), which limits but does not preclude post-expiry litigation over past damages.

Caveat: My CAFC docket search returned empty results, and I did not access the USPTO Patent Center or PACER directly. If you need authoritative confirmation of whether any CAFC appeal (e.g., from the 2023–2026 district court cases) exists, that should be verified against the Federal Circuit's public docket (PACER/CM/ECF) or USPTO records directly.

I'll search litigation databases for this specific patent number.

Let me dig deeper into specific cases and identify the defendants for each docket number.

Litigation involving US 6,891,807 B2

Short answer: yes, there is extensive known litigation — but all of it is district-court litigation. As noted in the prior section, I found no Federal Circuit docket for this patent, and nothing in this pass changes that. Every case below is a trial-level action, and virtually all of them were filed by CommWorks Solutions, LLC (referred to as "CommWorks Solutions, Inc." in one N.D. Ala. docket), asserting a seven-patent Wi-Fi portfolio of which '807 is one member.

Important caveats up front:

• Date inconsistency (flagged explicitly): the task header states the current date is April 26, 2026, but the authoritative patent fetch was dated 2026-09-08 and the Unified Patents feed on that page includes dockets filed in September 2026 (e.g., 0:26-cv-03949). I cannot reconcile these; the docket list below reflects what the sources actually said.
• CommWorks asserts the same portfolio repeatedly: US 6,891,807; US 7,177,285; US 7,463,596; US 7,919,979 (all one family — '807 is the parent) plus US 7,027,465; US RE44,904; US 9,554,304; US 6,832,249. Where I could confirm '807 was pleaded, I say so; where a docket is listed only at family level, I say so.
• Ownership/standing nuance: Google Patents records assignments to Intellectual Ventures Assets 130 LLC → CommWorks Solutions, LLC → Unwired Solutions, Inc. → Unwired Broadband, Inc. (current listed assignee), yet CommWorks Solutions, LLC is the plaintiff of record in these suits. The exact license/standing arrangement is not visible in the assignment records I reviewed.

Tier 1 — Cases where the '807 patent is confirmed asserted

Tier 2 — CommWorks cases listed on the '807 litigation feed, defendants not confirmed by me

These docket numbers appear in the Google Patents/Unified Patents litigation feed attached to the '807 record, but my searches did not resolve the defendant name or confirm '807 specifically (vs. a sibling patent). Treat as unverified:

• E.D. Tex.: 2:26-cv-00088 (2026); 2:25-cv-00716; 2:25-cv-01257; 2:25-cv-00433; 2:25-cv-00252; 2:25-cv-00024; 4:23-cv-00086; 2:20-cv-00158; 2:20-cv-00160
• W.D. Tex.: 7:26-cv-00043 (2026); 7:25-cv-00101; 7:25-cv-00354 (Complaint against Marvell Technology, Inc., filed 2025-08-18 per UniCourt, Judge Alan D. Albright; joint motion to stay citing settlement 2025-10-29 and voluntary dismissal 2025-10-31 — but the exhibit list I saw referenced '465, RE44,904 and '249, so '807's inclusion is unconfirmed); 6:23-cv-00147; 6:23-cv-00065
• E.D. Va.: 2:25-cv-00842
• S.D.N.Y.: 1:20-cv-07534; 1:20-cv-07529
• C.D. Cal.: 2:23-cv-08048; 2:23-cv-09229; 8:24-cv-02250
• D. Del.: 1:21-cv-01323
• N.D. Ala.: 5:23-cv-01327 — Commworks Solutions Inc v. Adtran Inc, complaint filed 2023-10-03 (per CourtListener). Six exhibits; '807 inclusion unconfirmed.
• D. Minn.: 0:26-cv-03949 — CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Digi International Inc., Judge Katherine M. Menendez, filed ~2026-09-09; five exhibits (A–E); '807 inclusion unconfirmed.

Other family-level CommWorks suits I encountered but could not tie to '807: CommWorks v. Charter Communications, Inc. et al, 6:22-cv-00156 (W.D. Tex., 2022-02-11); CommWorks v. Extreme Networks, Inc., 6:23-cv-00835 (W.D. Tex., 2023-12-07); CommWorks v. Frontier Communications Parent, Inc. et al, 6:22-cv-01268 (W.D. Tex., Judge Albright, filed 2022-12-08, terminated 2023-08-01, marked CLOSED/STAYED — consistent with settlement).

Disposition pattern

• No case reached a merits judgment on '807 that I could find. Dispositions are settlements, voluntary dismissals, and with-prejudice dismissals (TI, CommScope, Hitron, Marvell), or procedural transfers/consolidations.
• The litigation is directed at WPS (Wi-Fi Protected Setup) functionality. CommWorks' theory maps the "push a button to enroll a device within a time window" behavior of WPS onto the '807 claims — an interesting overlay, since WPS post-dates the 2003 priority date.
• Plaintiff-side counsel recurring: Rozier Hardt McDonough PLLC; Kaleo Legal; Kheyfits Belenky LLP; The Stafford Davis Firm.

What I could not verify

I did not access PACER, USPTO Patent Center, or the Unified Patents caselist page directly. Defendant names for the Tier 2 dockets, and any appellate activity (including any appeal to the Federal Circuit from the 2023–2026 judgments/dismissals), should be confirmed against PACER/CM-ECF and the Federal Circuit's public docket. As the prior section concluded, no CAFC 2026 docket for 6,891,807 could be confirmed — and I found none in this pass either. Note also that because the patent expired April 17, 2023, any surviving dispute is limited to pre-expiry damages.

Sources: https://patents.google.com/patent/US6891807/en (litigation feed, fetched 2026-09-08); https://npe.law.stanford.edu/patent/6891807; https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/Texas%20Eastern%20District%20Court/case/2:25-cv-00026; https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/Texas%20Eastern%20District%20Court/case/2:25-cv-00439; https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/Virginia%20Eastern%20District%20Court/case/1:25-cv-02504; https://litigation.rpxcorp.com/litigation/txedce-[235813](/patent/235813)-commworks-solutions-v-qualcomm; https://insight.rpxcorp.com/litigation/txedce-[234240](/patent/234240)-commworks-solutions-v-asustek-computer; https://litigation.rpxcorp.com/litigation/txedce-[232585](/patent/232585)-commworks-solutions-v-mediatek; https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/67859829/commworks-solutions-inc-v-adtran-inc/; https://services.patexia.com/lawsuits/CommWorks-Solutions-LLC-v-Hitron-Technologies-Inc-id-[186357](/patent/186357)/documents; https://cdn.pacermonitor.com/public/case/66702792/CommWorks_Solutions,_LLC_v_Digi_International_Inc; https://ipwatchdog.com/2022/07/29/patent-filings-roundup-future-waco-patent-cases-headed-wheel-ax-wireless-launches-wifi-6-campaign-helsinn-paragraph-iv-litigation/; https://www.archive.org/download/gov.uscourts.txed.[239172](/patent/239172)/gov.uscourts.txed.239172.1.0.pdf

I'll verify the structured "no PTAB proceedings" signal against public sources before finalizing — well-asserted patents occasionally attract IPRs that the ODP ingest may miss.

PTAB / AIA Trial Analysis — US 6,891,807 B2 ("Time based wireless access provisioning")

Bottom line up front: there are no AIA trial proceedings on this patent. Zero IPRs, zero PGRs, zero CBMs — not instituted, not denied, not settled, not terminated. I verified this against the structured "PTAB proceedings on file" block (USPTO Open Data Portal ingest) and ran independent searches for IPR/PGR/CBM activity referencing 6,891,807, its continuations (7,177,285 / 7,463,596 / 7,919,979), and its current owners. Nothing surfaced. Proceeding-by-proceeding sections below are therefore replaced with a verification record and a clearly-labeled "near-miss" analysis, so the null result is actionable rather than just a blank.

Proceedings overview

Total AIA proceedings: 0 — 0 active, 0 claims invalidated, 0 claims sustained, 0 settled, 0 institution denials.

The defensive posture this creates is the opposite of both of the narrative poles you might expect. This patent is neither hardened nor dead: it has never been stress-tested at the PTAB, so all 71 claims stand exactly as issued and all five independent claims (1, 17, 33, 46, 59) remain fully available to assert. A defendant does not get to say "the troll has no case." What the defendant does get is a completely clean slate: no § 315(e)(2) estoppel, no adverse claim constructions from an FWD, no cancelled claims to work around, and no PTAB record for the patent owner to leverage. The validity fight is 100% ahead of you, and it is unwinnable-by-default only in the sense that nothing has been won yet.

Proceedings on US 6,891,807 B2

None. For completeness, here is the verification record so you can rely on the null result:

Caveat (stated plainly): I could not query PTAB E2E / Patent Center directly with the tools available, and my search budget was exhausted before I could run every permutation. A null result from search plus a null result from the ODP ingest is strong but not the same as a docket pull. Before you rely on this in a brief or a client memo, pull the PTAB E2E "Patent Number" search for 6891807 yourself at https://ptab.uspto.gov/ — it takes 30 seconds and is dispositive.

Near-miss / related-party proceedings (NOT on 6891807 — do not cite these as proceedings on this patent)

IPR2021-01297 — Unified Patents, LLC v. CommWorks Solutions, LLC

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Patent at issue: U.S. Patent No. 8,923,846 B2 ("Recovery Techniques in Mobile Networks") — a different patent entirely, not in the 6891807 family.
• Filed: 2021 (Petition); instituted 2022-02-14 on all challenged claims
• Status: Final Written Decision issued 2023-02-13 — "Determining All Challenged Claims Unpatentable"
• Judge panel: Before Thu A. Dang, Kevin C. (panel listed in the FWD caption; full three-judge roster per the decision)
• Claims: Challenged claims 1–6, 9–13, and 16–20 — all held unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. § 103
• Related litigation: CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Comcast Cable Communications, LLC, No. 6:21-cv-00366-ADA (W.D. Tex.)
• Sources: Unified Patents insight, 2023-02-13; FWD via Docket Alarm
• Defensive value for this patent: None directly — no estoppel, no claim construction, no art finding from IPR2021-01297 transfers to 6891807. Its value is purely intelligence: it tells you (a) Unified Patents is willing to spend money against CommWorks Solutions' portfolio, (b) the Board will invalidate CommWorks claims when the art is there, and (c) CommWorks litigates its patents before the PTAB rather than settling out. That is a green light on a defensive-aggregator joinder strategy.

Strategic summary

Claim status across the whole family — every claim UNTESTED. No claim of 6,891,807 has ever been cancelled, disclaimed, or held unpatentable in any AIA proceeding. Independent claim 1 (power-on within an activated interval), claim 17 (system for tracking operation), claim 33 (broader power-on-timing process), claim 46 (signal-onset variant), and claim 59 (access-point apparatus) are all live as issued, along with 66 dependent claims. The same is true of the continuation family — 7,177,285, 7,463,596, 7,919,979 have no PTAB history I could find either. Note the flip side of this: because the patent expired (adjusted expiration 2023-04-17), the patent owner can never amend claims at the PTAB, and a defendant can never obtain an institution-driven stay-and-cancel. Any IPR here is purely a damages-defense exercise.

Estoppel landscape — wide open. With zero petitioners, no § 315(e)(2) estoppel exists against anyone. Every § 102/§ 103 ground is available to a new petitioner. The real gates are different:

• § 315(b) one-year bar is the clock that matters. Any party (or real party in interest / privy) served with an infringement complaint more than one year ago is barred. CommWorks has been filing these cases since at least 2020 (e.g., 2:20-cv-00159, E.D. Tex., 2020-05-27; 1:20-cv-07529 and 1:20-cv-07534, S.D.N.Y., 2020). Defendants from that era are time-barred. Newly-served defendants in the 2025–2026 wave still have a window.
• § 325(d) is the trap. The examiner cited and considered 21 references, including the core Wi-Fi/WLAN provisioning art (US 6,058,106; US 6,275,693; US 6,282,183; US 6,317,594; EP 1,081,895; WO 01/22661; US 2001/0048744 to Kimura; US 2003/0152235 to Cohen) plus 17 non-patent references. A petition built on art already of record invites discretionary denial. Build on art the examiner did not have.
• 2026 discretionary-denial climate. Current USPTO practice under Director Squires is markedly hostile to institution — reported discretionary denial rates around 64% and overall institution rates down to roughly 30% (down from the historical 60–70% band), with claim-construction consistency across forums now a hard requirement (Sterne Kessler, 2026). If you file here, your petition's claim-construction positions must match your district-court invalidity contentions, and you should not rely on a conditional stipulation.

Pattern signals. (1) CommWorks Solutions, LLC is a serial district-court filer on this family — asserted patents across its complaints include 7,177,285, 7,463,596, 7,919,979, RE44,904, 7,027,465, and 6,891,807. In CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Microchip Technology Inc., No. 7:26-cv-00043 (W.D. Tex., filed 2026-02-10), Exhibit G is "Evidence of Use Regarding Infringement of U.S. Patent No. 6,891,807" — this patent is being actively asserted in 2026. (Justia docket) (2) No IPR has been filed in response despite years of litigation — a notable absence, most plausibly explained by a combination of the § 315(b) bar on the older defendants, the expired-patent damages-only posture (which depresses IPR ROI), and the § 325(d) overlap problem. (3) No defensive aggregator appears in the chain for this patent — Unified Patents has been absent here, though it has hit CommWorks elsewhere. (4) Assignee/standing nuance worth flagging: Google Patents lists Unwired Broadband, Inc. as current assignee, but the USPTO assignment records characterize the CommWorks → Unwired Solutions / Unwired Broadband conveyances as "LICENSE" (see the 2020-11-05 and the two corrective assignments of 2021-02-04 and 2022-02-16), while CommWorks Solutions, LLC is the named plaintiff in the 2025–2026 suits. If you file an IPR, nail down the real party in interest and the licensee's standing to sue — this is a live issue in the chain, not a settled one. This also cross-references and partially tensions with the previously-generated summary's assignee line; treat the assignment records, not the Google Patents "current assignee" field, as authoritative.

The CAFC gap. Consistent with the previously-generated docket search, I found no Federal Circuit appeal arising from any PTAB proceeding on this patent, because there is no PTAB proceeding to appeal. The litigation wave is entirely at the district-court level.

Recommended next steps

1. Confirm the null result directly. Run a PTAB E2E "Patent Number" search for 6891807 at https://ptab.uspto.gov/. Also check whether any 2025–2026 filing has been docketed since the ODP ingest. If it comes back empty, that finding is defensible and citable.
2. If you are a defendant served in the 2025–2026 wave (e.g., the Microchip or Digi International matters), diary the § 315(b) deadline immediately — one year from service of the first complaint alleging infringement of 6891807. For Microchip, service was 2026-02-13, so the bar date is approximately 2027-02-13.
3. Do not expect a stay-driven cancellation. The patent's adjusted expiration of 2023-04-17 means no claim amendment is possible, and the practical value of an IPR is limited to cutting off past damages under the § 286 six-year lookback. Price the IPR accordingly — compare its cost against your realistic past-damages exposure on an expired patent.
4. Ground selection: avoid § 325(d). Do not lead with US 6,058,106, US 6,275,693, EP 1,081,895, WO 01/22661, or US 2001/0048744 — all were before the examiner. Hunt for 2003-and-earlier art the examiner never saw: Bluetooth pairing/association literature, pre-2003 802.11 ad-hoc and home-network provisioning disclosures, and IEEE 802.11 working-group submissions.
5. Coordinate forums before you file. Under the current 2026 discretionary-denial regime, an IPR petition that takes a claim-construction position inconsistent with your district-court contentions — or that relies on a conditional "if instituted, we'll withdraw" stipulation — is very likely to be denied institution even on strong art. Align the two positions before filing.
6. Consider the aggregator angle. Given that Unified Patents successfully invalidated a different CommWorks patent (IPR2021-01297, FWD 2023-02-13) and has not targeted 6891807, a joint or aggregator-supported petition may be worth exploring — particularly with other defendants hit by the same family.
7. Do not cite any proceeding number for 6891807. There isn't one. Any brief or opinion asserting an IPR/PGR/CBM on this patent would be fabricated.

I'll run targeted searches to verify the assignment chain, correspondent attorneys, and NPE status before drafting.

Good — several key facts confirmed. Let me dig into the correspondent/recording details and the remaining links.

Assignment & Ownership Analysis — US 6,891,807 B2

Method note / limitation. The assignment chain below is built from the USPTO legal-events record as republished on Google Patents (which mirrors Assignment Center filing data, including reel/frame), cross-checked against Justia, the Stanford NPE Litigation Database, Unified Patents, RPX, and Delaware district-court Rule 7.1 disclosures. I was unable to retrieve the Assignment Center "correspondent of record" field for any link in this chain — that field is not carried in the Google Patents legal-events feed, and my direct lookups of the Assignment Center pages did not return correspondent data within this session. I therefore do not name any recording attorney below. Reel/frame is captured for five of the eleven recorded events and is marked "not captured" where the source record was truncated. Nothing below is inferred from entity naming alone; every substantive call cites a reel/frame, a date, or a court/regulatory record.

Inventors

• Employer is established by the recorded assignment itself: the 2003-04-23 recording at Reel 014003/0373 carries the free-format text ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST;ASSIGNORS:ROSKIND, JAMES A.;ROBINSON, JOHN D.;REEL/FRAME:014003/0373;SIGNING DATES FROM 20030109 TO 20030114, with assignee AMERICA ONLINE, INC., VIRGINIA. Both inventors' residences (Roskind in Redwood City — AOL's Bay Area engineering footprint; Robinson in South Riding, VA — AOL's Dulles, VA campus corridor) are consistent with AOL employment.
• Departure pattern: not determinable, and no adverse pattern visible. The record shows no inventor assignment out, no inventor-held reversion, and no re-recording of inventor rights. The file history instead shows the family being actively prosecuted under AOL ownership long after filing — continuations filed 2004-10-08 (US 7,177,285), 2007-02-09 (US 7,463,596) and 2008-11-25 (US 7,919,979). A family prosecuted through November 2008 is inconsistent with the "inventors all leave within 12 months, portfolio dumped" precursor pattern. I could not verify either inventor's later employment history from the sources I reached, and I will not assert it.
• One prosecution-side lead I could not verify for this patent: an idiyas listing shows attorney Michael A. Glenn as counsel of record on a different AOL LLC patent (US 7,493,289, digital content store). That is a prosecution attorney on another patent in the same AOL batch — not a confirmed assignment correspondent for '807. Treat as an unverified lead only.

Original assignee

America Online, Inc. (Dulles / Virginia), per Reel 014003/0373.

• Primary line of business: subscription online service and consumer ISP (AOL dial-up/broadband access, AOL client software), later a Time Warner media subsidiary following the 2001 AOL Time Warner combination.
• Did they ship a product embodying the claims? No evidence found that AOL commercialized an access point practicing the claimed "activate a time window at the AP, then qualify a device by when it powered on / began transmitting" mechanism. The claims are directed to AP-side provisioning logic with a user-pressed activation and an acceptance interval (claims 1, 17, 33, 46, 59). Notably, the industry feature that most closely reads on this disclosure — Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) push-button mode — did not arrive until 2006, three years after this filing. AOL's own wireless activity ("AOL Wireless") was a branded connectivity service, not a self-branded AP/router line. Conclusion: portfolio/defensive asset for AOL, no known commercial embodiment.
• Current status of the original assignee: not dissolved and not bankrupt. America Online, Inc. → AOL LLC (change of name / conversion, effective 2006-04-03) → AOL Inc. (spinoff from Time Warner, Dec 2009) → acquired by Verizon (2015) → Verizon Media → sold to Apollo Global (2021, operating as Yahoo Inc.). The patent itself, however, left AOL's hands in 2009 (below).

Assignment timeline

Eleven recorded events, 2003 → 2022. Links 1–5 and 9–11 carry reel/frame; the 2015, 2019 and 2020-01-03 links were captured without reel/frame in the source feed.

1. 2003-01-09 → 2003-01-14 (executed; two signing dates) / recorded 2003-04-23 — Reel 014003/0373

• Conveyance: Assignment (ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS' INTEREST)
• Assignor: James A. Roskind; John D. Robinson (individually)
• Assignee: America Online, Inc. (Virginia)
• Correspondent: not retrieved (see method note)
• Context: initial invention assignment at filing — original prosecution chain of title.

2. executed 2006-04-03 (effective) / recorded 2007-08-17 — Reel 019711/0316

• Conveyance: recorded as an Assignment; later corrected to CHANGE OF NAME
• Assignor: America Online, Inc.
• Assignee: AOL LLC, a Delaware limited liability company (Virginia)
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: internal reorg / change of entity form only — no change in beneficial ownership.

3. executed 2006-04-03 / recorded 2009-03-25 — Reel 022451/0186

• Conveyance: Corrective Assignment — confirms the nature of conveyance recorded at Reel 019711/0316 is a change of name
• Assignor: America Online, Inc. / Assignee: AOL LLC
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: correction of record only.

4. executed 2006-04-03 / recorded 2009-06-17 — Reel 022835/0613

• Conveyance: Correction to corrective assignment — actual nature of conveyance is conversion to limited liability company
• Assignor: America Online, Inc. / Assignee: AOL LLC (Virginia)
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: second correction of record only. The triple-recording of a mere name/conversion event (214, 22451 and 22835 reels, at a single 2006-04-03 effective date) is a chain-of-title hygiene artifact, not a transfer.

5. executed 2009-09-17 / recorded 2009-10-15 — Reel 023379/0103

• Conveyance: Assignment (ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS' INTEREST)
• Assignor: AOL LLC
• Assignee: Tarquin Consulting Co., LLC (Delaware; Dover, DE per Justia assignee records)
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: first real divestiture — AOL exits the asset two months before the AOL/Time Warner separation. Justia's assignee page shows Tarquin holding a batch of AOL-origin patents (this one plus e.g. US 7,493,289), i.e. a portfolio carve-out sale/broker vehicle, not a strategic buyer.

6. executed/recorded 2015-12-29 — Reel/Frame not captured in source feed

• Conveyance: MERGER
• Assignor: Tarquin Consulting Co., LLC (Delaware)
• Assignee: Callahan Cellular L.L.C. (Delaware)
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: merger of the holding vehicle — the patent passes by operation of law, with no asset-purchase language. Callahan Cellular's later Rule 7.1 disclosure (below) identifies its corporate parent as Invention Investment Fund II, LLC, i.e. an Intellectual Ventures fund vehicle.

7. executed/recorded 2019-10-31 — Reel/Frame not captured in source feed

• Conveyance: Assignment
• Assignor: Callahan Cellular L.L.C.
• Assignee: Intellectual Ventures Assets 130 LLC
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: transfer into an IV special-purpose asset vehicle — the point in the chain where the asset is packaged for assertion-scale licensing.

8. executed/recorded 2020-01-03 — Reel/Frame not captured in source feed

• Conveyance: Assignment
• Assignor: Intellectual Ventures Assets 130 LLC
• Assignee: CommWorks Solutions, LLC (Georgia-based per RPX/Unified)
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: transfer to asserter. Unified Patents describes CommWorks Solutions, LLC as "an NPE and subsidiary of IP Investments Group LLC." This is the transfer that immediately precedes the litigation campaign (see signal 5).

9. executed/recorded 2020-11-05 — Reel 054443/0958

• Conveyance: LICENSE
• Assignor: CommWorks Solutions, LLC
• Assignee: Unwired Solutions, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: monetization — a recorded licence out of the asserting entity.

10. recorded 2021-02-04 — Reel 054443/0958 (corrective to link 9)

• Conveyance: Corrective Assignment to correct assignee name
• Assignor: CommWorks Solutions, LLC / Assignee: Unwired Broadband, Inc. (corrected from Unwired Solutions, Inc.)
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: correction of record; the underlying conveyance remains a licence.

11. recorded 2022-02-16 — Reel 056981/0631 (corrective)

• Conveyance: Corrective Assignment to correct the nature of conveyance previously recorded at Reel 056981/0631; assignor "hereby confirms the ASSIGNMENT"
• Assignor: CommWorks Solutions, LLC / Assignee: Unwired Broadband, Inc.
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: a second CommWorks→Unwired Broadband recording (reel 056981, distinct from the 054443 licence) whose nature was corrected from something else to an assignment. The original recording date of Reel 056981/0631 was not in my source extract — flagging this as an open item to verify at Assignment Center.

Non-assignment maintenance events (for completeness): maintenance-fee payments recorded 2008-09-18 (4th year) and 2012-10-04 (8th year); status is Expired – Lifetime, adjusted expiration 2023-04-17 (≈20 years from the 2003-01-13 filing plus PTA). Expiry was by natural term, not fee lapse.

Cross-reference flag — discrepancy with the prior section. The earlier summary presented the chain as a clean series of assignments ending "→ Unwired Broadband, Inc." Two refinements: (a) the first CommWorks→Unwired recording (Reel 054443/0958, 2020-11-05) is a LICENSE, not an assignment, and only the second recording (Reel 056981/0631, corrected 2022-02-16) confirms an assignment; (b) despite Unwired Broadband being the recorded/listed owner, CommWorks Solutions, LLC is still the named plaintiff on '807 suits filed as late as 2023 (e.g. CommWorks v. Ubee Interactive, 6:23-cv-00064, W.D. Tex., filed 2023-02-01 — Stanford NPE DB). The record therefore does not cleanly show CommWorks exiting enforcement rights, and the Google Patents "Current Assignee: Unwired Broadband Inc" field should be treated as provisional.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 6891807
    2003 : Filed and assigned to America Online Inc
    2005 : Patent issued
    2006 : Name change to AOL LLC
    2009 : Sold to Tarquin Consulting Co LLC
    2015 : Merged into Callahan Cellular LLC
    2019 : Transferred to Intellectual Ventures Assets 130 LLC
    2020 : Assigned to CommWorks Solutions LLC
         : First lawsuit on this patent
    2022 : Unwired Broadband recorded as owner
    2023 : Patent term expires

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — PRESENT.
The patent leaves the operating company at Reel 023379/0103 (effective 2009-09-17) into Tarquin Consulting Co., LLC (Dover, DE), a vehicle holding a batch of other AOL-origin patents (Justia assignee page). It then passes by MERGER (2015-12-29) to Callahan Cellular L.L.C., whose corporate parent is disclosed in court filings as Invention Investment Fund II, LLC — an Intellectual Ventures fund — and then to Intellectual Ventures Assets 130 LLC (2019-10-31) and CommWorks Solutions, LLC (2020-01-03). Four consecutive licensing-only vehicles, none of which sells a product. This is entity-level evidence, not naming inference.

2. Known asserter in the chain — PRESENT.
Two independent directory confirmations:

• CommWorks Solutions, LLC — Unified Patents: "an NPE and subsidiary of IP Investments Group LLC" (https://www.unifiedpatents.com/insights/2023/2/13/ip-investments-group-entity-commworks-solutions-mobile-communications-patent-held-invalid); RPX tags its litigation "NPE" (https://insight.rpxcorp.com/litigation/txwdce-[1204775](/patent/1204775)-commworks-solutions-v-zyxel-communications ; https://litigation.rpxcorp.com/litigation/txedce-[235813](/patent/235813)-commworks-solutions-v-qualcomm).
• Stanford NPE Litigation Database, patent page for 6891807 (https://npe.law.stanford.edu/patent/6891807) lists CommWorks Solutions, LLC with asserter category "1 Acquired patents" in both '807 cases.
• Intellectual Ventures (Assets 130 LLC, 2019-10-31) is a canonical NPE-list entity; Callahan Cellular L.L.C. appears as a co-defendant in 2026 declaratory-judgment actions along with IV I/II and OL Security, with corporate parent Invention Investment Fund II, LLC (D. Del. 1:26-cv-00417 and 1:26-cv-00397).

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — UNCLEAR (not retrieved).
No correspondent/recording-attorney field was obtainable for any of the eleven events, so I cannot test this signal. I will not substitute a guess. This is the single highest-value item to confirm at Assignment Center: if the 2009 Tarquin recording, the 2015 Callahan merger, the 2019 IV Assets 130 recording and the 2020 CommWorks recording share one correspondent, that would independently corroborate signals 1 and 4.

4. Cascading transfers — PRESENT.
Four recorded links in under 28 months: 2019-10-31 → 2020-01-03 → 2020-11-05 → 2021-02-04 → 2022-02-16 (plus the Reel 056981 recording later corrected in 2022). Consecutive chained LLCs, each record generated by the previous holder, with the last two events being corrective filings on two different reels. Even discounting the corrections, the 2019→2020 sequence alone is a two-hop cascade in ten weeks.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — PRESENT.
CommWorks Solutions, LLC acquires the patent 2020-01-03; the first '807 suit is filed 2020-05-27 (CommWorks Solutions, LLC v. Consolidated Communications Holdings, Inc. et al, 2:20-cv-00159, E.D. Tex. — Stanford NPE DB) — roughly 4.8 months later. Subsequent '807 assertions follow at Ubee Interactive (6:23-cv-00064, 2023-02-01), Adtran (5:23-cv-01327), Vyve Broadband, and Extreme Networks (6:23-cv-00835). That the first suit lands inside six months of the transfer is the classic clean-standing/venue-backed assertion setup.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — NOT PRESENT.
AOL never filed Chapter 7/11. The 2009-09-17 Tarquin transfer occurred on the eve of the AOL/Time Warner separation as a portfolio divestiture, not a bankruptcy sale. No §363 sale, no bankruptcy docket.

7. Privateering — UNCLEAR.
No SEC filing, court record or press coverage I reached shows AOL directing or benefiting from the later assertions against cable/broadband operators. The pattern (operating company divests → IV vehicle → IP Investments Group NPE) is consistent with privateering, but the evidence here shows the patent was sold out of AOL entirely in 2009, with no retained enforcement or revenue interest disclosed. Marked unclear rather than present.

8. Defensive aggregator — NOT PRESENT.
The chain terminates at asserting entities (CommWorks Solutions, LLC / Unwired Broadband, Inc.), not at RPX, AST, LOT, Unified Patents or OIN. This patent has not been neutralized; it has been actively weaponized.

Verdict

NPE — high confidence.

Four strong independent signals are present on the face of the record: (i) the asset left the operating company into a Delaware licensing vehicle at Reel 023379/0103, effective 2009-09-17 (Tarquin Consulting Co., LLC, a holder of a batch of AOL-origin patents); (ii) the chain runs through a confirmed Intellectual Ventures fund entity — Callahan Cellular L.L.C., corporate parent Invention Investment Fund II, LLC, disclosed under Rule 7.1 in D. Del. 1:26-cv-00417 — and then into Intellectual Ventures Assets 130 LLC (2019-10-31); (iii) CommWorks Solutions, LLC, which took the patent on 2020-01-03, is expressly identified by Unified Patents as "an NPE and subsidiary of IP Investments Group LLC" and is categorized as an acquired-patent asserter in the Stanford NPE database; and (iv) the first '807 infringement suit followed the CommWorks acquisition by under five months (2020-05-27, 2:20-cv-00159, E.D. Tex.). Add the 2019→2022 cascade of four-plus recorded links and the two corrective filings at Reels 054443/0958 and 056981/0631, and the chain is unambiguously an arranged assertion chain rather than an operating-company one. The only material gap is the correspondent field, which I could not retrieve for any link — resolving that is what would move signals 3 and 7 off "unclear," and the corresponding chain-of-title records should be pulled directly.

Verification: USPTO Assignment Center, search patent number 6891807 — https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (mirror index: https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html). Request the full assignment abstracts for Reels 014003/0373, 019711/0316, 022451/0186, 022835/0613, 023379/0103, 054443/0958, 056981/0631, plus the uncaptured reels behind the 2015-12-29, 2019-10-31 and 2020-01-03 events, to obtain the correspondent of record and the underlying recording dates.

I'll research this patent's prior-art citations. Let me run targeted searches.

Let me research the key cited references in detail.

I've gathered the citation data (Google Patents mirrors the USPTO's citation record; I also used uspto.report and freepatentsonline for reference content). Note two data-quality issues I'm flagging rather than silently fixing:

• The patent's own Background text renders the Thomson reference as "PCT Patent Application Ser. No. WO 01/2266," while the citation table gives it as WO2001022661A2 (confirmed as the same document — Thomson, Method for device registration in a wireless home network). I preserve both literal strings.
• The Google Patents full-text fetch of US6891807 was truncated partway through the Legal Events section; the citation lists below come from the authoritative citation tables in that same record.

Prior-art analysis for US 6,891,807 B2

Framing: what the prior art must show

For a § 102 anticipation analysis, a reference must disclose every element of a claim. The five independent claims (1, 17, 33, 46, 59) each contain a limitation with no analog in the cited art: a user-activated time interval at the access point, with provisioning granted only if the device's power-on (claims 1, 17, 33) or onset of signal transmission (claims 46, 59) falls within that interval. That time-qualification element is the point of novelty. Consequently, the cited references are best understood as background/motivation art, and none of them discloses the time-interval limitation. My claim-by-claim mapping below reflects that: most references anticipate nothing, and the ones with real § 102 traction reach only dependent claims (device identifiers, MAC addresses, access control lists, encryption).

Patent citations (21 references in the USPTO/Google Patents record)

Non-patent literature (17 references)

These are the more demanding § 102(b) candidates because most pre-date the 2003 filing by years, but they are all architecture/security survey papers. The notable entries and their claim relevance:

Bottom line

1. No cited reference anticipates any independent claim (1, 17, 33, 46, or 59). Every cited patent and NPL item discloses provisioning, authentication, registration, or access control — but none discloses the activated time interval within which the device's power-on/transmission-onset must fall. That is the distinguishing limitation across all five independent claims.
2. The "most relevant" cited art for the examiner's purpose (establishing the state of the art in wireless provisioning/authentication) is:
   • US 6,275,693 B1 (bearer-independent wireless provisioning) and US 6,058,106 A (AP-coordinated wireless network) — the two references the patent itself discusses.
   • WO 2001/022661 A2 (Thomson) and EP 1 081 895 A1 (Intel) — the closest thing to AP-driven device registration/authentication among the citations; these are the best § 102(b) art for the dependent identifier/encryption/access-list claims.
   • US 6,317,594 B1 (Openwave) — nearest on the "detect device activity" concept, but for data delivery, not time-gated provisioning.
3. The 2003-dated NPL entries (Microsoft WPS items, HP/CNET, Sony Ericsson manual) are post-filing and cannot be § 102 prior art against this patent; they are relevant only to secondary considerations / later art.
4. One § 102(e)-only candidate: US 2003/0152235 A1 (Cohen) published after the filing date but has a 2002 priority; treat it strictly as potential § 102(e) art, not § 102(a)/(b).

Confidence and caveats: The citation identities, numbers, and dates are confirmed from the patent's own citation tables and cross-checked against uspto.report/freepatentsonline/Google Patents. My claim-by-claim "potentially anticipates" calls for the dependent claims are analytical judgments about which limitations a reference could arguably meet if combined with the independent-claim elements — they are not assertions that these references actually anticipate those claims, and a full element-by-element § 102 comparison against each reference's complete specification (I retrieved full text for only US 6,058,106, WO 2001/022661, and EP 1 081 895) would be required before treating any as an anticipation reference. I did not retrieve the full text of US 5,461,627, EP 0 814 623, US 6,167,428, US 6,272,129, US 6,282,183, JP 2001-308866, US 6,317,594, US 2001/0048744, US 6,334,056, US 6,359,880, EP 1 191 763, US 6,418,146, US 6,418,324, EP 1 225 778, or US 2003/0152235; those descriptions are based on their titles/abstracts as listed in the citation record and should be verified against the documents themselves.

I'll verify the technical content of the key prior-art references before building the §103 combinations.

Now let me verify the remaining prior-art references relevant to motivation and the "activity detection" and "time-window" concepts.

Obviousness Analysis — US 6,891,807 B2 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

Grounding note. Per the task instruction I built this analysis from the references already collected on the patent page's Prior Art section (the "Patent Citations (21)," "Non-Patent Citations (17)," and the references discussed in the Background of the specification). I independently retrieved the full text or abstract of the load-bearing references to confirm what they actually teach; where I could not verify content, I say so. I do not repeat the claim summary or litigation summary from the prior sections.

Date inconsistency (flagged, carried forward). The task header says April 26, 2026; this session's header says September 13, 2026; the authoritative patent fetch is stamped 2026‑09‑08 and its litigation feed contains September 2026 dockets. The prior sections flagged this and could not reconcile it. It does not affect this analysis, because the §103 critical date is fixed at January 13, 2003 (pre‑AIA application). Everything below turns on art published before that date.

1. Legal frame and claim construction predicates

• Pre-AIA § 103(a) governs. Prior-art status is assessed under pre-AIA §§ 102(a),(b),(e). "Prior art" below means art qualifying before 2003‑01‑13.
• POSITA: a bachelor's in EE/CS (or equivalent) plus 2–4 years in wireless LAN/home networking, familiar with IEEE 802.11 authentication/association, WEP/shared-key authentication, Bluetooth inquiry/pairing, and access-point administration. All references are in this field; there is no analogous-art dispute (and two of the key references are cited inside the '807 specification itself, which is near-conclusive evidence the inventor regarded them as the pertinent field).
• Order of steps: Claim 1 recites "powering on the wireless device; activating a time interval" in that order. Under Interactive Gift Express/Altiris, method steps are not limited to the recited order absent language or logic requiring it. Claim 1 therefore covers the Fig. 3 sequence (device first) and the Fig. 4 sequence (activation first) — which matters, because the examining attorney's ability to distinguish on sequence is gone.
• Means-plus-function: Claim 59's "means for provisioning access" triggers § 112(f). Corresponding structure from Fig. 2 is access point network componentry 36/40 plus time-based provisioning logic 44. A § 103 mapping therefore needs only equivalent structure at the access point.

2. Prior-art status of the references actually on the page

Non-art on the page (important): the HP/CNET piece (2003‑10‑13), GeekZone "Microsoft Announces Wireless Provisioning Services" (2003‑12‑10), "Wireless Provisioning Services Overview," The Cable Guy (Dec. 2003), the Sony Ericsson HBH‑65 manual (Aug. 2003), and the 2004 Microsoft TechNet item all post-date 2003‑01‑13. They cannot be § 102(a)/(b) art to this application, and none is a US application/patent, so § 102(e) does not reach them either. They were apparently placed in the examiner's NPL list for context. They should not be relied on in any § 103 ground, and using them invites a collateral attack on the ground. My grounds below deliberately exclude them — which is also proof the ground does not need them.

3. The pivot: what Kimura alone supplies

I verified Kimura's disclosure directly. US 2001/0048744 A1 / EP 1 161 031 A2 (Kimura, Sharp) discloses an access point device 18 comprising radio communication processing means 12 + antenna 19, network interface means 14 to wired networks 7, authentication/association processing means 13, authentication request display means 16 (notifies the LAN administrator), and authentication input means 15 ("button or other physical human inputs").

Its operation, verbatim-grounded: the mobile station "is turned on or otherwise operated to send to the access point device 18 an authentication request message 1 for initiating the authentication procedure by the Shared Key Authentication method" (IEEE 802.11). The AP then "start[s] an authentication wait timer set at an arbitrary time," notifies the administrator, and waits. If the administrator "input[s] an authentication authorization before the timeout of the authentication wait timer," the AP sends the authorization and the station proceeds to association; if the timer times out first, the AP "send[s] the authentication response message 2 that indicates the authentication rejection automatically." Kimura also states the interval can be "arbitrarily determined by the network-administering user."

So Kimura is a user-actuated provisioning gate bounded by a selectively-timed window with automatic denial on expiry, in an 802.11 WLAN. That is nearly the whole architecture of the '807 claims. The residual delta is narrow and specific: whose event the window is measured against and what is being measured — '807 measures the device's power-on / onset-of-transmission against a window; Kimura measures the administrator's button press against a window opened when the device's request arrives.

Claim 59 is the most exposed, because it recites only "a received input signal" — not a power-on or transmission onset. On the broadest reasonable reading, Kimura's authentication request message 1 is a "received input signal," the authentication wait timer is the "time-based interval," and the auth/association processing means is the "means for provisioning access." Claim 59 is arguably anticipated by Kimura, and at minimum obvious. Its breadth is a drafting vulnerability, not a strength.

4. Combination 1 (primary ground) — Kimura + US 6,317,594 (Openwave)

Targets: independent claims 1, 17, 33, 46, 59.

Why a POSITA would combine them. Four independent, documented motivations:

1. Same node, same function. Openwave's detection is performed by the network infrastructure — the same network-side element that performs Kimura's authorization. Combining is a reconfiguration within one box, not an architectural change (KSR rationale A: known elements combined by known methods, predictable result).
2. The problem was already articulated in the art, not by the inventor. WO 01/22661 says "For a home environment, a more automatic authentication procedure is desirable. The interface with the user should be as simple as possible," and EP 1 191 763 expressly touts accessing a WLAN "without the user needing to provide, for example, a MAC address." That is exactly the '807 Background's stated problem. Where the art itself identifies the deficiency and the direction of the fix, the fix is obvious.
3. Kimura's own notification burden creates the design incentive. Kimura requires the administrator to identify and act on a specific requesting station. Using the device's own power-on as the measured event collapses that step to a single button press, and simultaneously solves a problem Kimura does not solve: rejecting devices that have been resident/active for a long time (e.g., a neighbor's AP client). This is KSR rationale C/D — known technique (timer-bounded user authorization) applied to a known device ready for improvement.
4. Security pressure. Candolin (2000‑10‑23) states Bluetooth security is "too weak to be used for anything else than for personal purposes," and Aziz & Diffie address WLAN authentication generally. A POSITA would tighten enrollment, and a short window keyed to a device's cold-start is the tightest low-cost gate available.

Verdict: claims 1, 17, 33, 46, 59 obvious; claim 59 additionally at serious anticipation risk from Kimura alone.

5. Combination 2 — Kimura + US 6,282,183 (Harris et al.)

Targets: claims 1, 17, 33, 46, 59; especially claim 17's "tracking operation."

Harris discloses authorizing a coupling between devices via an authorization key and a beacon message periodically transmitted on device activation, where coupling occurs only within about five meters, and — critically — claim 12: "resetting an internal timer in the first peer prior to the first peer establishing the method of communicating between the first peer and the second peer," claim 13: "determining that the first peer has a timer expired message pending as a result of the internal timer … timing out … executing a timer expired process."

That is a time-limited authorization/coupling protocol for a short-range wireless network, with an affirmative timeout action. Combined with Kimura's AP-side user-actuated authorization window, claim 17's dual requirement — "logic for tracking operation of the wireless device" plus "logic for provisioning … if the operation … occurs within an activatible time interval" — is fully met. Motivation: both are directed to authorizing a newly encountered wireless device into a local network using a transient, time-bounded invitation; Harris contributes the tracking/timer element, Kimura the AP-side button and the provisioning output. Both are Motorola/Sharp-class wireless networking art, and a POSITA seeking to gate enrollment would consult both (KSR rationale B, substitution of a known temporal-gate element).

6. Combination 3 — Combinations 1 or 2 + WO 01/22661 (+ EP 1 081 895) for the dependent claims

Targets: claims 9–15, 25–32, 39–45, 52–58, 65–71 (access control list; MAC-address device identifier; key material; encrypted connection; peer-to-peer connection).

WO 01/22661 discloses the complete provisioning output: the device sends an identification code, the AP verifies it, and if positive the AP "send[s] an authentication key from said access point to said device," the device storing it "for use in authentication procedures." That is "communicating the device identifier to the access point" (cl. 14, 43, 56, 69), "storing a MAC address" (12, 28, 40, 53), "communication of an access control list" (13, 29, 42, 55, 68), and the ACL augmentation of Fig. 7. EP 1 081 895 supplies the "encrypted connection" limitation (cl. 15, 30, 31, 44, 57, 70) via air-channel authentication. For peer-to-peer provisioning (cl. 16, 32, 45, 58, 71), US 6,058,106 (Cudak) supplies AP-coordinated peer-to-peer communication. Motivation is express in WO 01/22661's own text (home-network automatic installation, simple user interface) and in Kimura's shared-key/association framework.

Claim 46's "onset of transmission" and the addressable timing art. US 5,461,627 (Rypinski) and the Bluetooth NPL (Candolin; Cypher, "Painting Your Home Blue"; Shepherd) establish that a wireless device announces/inquires/transmits upon power-up — so "transmission … begins during the interval" is a detected physical event, not a new concept.

7. Motivation-to-combine catalog (restated by KSR rationale)

• (A) Known elements, known method, predictable result — AP + receiver + authorization logic + timer.
• (B) Substitution of a known element — Kimura's administrator-response timer ↔ a device-power-on-referenced timer; both are timers gating authorization at the same node.
• (C) Known technique improving a similar device the same way — a short enrollment window.
• (D) Known device ready for improvement — Kimura's own notification step creates the incentive to eliminate per-device identification.
• (E) Obvious to try — the window length is a finite, identified, predictable set of solutions (seconds to minutes; the spec itself recites "such as within 5 minutes" / "a 5 minute interval").
• (F) Problem identified in the art — WO 01/22661 and EP 1 191 763 independently state the no-UI/no-MAC-entry problem and the desirability of automation.
• (G) Design incentives/market forces — consumer home networking adoption of 802.11 and Bluetooth (the home-network NPL corpus).

Range optimization. The "5 minute" numeral and the "designated time interval" are results-effective variables. Under In re Aller / In re Boesch (MPEP 2144.04), selecting a working range by routine experimentation is obvious absent a showing that the criticality of the range is unexpected. The '807 specification offers no comparative data — only the conclusory assertion of "more than reasonable levels of security."

8. Foreseeable counterarguments, and responses

1. "Kimura teaches away — the administrator must see who is requesting." Kimura's stated improvement is that the admin can see the requester before authorizing. Response: the operative gate in Kimura is the timer, and the notification is a display output; the '807 specification treats notification as optional. Moreoever, WO 01/22661 and EP 1 191 763 both push in the direction of less user involvement, so the art as a whole does not discourage an identity-agnostic time window. In re Fulton/In re Gurley teach-away requires a teaching that the alternative would not work or a criticism of it — absent here.
2. "The point of novelty is detecting power-on/transmission onset at the AP." Response: Openwave '594 expressly detects "origination, status, registration or other activity" at the network; Bluetooth NPL teaches the device transmits on power-up. Detection of a device's cold start is an old, known signal.
3. "Different sub-fields (cellular WIN vs. home WLAN)." Response: Kimura is directly 802.11 WLAN, and '594 was cited in the '807 Background by the inventors themselves — the strongest possible admission of analogous art.
4. "The examiner had Kimura and allowed the claims." This is the strongest practical counterpoint and it is real: Kimura, WO 01/22661, EP 1 081 895, EP 1 191 763, US 6,282,183 and Cohen appear among the examiner-cited references. But it suggests the examiner read Kimura for 802.11 shared-key authentication and did not appreciate the authentication-wait-timer/user-actuation teaching, which sits in Kimura's specification (steps S30–S34) rather than in its claims. That is precisely the kind of examiner oversight a § 103 ground is designed to exploit — and it must be presented with a full claim chart, not a citation list.

9. Secondary considerations (Graham)

• Long-felt need / failure of others: favors obviousness. The need is documented by the prior art itself (WO 01/22661; EP 1 191 763), and those references were actively solving it before the '807 filing date. The need was neither unrecognized nor unsolved.
• Unexpected results: none asserted. No data in the specification.
• Commercial success: weak, and lacking nexus here. The commercial activity around this patent is a licensing/assertion campaign (CommWorks Solutions) mapped onto third-party WPS functionality, which the prior sections establish post-dates the 2003 priority date. Licensing revenue extracted by a non-practicing successor is generally accorded little weight absent a nexus between the claimed invention and marketplace success. WPS's later adoption of a 2‑minute push-button enrollment window is better framed as evidence that the design was the natural, near-inevitable choice — i.e., supporting obviousness — than as a nexus to the '807 claims.
• Copying: none shown.

10. Claim-by-claim conclusion

Overall: Every independent claim is vulnerable. Claim 59 is the weakest link — broad enough that Kimura alone may anticipate it, and clearly obvious over Kimura in view of the art's own stated desire for automatic, MAC-address-free enrollment. Claims 1/33 and 46 fall to Kimura + '594; claim 17 to Kimura + '183 (with or without '594).

11. Practical posture and what I could not verify

• The patent is Expired – Lifetime (adjusted expiration 2023‑04‑17). A § 103 challenge today is therefore almost certainly a district-court invalidity defense in the co-pending CommWorks actions (prior sections catalogued these), not an IPR filed at the PTAB in the ordinary course. Any surviving recovery is limited to pre-expiration past damages, which makes the accused WPS-function mapping and the 2003 critical date the two battlegrounds — and the grounds above attack both directly.
• I could not retrieve the file wrapper / office actions (no USPTO Patent Center or PACER access in this pass). Accordingly I cannot state with certainty which references the examiner actually applied, or on what reasoning, only which appear in the "cited by examiner" lists. Treat the "examiner had Kimura" counterpoint in § 8 as a reasoned inference, not a verified prosecution-history fact.
• I did not independently verify the full text of EP 1 081 895, US 5,461,627, US 6,275,693, US 6,058,106, or the home-network NPL papers; for those I relied on the patent's own characterizations plus their titles and bibliographic records. The combinations above do not depend on those references for the core independent-claim analysis — they are used only for dependent-claim/device-type and secondary motivation support.

Sources: https://patents.google.com/patent/US6891807/en (fetched 2026‑09‑08) · https://patents.google.com/patent/US20010048744A1/en · https://uspto.report/patent/app/20010048744 · https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/fd/9b/3d/07433280dcae9b/EP1161031A3.pdf · https://patents.google.com/patent/[US6317594B1](/patent/US6317594B1)/en · https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/ad/f2/9d/a25d50a86491a7/US6282183.pdf · https://data.epo.org/gpi/EP1214829B1 · https://patents.google.com/patent/WO2001022661A2 · https://patents.google.com/patent/EP1191763B1/en · https://www.freepatentsonline.com/[7702915](/patent/7702915).html