US 8078436

I'll verify this against live sources before summarizing.

Key live finding: the CAFC ruled on this patent in February 2026. Let me pull the actual claim text and the current docket status.

Let me retrieve the actual claim set for the '436 patent (including the 2014 reexamination certificate).

US 8,078,436 — Verification Summary

Scope note on method: I could not directly query USPTO PatentCenter/PAIR or PACER/CAFC docket APIs in this session. The findings below come from Google Patents (including the full patent text you supplied), CourtListener, FreePatentsOnline/RPX, and IPWatchdog/Fed Circuit Blog reporting. Where a fact rests on a single secondary source, I say so.

1. Bibliographic data (US 8,078,436 B2)

Important discrepancy to flag: the Google Patents page you supplied shows the legal status as "Active." That status line appears stale. Live sources show a February 2026 Federal Circuit affirmance holding the bulk of these claims unpatentable (details in §4). I have not been able to confirm whether the USPTO has yet issued certificates of cancellation for the affirmed claims — treat the "active" designation as unreliable until a cancellation certificate is verified.

2. Abstract (verbatim)

"Methods and systems for roof estimation are described. Example embodiments include a roof estimation system, which generates and provides roof estimate reports annotated with indications of the size, geometry, pitch and/or orientation of the roof sections of a building. Generating a roof estimate report may be based on one or more aerial images of a building. In some embodiments, generating a roof estimate report of a specified building roof may include generating a three-dimensional model of the roof, and generating a report that includes one or more views of the three-dimensional model, the views annotated with indications of the dimensions, area, and/or slope of sections of the roof."

3. Technology overview

The '436 patent is the foundational disclosure in EagleView's aerial-measurement family (both '436 and '961 share a common specification). The workflow claimed is: geocode a street address → retrieve aerial/satellite imagery (top-plan plus oblique) → calibrate at least one image → correlate/co-register reference points across images → photogrammetrically triangulate into a 3D roof model of planar roof sections (each with slope, area, edge lengths, ridge/valley attributes) → generate and transmit an annotated report (FIG. 5A–5F show pages annotated with dimensions, pitch, and square footage). Notably, the specification expressly defines "aerial images" to include ground-based platforms (street-view vehicles, towers, nearby buildings, hilltops) — a definition that became decisive in the 2026 appeal.

4. Prosecution, PTAB, and CAFC history (the part that matters now)

• Ex parte reexamination → US 8,078,436 C1, August 27, 2014. The enforceable claim text is the reexamination certificate version, which added the limitation that the first image is a top plan view and the second an oblique perspective view, and that the images "are not a stereoscopic pair."
• IPR2016-00582 and IPR2016-01775 (Unified Patents) — not instituted (procedural).
• IPR2017-00021 (Xactware Solutions) — not instituted (merits). Exhibit 1002 in that proceeding is the Ex Parte Reexamination Certificate for 8,078,436.
• IPR2022-01090 (Nearmap US, Inc.), filed June 1, 2022; instituted January 12, 2023; Final Written Decision January 9, 2024, holding claims 1–42 and 46–66 unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) over Littleworth + Linder + Middlebrook. Claims 43–45 were not part of the challenge.
• CAFC Nos. 2024-1488 & 2024-1549 — Eagle View Technologies, Inc. v. Nearmap US, Inc., decided February 3, 2026 (nonprecedential), AFFIRMED (Moore, C.J.; Chen and Stark, JJ.; opinion by Chen). The court held that "calculate" and "determining" carry no accuracy requirement and encompass estimation/approximation, and that substantial evidence supported the obviousness combination.
• D. Utah 2:21-cv-00283 (EagleView/Pictometry v. Nearmap) was stayed August 25, 2025 pending the PTAB/CAFC proceedings; a settlement announced May 28, 2026 is reported by one secondary source (scalejuris.com) — treat that settlement report as unconfirmed.
• The patent's own litigation record also lists D.N.J. 1:15-cv-07025 and 2:15-cv-07025 (Xactware), D. Utah 2:22-cv-00215 (GAF Materials), W.D. Wash. 2:12-cv-00618 and 2:12-cv-00544, and CAFC 21-1048, 21-1049, 21-1743.

Sources: Fed Circuit Blog, Feb. 3, 2026 · CourtListener combined opinion · IPWatchdog · IPR2022-01090 case page

5. Independent claims — plain language

Caveat: Google Patents' rendering of this patent truncated before the claims section, so I reconstructed the independents from (a) the CAFC opinion, (b) the C1 certificate excerpted in the D.N.J. 1:15-cv-07025 record, and (c) the 2:22-cv-00215 complaint analysis. I am confident about claims 1, 18, 36, and 58; I cannot rule out that an additional independent claim exists elsewhere in the 66-claim set.

Claim 1 — Computing system (independent).
A computing system for generating a roof estimate report, comprising a memory and a roof estimation module stored on the memory and configured, when executed, to:

1. receive a first and a second aerial image of a building having a roof, each image providing a different view of the roof — with the C1 amendment specifying the first is a top plan view and the second an oblique perspective view, and that they are not a stereoscopic pair;
2. correlate the first image with the second image;
3. generate, based at least in part on that correlation, a three-dimensional model of the roof comprising a plurality of planar roof sections, each having a corresponding slope, area, and edges; and
4. generate and transmit a roof estimate report containing one or more top plan views of the 3D model, annotated with numerical values indicating the corresponding slope, area, and edge length of at least some of the roof sections, using at least two different indicia for different types of roof properties.

Plain English: Put a 3D roof model together from two different aerial shots (an overhead one plus an angled one that aren't a matched stereo pair), then mail out a top-down drawing of that model with numbers on it, using at least two different visual conventions (e.g., color, line style) to distinguish different roof features like ridges vs. valleys.

Claim 18 — Method (independent, inferred). A method claim covering the same operational sequence: receiving the different-view aerial images, correlating them, generating the 3D model of planar roof sections, and generating/transmitting the annotated roof estimate report. (Dependent claim 20 adds that correlating includes "receiving an indication of one or more corresponding points shown in each of the first and second aerial images"; dependent claim 31 adds that the two indicia include one color of line associated with a ridge and a different color of line associated with a valley.)

Claim 36 — Non-transitory computer-readable storage medium (independent, inferred). Same substance as claim 1, but claimed as a storage medium storing instructions that, when executed, perform the image-receipt → correlation → 3D model → annotated report steps. (Dependent claim 37 recites valley-property indicia; claims 38+ recite ridge/valley color conventions such as ridge = red. Claims 43–45 sit in this block and were the only claims not held unpatentable in IPR2022-01090.)

Claim 58 — Method (independent, inferred). A method emphasizing ridge/valley identification and color-coded display: determining a ridge line and a valley line of the roof, and displaying on at least one top plan view the ridge line in a first color and the valley line in a second, different color, so that the ridge-ness or valley-ness of each line is conveyed by its color. (Dependent claim 59 recites the ridge/valley color-indicia feature explicitly.)

6. Uncertainty and open items

1. Current claim status. The Feb. 3, 2026 CAFC decision affirmed unpatentability of claims 1–42 and 46–66. I could not verify whether certificates of cancellation have issued, whether EagleView sought en banc or Supreme Court review, or how the 2:21-cv-00283 settlement interacts with the judgment. The "Active" status on the page you supplied conflicts with this and should not be relied on.
2. Claim text provenance. The C1 (reexamination) text is the operative version. Whether the original B2 claim 1 lacked the "not a stereoscopic pair" limitation is something I could not confirm from a primary document — the CAFC opinion cites the '436 claim 1 for that language, and the GAF complaint reproduces it, but I did not inspect the pre-reexam file history.
3. Independent claim set. Claims 18, 36, and 58 are identified as bases of dependent claims in litigation exhibits; I did not obtain a verbatim full claim listing, so an additional independent claim cannot be excluded.
4. Terminal disclaimer / adjusted expiration. The listed 2029-10-01 adjusted expiration implies PTA or a terminal disclaimer; I did not verify which, and it is moot if the claims are cancelled.
5. Number format. Per your instruction I have not altered any identifier. The number you gave (8078436) and US 8,078,436 B2 / C1 refer to the same patent; 8,670,961 (commonly cited alongside it, including in IPR2022-01009) is a different patent in the same family and is not the subject of this summary.

I'll research litigation involving US patent 8078436. Let me start with targeted searches.

Let me gather more details on the specific cases and their outcomes.

I have substantial information. Let me do one more targeted search to pin down the Federal Circuit appeals and the remaining district court cases.

I'll research the PTAB proceedings on this patent before drafting.

Now let me dig into the 2022 proceeding and its appeal, plus check for any other challenges.

I'll verify what's available before assembling the record.

Assignment Record Reconstruction — US 8078436 B2

Analyst caveat up front (read before relying on any line below). The USPTO Assignment Center (assignmentcenter.uspto.gov) and its older mirror (assignment.uspto.gov) were not reachable for a reel/frame pull in this session. Every date, assignor and assignee below is drawn from the Google Patents "Legal Events / Reassignment" record for US 8078436, which mirrors the underlying USPTO assignment filings but does not expose reel/frame numbers or the correspondent-of-record field in the fetched page. I searched for the reel/frame strings and could not retrieve them. No reel/frame identifiers are asserted in this memo, and the correspondent analysis — the single most important tell in your brief — is therefore incomplete by data availability, not by absence of records.

Inventors

Pattern notes. No unusual inventor pattern is evident: both named inventors assigned to the original assignee and no inventor-related conveyance (e.g., a later inventor-to-LLC assignment) appears anywhere in the chain. There is no evidence in the record that either inventor departed the assignee within 12 months of filing, and I will not infer one. The application itself is a continuation-in-part of 12/148,439 (filed 2008-04-17), which claims benefit of provisional 60/925,072 (filed 2007-04-17) — hence the 2007-04-17 priority date despite the 2008-10-16 filing date. Continuity filings later spun out of this family (14/195,543, 15/345,358, 15/898,399) indicate the inventors stayed with the technology rather than exiting early. Confidence on inventor employer: moderate — the assignor identity is documented; the job title is not part of the assignment record.

Original assignee

EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC. (recorded as "EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC."; the patent face and SumoBrain list the assignee address as Redmond, WA; Google Patents now displays the owner as EagleView Technologies Inc).

• Line of business: aerial imagery acquisition and automated aerial roof measurement / property analytics — roof dimension and pitch reports used by roofing contractors, insurance carriers, and solar installers. This is squarely the commercial embodiment of the claims: the specification's FIGS. 5A–5F report pages (edge dimensions, per-section pitch, per-section square footage, wide-angle access/clean-up views) are the product itself.
• Did they ship a product embodying the claims? Yes. Roof measurement reports annotated with per-section slope, area and edge lengths — the exact claim-adjacent output described in the specification — are EagleView's core commercial offering.
• Current status: Operating, privately held. EagleView is a Vista Equity Partners portfolio company; since 2015 it has operated alongside Pictometry International Corp. and (at times) OmniEarth, Inc., all three of which appear in the security- interest recordings below as co-obligors. No dissolution, Chapter 7/11, or assignment-for-the-benefit-of-creditors event appears in the record.

Naming inconsistency worth flagging: the record alternates between "EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC." (2009, 2015, 2018 assignor entries) and "EagleView Technologies Inc" (Google Patents current-assignee field), and the corporate parent is referred to elsewhere as EagleView Technology Corporation. No recorded change-of-name assignment appears in the file. I cannot confirm whether that equivalency was ever papered with the USPTO; treat it as an unresolved entity-name question, not as a chain-of-title break I have verified.

Assignment timeline

All entries below are recordings visible in the Google Patents legal-events record for US 8078436. Reel/frame numbers were not retrievable and are marked "not retrieved." The USPTO records security interests as "assignments" of a lien — they do not convey title — which matters enormously for the NPE analysis. Correspondent-of-record was likewise not exposed in the fetched record.

• 2009-01-29 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: Assignment of assignors' interest
  • Assignor: CARLSON, DAVID P.; PERSHING, CHRIS (the two named inventors)
  • Assignee: EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
  • Correspondent: not retrieved — flag: this is the only recording in the entire chain where the correspondent is likely company-side patent counsel rather than lender-side counsel. It is the entry you most want to pull from Assignment Center.
  • Context: Original inventor-to-company assignment at formation of title.

• 2015-07-20 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: Security Agreement — FIRST LIEN PATENT SECURITY AGREEMENT
  • Assignor: EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC.; PICTOMETRY INTERNATIONAL CORP.
  • Assignee: MORGAN STANLEY SENIOR FUNDING, INC.
  • Correspondent: not retrieved — flag: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding recurs in this chain, so a repeat lender-side correspondent is likely across three entries; that is a financing relationship, not an NPE repeat-player attorney.
  • Context: Securitization — collateral pledge supporting EagleView's 2015 acquisition/combination with Pictometry International.

• 2015-07-20 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: Security Agreement — SECOND LIEN PATENT SECURITY AGREEMENT
  • Assignor: EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC.; PICTOMETRY INTERNATIONAL CORP.
  • Assignee: MORGAN STANLEY SENIOR FUNDING, INC.
  • Correspondent: not retrieved
  • Context: Securitization — junior tranche of the same July 2015 credit facility.

• 2017-09-22 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: RELEASE OF SECOND LIEN SECURITY INTEREST
  • Assignor: MORGAN STANLEY SENIOR FUNDING, INC.
  • Assignee/beneficiary: PICTOMETRY INTERNATIONAL CORP.; EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC.; OMNIEARTH, INC.
  • Correspondent: not retrieved
  • Context: Securitization unwind — lien release on the second lien; consistent with payoff/refinancing, not with a fire-sale.

• 2018-08-14 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: Security Agreement — SECOND LIEN PATENT SECURITY AGREEMENT
  • Assignor: EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
  • Assignee: HPS INVESTMENT PARTNERS, LLC
  • Correspondent: not retrieved
  • Context: Securitization — new junior-lien lender replacing/refinancing the 2015 second lien.

• 2018-08-23 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: Security Agreement — FIRST LIEN PATENT SECURITY AGREEMENT
  • Assignor: EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
  • Assignee: MORGAN STANLEY SENIOR FUNDING, INC., AS COLLATERAL AGENT
  • Correspondent: not retrieved — flag: third appearance of Morgan Stanley Senior Funding as recorded assignee (2015 ×2, 2018, then 2025), i.e., a recurring secured party across 10 years.
  • Context: Securitization — restated senior facility.

• 2018-08-29 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: RELEASE OF FIRST LIEN SECURITY INTEREST IN PATENTS
  • Assignor: MORGAN STANLEY SENIOR FUNDING, INC., AS COLLATERAL AGENT
  • Assignee/beneficiary: PICTOMETRY INTERNATIONAL CORP.; OMNIEARTH, INC.; EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
  • Correspondent: not retrieved
  • Context: Securitization unwind — superseded 2015 first lien released six days after the 2018 restatement.

• 2025-03-28 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: Security Agreement — FIRST LIEN PATENT SECURITY AGREEMENT
  • Assignor: EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC.; PICTOMETRY INTERNATIONAL CORP.
  • Assignee: MORGAN STANLEY SENIOR FUNDING, INC.
  • Correspondent: not retrieved
  • Context: Securitization — 2025 refinancing, same senior lender.

• 2025-04-09 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: RELEASE OF FIRST LIEN SECURITY INTEREST IN PATENTS
  • Assignor: MORGAN STANLEY SENIOR FUNDING, INC.
  • Assignee/beneficiary: EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC.; PICTOMETRY INTERNATIONAL CORP.; OMNIEARTH, INC.
  • Correspondent: not retrieved
  • Context: Securitization unwind — first lien discharged within two weeks of the March 2025 grant.

• 2025-04-14 (recorded) — Reel not retrieved

  • Conveyance: RELEASE BY SECURED PARTY
  • Assignor: HPS INVESTMENT PARTNERS, LLC
  • Assignee/beneficiary: EAGLE VIEW TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
  • Correspondent: not retrieved
  • Context: Securitization unwind — 2018 HPS second lien discharged, completing the 2025 debt payoff/refinancing.

Bottom line of the timeline: across seventeen years and ten recordings, title never left the EagleView/Pictometry operating group. Every third-party entry is either a lender taking a lien or the same lender releasing it. There is no sale, no LLC purchaser, no assignment-for-value to a non-operating entity.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 8078436
    2007 : Priority date from provisional
    2008 : Application filed by Eagle View Technologies
    2009 : Inventors assign to Eagle View Technologies
    2011 : Patent issued
    2015 : First and second lien to Morgan Stanley
         : EagleView combines with Pictometry
    2017 : Second lien released
    2018 : New liens to HPS and Morgan Stanley
         : Prior liens released
    2025 : Refinancing liens granted and released

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — NOT PRESENT. No conveying instrument moves title from the operating assignee to a licensing-only vehicle. The assignee names in every recording are operating companies (Eagle View Technologies, Pictometry International, OmniEarth) and financial institutions (Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, HPS Investment Partners). No "IP," "Patents," "Licensing," "Holdings," or "Ventures" suffix appears. Critically, the 2015, 2018 and 2025 entries are security agreements, which the USPTO indexes alongside assignments but which convey a security interest, not ownership — a distinction that is the single most common source of false-positive NPE flagging in Assignment Center data.

2. Known asserter in the chain — NOT PRESENT. No assignee or assignor matches Acacia Research, Marathon Patent Group, Intellectual Ventures, IPNav, Wi-LAN, Mosaid/Conversant, Vringo, Pendrell, Innovatio IP Ventures, MPHJ, Lumen View, Round Rock, Document Generation Corp, or any Spangenberg-linked entity. The three recurring names — EagleView, Pictometry, Morgan Stanley Senior Funding — are, respectively, an operating imagery company, its operating subsidiary/sister company, and a bank acting as collateral agent.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — UNRESOLVED (data gap). The correspondent-of-record field was not retrievable for this patent from the sources accessible in this session. I am therefore unable to confirm or exclude a recurring recording attorney. What is observable is a recurring counterparty: Morgan Stanley Senior Funding, Inc. appears as recorded assignee in 2015 (twice), 2018, and 2025. That is a lender relationship and must not be miscoded as the "same lawyer running multiple shells" pattern — the shell LLCs in a genuine NPE chain are usually different names sharing one attorney; here the repeated name is a single regulated financial institution across a decade of refinancings. To close this signal, pull the correspondent field for all ten recordings from https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ and check whether the 2009 inventor-assignment correspondent differs from the lender-side correspondent on the 2015/2018/2025 entries.

4. Cascading transfers — NOT PRESENT. There are multiple recordings within short windows (two on 2015-07-20; three across 2018-08-14/23/29; three across 2025-03-28/04-09/04-14), but the pattern is grant-then-release of liens held by a single lender, not transfers of title through chained LLCs. No two assignees in the chain share a correspondent address or a common principal as far as the record shows, because no two assignees are shells. The 2017-09-22 release followed by the 2018-08-14 and 2018-08-23 grants is a textbook refinancing sequence, not a cascade.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — NOT PRESENT. Title remained with the EagleView group at all times. Moreover, litigation naming this family predates the earliest security interest by roughly three years: the W.D. Wash. cases 2:12-cv-00544 and 2:12-cv-00618 were filed in 2012, whereas the first Morgan Stanley lien was recorded 2015-07-20. A chain arranged to enable assertion would show the opposite ordering. The D.N.J. case 1:15-cv-07025 (Sept. 2015) does fall within ~2 months of the July 2015 lien, but the lien is collateral for the Pictometry combination, and the patent had already been asserted for three years beforehand.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — NOT PRESENT on the record. No Chapter 7/11 conveyance, no bankruptcy-court sale order, no "Assignee: [purchaser]" entry in the Kodak/Nortel/Polaroid mold. The 2017 and 2025 releases are lien discharges. I note candidly that a release of lien does not itself establish solvency — the 2025 sequence (grant 2025-03-28, release 2025-04-09, release-by-secured-party 2025-04-14) could reflect a payoff, a refinancing with a new lender, or a recapitalization. I have no evidence of insolvency and am not asserting one; the point is only that the record is silent rather than exculpatory.

7. Privateering — NOT PRESENT. Privateering requires the operating company to transfer the patent to a third-party asserter. Here the operating company is the plaintiff itself: EagleView litigates in its own name across W.D. Wash. (2012), D.N.J. (2015, 2021), D. Utah (2022), with Federal Circuit appeals 21-1048, 21-1049, 21-1743, 24-1549. Those appeals trace to litigation against Xactware Solutions — a Verisk Analytics business and a direct competitor in insurance-claims imagery and estimating. Suing an actual competitor in your own name over your own patent is the definitional opposite of privateering.

8. Defensive aggregator — NOT PRESENT. The chain does not terminate at RPX, AST, LOT Network, Unified Patents, or OIN. It terminates at EagleView Technologies, Inc., which continues to hold and to assert. Note the mirror-image evidence: Unified Patents filed IPR2016-00582, IPR2016-01775 and IPR2017-00021 against this family (all not instituted), and IPR2022-01090 reached a Final Written Decision. A defensive aggregator challenging a patent is evidence the patent is being asserted by a practicing entity — the inverse of the aggregator owning it.

Verdict

Operating-company assertion.

EagleView Technologies holds title continuously from the 2009-01-29 inventor assignment onward; every third-party recording in the chain is a lien grant or lien release by Morgan Stanley Senior Funding (2015-07-20 ×2, 2018-08-23, 2025-03-28; releases 2017-09-22, 2018-08-29, 2025-04-09) or by HPS Investment Partners (2018-08-14; release 2025-04-14) — securitizations, not transfers of title. The assignee ships products embodying the claims (annotated aerial roof measurement reports of the FIGS. 5A–5F type) and has sued a genuine competitor, Xactware Solutions/Verisk, in its own name since 2012 — litigation that predates the earliest security interest, which rules out the pre-litigation-transfer signal. The single unresolved signal is the repeat-correspondent check, which could not be completed because reel/frame and correspondent fields were not retrievable; that is a documentation gap, not evidence of an NPE pattern.

Verification links:

• USPTO Assignment Center (search patent number 8078436): https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/
• Legacy mirror: https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html
• Google Patents legal events / reassignment record: https://patents.google.com/patent/US8078436/en
• Unified Patents asserter/litigation record for this family: https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/[ptab](/ptab)/case/IPR2022-01090
• D.N.J. litigation record: https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/New%20Jersey%20District%20Court/case/1%3A15-cv-07025

What I could not confirm and would not report as fact: all reel/frame numbers, all correspondent-of-record entries, the execution dates as distinct from recording dates, and whether the "Eagle View Technologies, Inc." → "EagleView Technologies Inc" naming was ever papered as a change of name.

I'll research US patent 8078436 and its prior art citations.

Let me get the specific "Patent Citations" section listed on the face of US 8,078,436.

Let me get the full reference list from the Justia/Google Patents page for this specific patent.

Prior-Art Analysis — US 8,078,436 B2

"Aerial Roof Estimation Systems and Methods"

• Patent No.: US 8,078,436 B2 · Appl. No. 12/253,092 · Filed 2008‑10‑16 · Granted 2011‑12‑13
• Inventors: Chris Pershing (Bellevue, WA); David P. Carlson (Woodinville, WA)
• Original/Current Assignee: EagleView Technologies, Inc.
• Priority: CIP of US 12/148,439 (filed 2008‑04‑17), which claims benefit of provisional 60/925,072 (filed 2007‑04‑17). Google Patents lists the priority date as 2007‑04‑17 on the US family page but as 2007‑04‑16 on the Unified Patents family view — I report both literally rather than reconciling them.
• Classification: G06T 17/10; G06F 30/13; G06Q 30/0283; G06T 11/60 · Adjusted expiration indicated as 2029‑10‑01.

Important caveat on claim mapping. The authoritative text supplied to me reproduces the abstract, summary, description and figures of US 8,078,436, but not the numbered claims. I therefore cannot quote claim language verbatim from the record in front of me, and claim numbers below should be treated as best‑effort, provisional mappings keyed to the subject matter the specification itself labels as the claimed invention (routines 800/900, the FIG. 6/7 engine architecture, and the Steps a–e method). Google Patents' "prior‑art keywords" for this patent — roof, different, indicia, valley, line — indicate the claims recite terms such as "different" views and "indicia," which is consistent with the mapping I use. Any mapping must be re‑verified against the issued claim set before being relied on.

1. Prosecution / validity context

These matter because the citations below were the examiner's front‑page references, but the substantive §102/§103 fights occurred elsewhere:

• Ex parte reexamination 96/000,004 → Ex Parte Reexamination Certificate (11th), US 8,078,436 C1, issued 2014‑08‑27 (claims confirmed/added after reexam).
• PTAB: IPR2016‑00582 (Not Instituted – Procedural), IPR2016‑01775 (Not Instituted – Procedural), IPR2017‑00021 (Not Instituted – Merits), all by Xactware Solutions, Inc. v. EagleView Technologies, Inc. — note that not instituted on procedural grounds is not a merits validation of the claims.
• Litigation: D.N.J. 1:15‑cv‑07025 and 2:15‑cv‑07025; D. Utah 2:22‑cv‑00215; W.D. Wash. 2:12‑cv‑00544 and 2:12‑cv‑00618; Fed. Cir. 21‑1048, 21‑1049, 21‑1743, 24‑1549; PTAB IPR2022‑01090 (Final Written Decision).
• A Declaration of Harold Schuch (Feb. 5, 2016) was submitted in the IPR of this patent, showing that the economically significant art was largely printed publications / prior systems rather than the front‑page patents.

2. U.S. patent documents cited on the face of US 8,078,436

Below, "Pub. date" is the grant/publication date listed for the reference; I flag where a filing date is uncertain rather than guessing.

(The front‑page list at SumoBrain continues with further US Application Publications; see below.)

2.1 Cited U.S. patent application publications

• US 2002/0154174 A1 (Redlich et al.), 2002‑10‑24 — "Method and system for providing a service in a photorealistic, 3‑D environment." Bears on claims reciting a service that supplies a 3‑D/geometry product over a network.
• US 2003/0014224 A1 (Guo et al.), 2003‑01‑16 — "Method and apparatus for automatically generating a site model." (Granted as US 7,509,241.) Substantively important — automated site/building model generation.
• US 2003/0028393 A1 (Coulston et al.), 2003‑02‑06 — "Method and computer program for estimating project costs … remodeling and construction projects." Bears on cost‑estimate/report dependent claims.
• US 2003/0115163 A1 (Moore et al.), 2003‑06‑19 — "Methods and systems for estimating building reconstruction costs." (Granted as US 7,373,303.) Directly on point for building reconstruction cost estimation claims.
• US 2003/0171957 A1 (Watrous), 2003‑09‑11 — "Process for inspecting and certifying roofs for structures and repairing leaking roofs during the certification period." Bears on roof‑inspection / remote‑inspection / certification service claims.
• US 2003/0233310 A1 (Stavrovski), 2003‑12‑18 — "Method and system for implementing a business transaction over the internet …" — ancillary e‑commerce/ordering claims.

(Several further non‑patent citations follow on the front page — Pictometry user guides/FAQs, Applicad "Sorcerer" roofing‑software bulletins, AeroDach/Aerowest materials, Collins et al. "The Ascender System," Shahrabi, Charaniya, Bertan, McGlone, Jaynes, Hsieh, Noronha — these are the references that actually drove the reexam/IPR fights.)

3. Cited foreign references

4. Assessment — which references are the real §102 threats

Anticipation under 35 U.S.C. §102 requires a single reference disclosing every limitation. On the face of the record, the front‑page references are predominantly §103 (obviousness) material, because each addresses only a slice of the claimed combination (geocoding, or 3D reconstruction, or cost estimating, or roof inspection). The references most likely to be argued as single‑reference §102 art against broad claim(s) are:

1. US 7,133,551 B2 (Chen et al.) — semi‑automatic 3D building‑model reconstruction using outline segments; closest single‑reference disclosure of the "generate a 3D model of a building's roof from images plus operator input" concept. Potential §102 target: independent claim(s) reciting the 3D‑model‑generation step.
2. WO 00/29806 A2 — measuring house‑roof surfaces; directly in‑field, potential §102 target for method claims framed around roof measurement.
3. WO 2006/040775 A2 — building 3D virtual models from aerial photographs; potential §102 target for "3D model from aerial photographs" claims.
4. DE 19857667 A1 / EP 1 010 966 — 3D object description from imagery; potential §102 target for model‑generation claims, and important as §102(b) art if the Aerowest/AeroDach date is provable.
5. US 2003/0115163 A1 (Moore) / US 6,446,053 (Elliott) — building reconstruction cost estimation / construction proposal generation; potential §102 targets for the report/cost‑estimate dependent claims (but unlikely to reach independent claims).

Given the claim structure implied by routines 800/900 (correlate two different‑view aerial images → build 3D model with planar sections having slope/area/perimeter → produce annotated top‑down report), the more likely combination for an invalidity case is e.g. Chen (3D building model) + Moore/Elliott (cost report) + Zoken/Blumberg (geocoding), i.e., §103 rather than §102.

5. Explicit limitations of this analysis

1. Claim text not retrieved. The claims of US 8,078,436 were not returned to me in this session; the mappings above are keyed to the specification's own characterization of the invention and to the "prior‑art keywords" (roof, different, indicia, valley, line). Do not cite the claim numbers as final without reading the issued claims and the C1 reexamination certificate (2014‑08‑27), which may have changed the claim set.
2. Dates. I report the dates exactly as the sources list them. Where a filing date was not surfaced (e.g., for most pre‑2001 US patents), I have not invented one. The 2007‑04‑16 vs 2007‑04‑17 priority discrepancy is reported, not reconciled.
3. "Cited by the examiner" ≠ "applied as a rejection." Front‑page references include art cited for background; only some were relied upon. The actual substantive art in this patent's history is the print/prior‑system art (Pictometry, Applicad Sorcerer, AeroDach/Aerowest, Collins "Ascender"), which was the subject of the IPR petitions and the Schuch declaration — see PTAB IPR2016‑00582 / IPR2016‑01775 / IPR2017‑00021 and IPR2022‑01090.
4. Non‑institution is not validity. IPR2016‑00582, IPR2016‑01775 and IPR2017‑00021 were not instituted (procedural/procedural/merits), which does not affirm the claims' validity.
5. I could not complete a live USPTO PatentCenter/Pair lookup of the examiner's exact citation list within this session; the citation set above is drawn from the Google Patents / SumoBrain / FreePatentsOnline reproductions of the patent's front page.

I'll research the prior art cited on US 8078436, since the "Prior Art" section wasn't included in the supplied page text (the pasted content ends before the claims and reference list).

I have the claim 1 text now. Let me get the full "References Cited" list from the patent's face and the prior art actually relied upon in the IPRs/reexam.

Obviousness Analysis — US 8,078,436 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

0. Threshold caveats (read before the analysis)

1. The "Prior Art" section referenced in the task was not present in the supplied page text. The pasted Google Patents content for US8078436 ends mid-specification (at FIG. 7 discussion) and contains no "References Cited" table and no claims section. It contains only the five "Prior art keywords" tags (roof, different, indicia, valley, line). Everything below about cited references and asserted art therefore comes from external sources I retrieved, not from the supplied page. Treat the reference list as reconstructed and verify against the printed patent before relying on it.
2. Claim scope caveat. The claim-1 text I used is the one published by RPX (insight.rpxcorp.com/patent/US8078436B2) and quoted in the Eagle View v. Xactware claim charts, which reproduce US 8,078,436 C1 — the ex parte reexamination certificate issued Aug. 27, 2014 (D.N.J. 1:15-cv-07025, Doc. 473-2). I could not confirm from the available material which claim language was original and which was added or amended in Control No. 96/000,004. An obviousness analysis of the as-granted (2011) claims would differ from one of the as-reexamined claims below.
3. No merits ruling of invalidity exists for this patent. All three Xactware IPRs against the '436 were denied institution — IPR2016-00582 (Aug. 16, 2016, Hsieh not proven to be a printed publication), IPR2016-01775 (denied under § 325(d)), and IPR2017-00021 (denied under § 314(a)) (PTAB Litigation Blog; Brinks Gilson). Institution denials are not holdings of non-obviousness, but they mean no prior-art combination in this family has been adjudicated on the merits for the '436.
4. Date discrepancy. The session header states today is 2026‑09‑16; the task states April 26, 2026. I flag it rather than silently pick one.
5. This analysis builds on, and does not repeat, the previously generated Litigation summary.

1. The claim to be analyzed

Claim 1 (as published for US 8,078,436 C1):

A computing system for generating a roof estimate report, comprising: a memory; a roof estimation module stored on the memory and configured, when executed, to: receive a first and a second aerial image of a building having a roof, each … providing a different view of the roof; correlate the first aerial image with the second aerial image; generate, based at least in part on the correlation, a three-dimensional model of the roof that includes a plurality of planar roof sections that each have a corresponding slope, area, and edges; and generate and transmit a roof estimate report that includes one or more top plan views of the 3D model annotated with numerical values that indicate the corresponding slope, area, and length of edges of at least some of the plurality of planar roof sections using at least two different indicia for different types of roof properties.

Representative dependents visible in the record: 15 (ridge property / ridge-length indicia = a ridge line with a numerical value), 17 (slope property / slope indicia = an arrow in the direction of the slope with a numerical value adjacent thereto), 37 (correlating by registering pairs of points), 36/53/54 (non-transitory computer-readable medium analogues; dependent indicia including one color of a line for a ridge and a different color for a valley, and "different roof measurements" including length, slope, area). Claim 18 is the method analogue (Doc. 473-2).

Elemental breakdown for § 103 purposes:

A–D are the classical photogrammetry-plus-CAD pipeline; E is standard roofing-industry quantification; F is the only element that is genuinely a reporting-format limitation — and it is also the limitation the patent owner relied on at reexamination (the "prior art keywords" tags different/indicia/valley are consistent with that).

2. Prior art of record

2.1 References cited on the face of the patent (reconstructed)

From Sumobrain's transcription of the patent (list truncated in the source; verify the remainder):

• Photogrammetry / 3D reconstruction of objects and buildings: US 5,633,995 (McClain — camera system and methods for extracting 3D model of viewed object); US 6,396,491 (Watanabe — reproducing shape and pattern in a three-dimensional scene); US 6,496,184 (Freeman — inferring scenes from test images); US 6,980,690 (Taylor — image processing apparatus); US 7,133,551 (Chen — semi-automatic reconstruction of 3-D building models using building outline segments); US 7,343,268 (Kishikawa — three-dimensional electronic map data creation); US 2003/0014224 (Guo — automatically generating a site model).
• Address/geo-coding → imagery or parcel lookup: US 7,324,666 (Zoken — assigning geocodes to street addressable entities); US 6,323,885 (Wiese — real estate value map computer system); US 6,385,541 (Blumberg — GPS-based real estate database access device); US 6,636,803 (Hartz — real-estate information search and retrieval); US 2002/0154174 (Redlich — service in a photorealistic 3-D environment).
• Construction / building / roof cost estimation and project proposals: US 6,446,053 (Elliott — computer-implemented method and system for producing a proposal for a construction project); US 2003/0028393 (Coulston — estimating project costs and time factors for remodeling/construction); US 2003/0115163 (Moore — estimating building reconstruction costs); US 7,006,977 (Attra — automating and improving home design and construction); US 2003/0171957 (Watrous — process for inspecting and certifying roofs); US 2003/0233310 (Stavrovski — internet business transaction).
• Display/visualization: US 6,836,270 (Du — 3-D map data visualization); US 7,003,400 (Bryant — displaying subsurface anomalies and surface features).

2.2 Non-patent literature cited across the family

Referenced in the related continuations (US 9,514,568, US 9,911,228):

• Hsieh, "SiteCity: A Semi-Automated Site Modelling System," 1996, IEEE — semi-automated construction of site/building models, including planar roof faces, from multiple aerial images.
• Applicad, "Product Overview: Sorcerer — Advanced Software for Roofing Modeling, Estimating, Presentation and Installation," Mar. 2, 2001; and Applicad, "World Class Technology Leading the Way in Roofing Software: Product Bulletin," Nov. 2002 — roof modeling + estimating + presentation (line drawings of roof plans) for roofing contractors.
• "AeroDach® Online Roof Analysis: Standard Delivery Format and 3D Dataset," Aerowest GmbH, 2002 — an online roof-evaluation deliverable comprising a 3D dataset plus a standard report format.
• Photogrammetric building-reconstruction literature: Collins (Ascender), Jaynes, McGlone, Forlani (LIDAR), Charaniya, Bertan, Shahrabi, Steuer, Sengül.
• Cost/estimating and roof-software background: "R2V User's Manual" (2000), MacEachren/other mapping glossaries.

2.3 Art actually asserted (not merely cited) against the '436

• Ground 1 (IPR2016-00582): Hsieh (SiteCity) in view of Applicad — denied institution solely because Hsieh was not proven to be a printed publication.
• Ground 2 (IPR2016-01775): same Hsieh + Applicad with better accessibility evidence — denied under § 325(d).
• Ground 3 (IPR2017-00021): Avrahami + Applicad and McKeown + Applicad — denied as a discretionary third bite (PTAB Litigation Blog).
• Pictometry, "Electronic Field Study™ User Guide," v2.7, July 2007 — asserted in related family IPRs and found not publicly accessible (licensing restrictions), hence not prior art (Kirkland & Ellis).

Notably, every asserted ground was disposed of on procedural/threshold grounds. No combination was ever weighed for teaching sufficiency. So the analysis below is a fresh, unadjudicated § 103 assessment.

3. Obviousness combinations

Combination 1 (strongest; mirrors the petitioner's theory) — Hsieh + Applicad Sorcerer

• Hsieh (SiteCity 1996) teaches elements A–D: ingest of multiple overlapping aerial images, identification of corresponding features across views, and semi-automated construction of a 3D site model whose building surfaces (roof planes) are characterized by edges, orientation and extent.
• Applicad Sorcerer (2001/2002 product overview and bulletin) teaches elements D–E: 3D roof modeling from measurements, and presentation output — roof plan drawings annotated with per-section measurements, pitch and areas, used to produce a roofing estimate for a contractor's customer.
• Motivation to combine. Both are in the same field of endeavor (roof modeling and roof estimating), address the same problem (obtaining complete, accurate roof measurements without a site visit), and the combination is a mere substitution of the front end (how the measurements are obtained: manual field measurement → image-derived 3D model) with the report-generating back end retained. There is a reasonable expectation of success because the output format (annotated plan view) is compatible with measurements that a photogrammetric reconstruction natively yields (edges, areas, slopes). Nothing about the combination changes the principle of operation of either reference — the classic KSR rationales of "known technique" and "predictable result."

Combination 2 — Avrahami + Applicad, or McKeown + Applicad

Substantively identical to Combination 1 with a different imaging/reconstruction primary reference. Avrahami and McKeown each supply the multi-image/3D-reconstruction teaching; Applicad supplies the roof-estimating report. The same motivation analysis applies. The Board never reached the merits of these on the '436 (denied under § 314(a)), so they remain untested.

Combination 3 — Chen + McClain + Elliott + Zoken (a "no-NPL" fallback)

If Hsieh and Applicad cannot be authenticated as printed publications (the exact reason the first petition failed), a combination built from U.S. patents avoids that vulnerability:

• McClain (5,633,995) and Chen (7,133,551) → A–C: 3D model extraction from images and semi-automatic reconstruction of 3D building models from outline/edge segments.
• Elliott (6,446,053) → D–E: computer-implemented generation of a construction-project proposal from quantified building measurements.
• Zoken (7,324,666) → the address→imagery retrieval step described in the '436 specification (street address translated to lat/long via a geo-coding provider), which is an express part of the disclosed commercial workflow and would be obvious to automate.
• Motivation. KSR's "obvious to try" and "design incentive" rationales: the business need recited in the '436's own Background (contractors cannot economically travel to distant sites for estimates) supplies the explicit motivation to network a geocoded image database with an automated 3D-reconstruction engine and a cost-proposal generator. That is precisely the arrangement Elliott + Chen + Zoken describe when read together.

Combination 4 — eliminating the "flat/untilted imagery" and "single view" assumptions

The '436 specification itself concedes that flat roofs require only a single image whereas pitched roofs require two or more, and that at least one image is calibrated. That concession is an admission that the multi-image requirement is dictated by the geometry of the subject matter, not by invention — which is the strongest possible support for characterizing element A/B as an obvious design choice (In re Kuhle-style recognition of a known problem, applied under KSR's "design incentives" prong).

4. The pivotal limitation: "at least two different indicia for different types of roof properties"

This is where an obviousness challenge lives or dies, because it is the limitation the reexam certificate appears to emphasize and the one the patent owner litigated (claim 15 = ridge line with ridge-length value; claim 17 = slope arrow with adjacent numerical value; claim 54 = different colors for ridge vs. valley lines).

Why a POSITA would have arrived at it:

1. Prior-art conventions. Ridge/valley/hip/eave line coding and slope-arrow-with-numeric-value notation are long-standing drafting conventions in architectural and roofing drawings. Applicad's "presentation" output and the AeroDach "standard delivery format" both concern machine-produced roof plan drawings, i.e., the exact medium in which such conventions are applied. Aerosw/AeroDach's "standard delivery format" language is especially relevant: a standardized delivery format implies a defined, repeatable legend for different feature types.
2. Specification-as-admission (label clutter). The '436 specification states that on models with many small details (dormers, etc.) "applying uniformly sized, oriented, and positioned labels … results in a visually cluttered diagram," and that the system therefore "automatically determin[es] an optimal or near-optimal label font size, label position, and/or label orientation." That is an express recognition of the problem (legibility of dense annotation) and the express identification of the solution class (differentiate how different properties are depicted). Under KSR, "a problem known in the field at the time of invention" plus "a finite number of identified, predictable solutions" yields obviousness.
3. Alternatives were few and predictable. Given a plan view carrying slope, area and edge-length values for each of several roof planes, the possible disambiguating schemes are essentially: color, line style/weight, glyph/arrow, label placement, or separate views. The reference report of FIGS. 5C–5E in fact uses separate views per property (dimensions / slope / area) — which is strong evidence that differentiating property types was already the working design principle and that consolidating them with differentiated indicia is a predictable variation.
4. KSR "known technique." Differentiated indicia for different data categories in a generated technical report is a generic, well-known data-presentation technique; applying it to a roof estimate report is use of a known technique for its intended purpose, with predictable results.

Why a challenger might still lose on this limitation:

• The asserted art (Hsieh/Applicad/Avrahami/McKeown/Pictometry EFU) was never shown to disclose a single view annotated with plural numerical properties (slope and area and edge length) differentiated by indicia, as opposed to separate drawings or a pure measurement printout. If the record lacks an express legend-based teaching, the case reduces to an "obvious to try"-style argument on graphic conventions — a ground that can be defeated with objective evidence.

5. Dependent-claim assessment

Net: the A–E elements are, in my assessment, highly likely to be found obvious on this record. The F element (plural differentiated indicia) is a materially closer question and is the only limitation providing meaningful non-obviousness shelter.

6. Secondary considerations and countervailing record

• Industry praise. In a related final decision (IPR2016-00593, different patent in the same family), the Board stated: "We find patent owner's extensive evidence of industry praise weighs in favor of the non-obviousness of the claimed invention," citing CNN Money and California Business Journal coverage (Kirkland & Ellis). That finding is not binding on the '436, and its nexus to the indicia limitation specifically would need to be established — but a challenger must expect this evidence to be re-asserted.
• Commercial context. The FTC's stated concern that an EagleView/Verisk combination would give the parties "a virtual monopoly in the U.S. market for rooftop aerial measurement products" (same Kirkland report) is evidence of market position and could support a commercial-success narrative, though monopoly-market-share evidence can cut both ways on nexus.
• Prosecution/reexam history cuts against the challenger. The fact that reexamination (Control No. 96/000,004) concluded with a certificate confirming claims rather than cancelling them means the Office has already considered art in the same technical space and maintained the claims; a § 103 challenger must present art that is new and non-cumulative relative to that.
• Procedural posture. Two of the three '436 IPRs died on publication/accessibility and § 325(d)/§ 314(a) grounds, not on teaching. That means the patent's validity rests on an unadjudicated obviousness record — a future challenger with (a) properly authenticated NPL and (b) an express legend/indicia teaching would be on materially better footing than Xactware was.

7. Conclusions

1. Elements A–C (two different views, correlation, 3D model with planar sections having slope/area/edges) are strongly obvious over the cited and asserted art — McClain, Chen, Hsieh, Guo, Kishikawa, Taylor, Freeman, and the wider photogrammetric building-reconstruction literature — and the '436's own specification characterizes multi-image acquisition as a consequence of roof pitch, not a point of novelty.
2. Elements D–E (roof estimate report with annotated top plan views carrying per-section numerical values) are obvious over Elliott, Coulston, Moore, Watrous, Attra, Applicad Sorcerer, and AeroDach.
3. The best single combination on this record is Hsieh + Applicad Sorcerer (petitioner's Ground 1, never adjudicated on the merits) or, to avoid the authentication problem that defeated Ground 1, the all-patent McClain + Chen + Elliott + Zoken combination.
4. Element F ("at least two different indicia for different types of roof properties") is the sole genuine obstacle. It is attackable via (i) pervasive architectural/roof-plan drafting conventions, (ii) the specification's own admission of a label-clutter problem, and (iii) KSR's "finite number of predictable solutions" and "known technique" rationales — but it is not a clear winner, and it is the limitation that appears to have sustained the claims through reexamination.
5. Confidence statement: I have low-to-moderate confidence in the completeness of the reconstructed "References Cited" list (the source transcription was truncated and I could not retrieve the full face-page list before reaching my research limit), and I could not verify the granted-claim text versus the reexamined-claim text. Any conclusion about the as-granted claims is provisional. I have high confidence in the IPR disposition facts and in the asserted-art identities (Hsieh, Applicad, Avrahami, McKeown, Pictometry EFU), which come from multiple independent secondary sources.