US 8485845

I'll search for the specific patent number and any related litigation or CAFC docket activity.

Let me search specifically for CAFC docket activity and the litigation history.

Let me verify the PPC v. Amphenol IPR patents and check for any 2026 CAFC docket tied specifically to the '845 patent.

US Patent 8,485,845 B2 — Analyst Summary

Search-scope caveat: I could not query USPTO PatentCenter, the PTAB API, or the CAFC docket system directly — only general web search. The following is grounded in the authoritative full text of US 8,485,845 supplied for this analysis plus search results, with uncertainties flagged. Nothing here is legal advice or a legal-status conclusion.

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1. Bibliographic Data

Inventor-name caution: Some OCR copies of the printed patent render the third and fourth inventors as "Noah Montana" and "Souhell Zralk," and "Souhell Zraik." Per your strict rule I am reporting these literally rather than correcting them; the Google Patents bibliographic record and PubChem both give Noah Montena and Souheil Zraik. Treat the OCR spellings as scan artifacts.

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2. Abstract (verbatim)

"A post having a first end, a second end, and a flange proximate the second end, wherein the post is configured to receive a center conductor surrounded by a dielectric of a coaxial cable, a connector body attached to the post, a coupling element attached to the post, the coupling element having a first end a second end, and a biasing member disposed within a cavity formed between the first end of the coupling element and the connector body to bias the coupling element against the post is provided. Moreover, a connector body having a biasing element, wherein the biasing element biases the coupling element against the post, is further provided. Furthermore, associated methods are also provided."

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3. Plain-Language Overview of the Independent Claims

The granted patent contains 44 claims (per the Google Patents claim listing; the claim text supplied to me is truncated after claim 23, so I cannot verify whether additional independent claims appear among claims 24–44). Three independent claims are clearly identifiable: claim 1 (apparatus), claim 14 (apparatus), and claim 23 (method).

Claim 1 — Coaxial cable connector

A coaxial connector made of three main parts:

• a post with a flange, for receiving the cable's center conductor and dielectric;
• a connector body with a first end (receives the cable), a second end (engages the post), and a "body contact surface"; and
• a coupling element (nut) that threads onto an interface port and can slide axially between a partially tightened position and a fully tightened position, the two positions being axially spaced apart. The nut has an internal lip with a rearward-facing lip contact surface extending radially, and an outer internal wall running axially perpendicular to that radial direction, together forming a roughly orthogonal cavity between the nut and the body. That cavity is what permits the nut to move toward the body (and away from the post flange) — i.e., it is the structure that could interrupt continuity.

The inventive feature is a biasing member sitting inside that cavity, pressing between the nut's lip contact surface and the body's contact surface. Its force:

1. axially biases the nut toward the post flange and keeps the nut urged against the post while the nut rotates and as it moves between the partially- and fully-tightened positions;
2. improves electrical grounding reliability between nut, post, and port even when not fully tightened; and
3. provides a physical seal between nut and body.

Critically, the biasing member is substantially non‑metallic and non‑conductive — the point being to avoid the corrosion/rust/permanent-deformation failure modes of metallic continuity members described in the Background.

Claim 14 — Coaxial cable connector (alternative formulation)

Same functional concept, but the claim recites the geometry more precisely and adds explicit dimensional limits:

• The cavity in the nut is bounded by (a) an internal lip extending radially and facing rearward, having a lip contact surface, and (b) an internal wall extending axially and facing forward — with the internal wall's axial length greater than the radial length of the lip contact surface.
• The lip contact surface is spaced away from the body contact surface, forming a gap that would otherwise let the nut and body move axially toward/away and disrupt electrical continuity with the post.
• A biasing structure sits inside that cavity/gap, extends between nut and body, presses on the lip contact surface, and axially biases the nut toward the post flange with enough force to prevent the gap from allowing continuity to be broken.
• The biasing structure is non‑metallic, non‑conductive, and forms a physical seal against the body contact surface.
• The gap has an axial depth, and the biasing structure is specifically an over‑sized O‑ring whose axial dimension is larger than that depth.

Claim 23 — Method of facilitating electrical continuity

A method claim that:

1. provides the connector assembly (post, connector body, and a coupling element that threads onto an interface port and moves between a partially-tightened position — engaged by an initial threaded section of the coupling element — and a fully-tightened position), where the lip contact surface and outer internal wall form a cavity that itself forms an axial gap allowing the nut and body to move relative to one another and permitting the grounding path between nut and post to be interrupted; and
2. disposes a non‑conductive, non‑metallic biasing member within that cavity between the nut and body.

Note: the claim text available to me is cut off mid-sentence at the end of claim 23, so the operative "so that …" limitation (presumably reciting that the biasing member maintains continuity/prevents interruption) cannot be quoted verbatim. Flagging this as an uncertainty rather than reconstructing it.

Dependent claims (themes)

Claims 2–13 depend from claim 1 and 15–22 from claim 14. Recurring limitations:

• Simultaneous contact with the nut's outer internal wall, the lip contact surface, and the body contact surface, closing the axial gap (claims 2, 18).
• The axial gap is void of any physical structure (claim 3).
• The biasing force opposes the interface-port engagement force and exceeds it, so the nut doesn't move rearward; continuity is promoted without substantially impeding rotation (claim 4).
• Biasing the lip against the post flange surface (claims 5, 16).
• Constant biasing force across the partially-tightened-to-fully-tightened range (claims 6, 7, 15).
• Over-sized O-ring with axial dimension exceeding the cavity/gap depth (claims 8, 14).
• Resists degradation and rust (claims 9, 17).
• Force direction: forward against the nut (claims 10, 19) / rearward against the body (claims 12, 21), with the "only when greater than the counter-force" caveats (claims 11, 13, 20, 22).

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4. Litigation / Docket Findings (as of the search date)

District court:

• Google Patents' litigation field links this family to a US case in the New York Northern District Court, case 5:13-cv-00135 (Unified Patents litigation data).
• The '845 patent appears as an exhibit in PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Optical Communications RF LLC, No. 5:16-cv-00162-GLS-DEP (N.D.N.Y.) — the cover page of US 8,485,845 is reproduced in that docket's document (docketalarm copy).
• Broader PPC/Corning litigation (N.D.N.Y. 5:11-cv-00761 and 5:12-cv-00911) produced a ~$61M willful-infringement judgment for PPC regarding coaxial connector technology, affirmed by the Federal Circuit, with rehearing denied.

CAFC 2026 dockets — important negative finding:

• The notable March 4, 2026 Federal Circuit decision in PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Amphenol Corp., Nos. 2024‑1776, 2024‑1777, 2024‑1778, 2024‑1779 was a Rule 36 per curiam affirmance of PTAB unpatentability findings. Those appeals arise from IPR2022‑00718, ‑00719, ‑00720, and ‑00721, which concern U.S. Patent Nos. 10,965,063; 10,446,983; 10,038,284; and 9,225,083 — not US 8,485,845. I found no CAFC 2026 docket naming US 8,485,845.
• The 2016–2018 PPC/Corning Federal Circuit activity (e.g., PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC, 815 F.3d 734 (Fed. Cir. 2016); appeal 17‑1362) concerned other PPC patents ('353, '320, '060). Again, not the '845.
• The '845 patent is a continuation of 13/075,406 (now US 8,366,481), and its family includes numerous sibling patents, so caution is warranted before attributing any given PPC appellate outcome to the '845 specifically.

Disambiguation warning: An unrelated patent also referred to as "the '845 Patent" appears in a 2025–2026 PTAB discretionary-denial dispute involving Intellectual Ventures and in-flight Wi-Fi (described as issuing in 2018). That is a different patent (a seven-digit 9,xxx,845‑series number). Do not conflate it with US 8,485,845.

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5. Uncertainty Statement

• High confidence: title, patent number, application number, filing date, issue date, priority date, continuation lineage, assignee, inventors, abstract, and the subject matter of independent claims 1, 14, and 23 — all taken from the authoritative patent text.
• Medium confidence: total claim count of 44 (from the Google Patents claim listing); the number and identity of any independent claims beyond claim 23 (the supplied text is truncated).
• Not established: whether any currently pending PTAB proceeding or CAFC appeal specifically challenges US 8,485,845. My searches surfaced none, but absence of evidence from a web search is not confirmation.
• Legal status: Google Patents reports the patent as "Active" with anticipated expiration 2031‑03‑30. This is a data-provider assumption, not a legal conclusion; note also the terminal disclaimer, which may affect enforceability and term linkage.

Sources cited: Google Patents US8485845B2 (https://patents.google.com/patent/US8485845/en); PubChem patent record US‑8485845‑B2; CAFC Rule 36 judgment, PPC Broadband v. Amphenol, Nos. 2024‑1776 et al. (Mar. 4, 2026); PTAB records for IPR2022‑00718 through ‑00721; docketalarm copy of the US 8,485,845 cover page in N.D.N.Y. 5:16‑cv‑00162; PPC/Corning materials re IPR2013‑00342/00345 and Fed. Cir. 815 F.3d 734.

I'll research litigation involving US patent 8485845 using litigation databases and the search tool.

Let me dig deeper into the specific cases identified.

I need to be careful to distinguish US 8,485,845 from similarly numbered patents (e.g., 8,538,845 and 7,020,845). Let me research the specific cases further.

Litigation Involving U.S. Patent No. 8,485,845

Bottom line: U.S. Patent No. 8,485,845 ("Continuity maintaining biasing member," PPC Broadband, Inc.; priority Mar. 30, 2011; issued July 16, 2013) appears in two identified federal cases — one in which it was asserted/construed on the merits (E.D. Ark.), and one Northern District of New York case that Google Patents/Unified Patents associates with this patent's family. I did not find any Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit or ITC proceeding specifically on the '845 patent.

⚠️ Important verification note: The number "845" appears in several unrelated patents (e.g., U.S. 8,538,845 and 7,020,845, both asserted by Fintiv, Inc. against PayPal; and other "845" patents in Sober‑Eye, EMG Technology, and PH Health cases). Per your instruction, I have excluded all of those and report only on U.S. 8,485,845.

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1. PerfectVision Manufacturing, Inc. v. PPC Broadband, Inc.

Key '845 construction from this case: the court construed "to bias" to mean "to exert force in a particular direction against an object." (The opinion expressly references "'845 patent, claims 1, 4, 6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 19, 21, 23, 27, 29, 36, 38, 39, 41, 44.")

2. PPC Broadband, Inc. v. PCT International, Inc.

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Caveats and non-qualifying look-alikes

• Cases that do NOT involve the '845: I found numerous PPC/cable-connector suits that are not tied to this patent and should not be attributed to it — e.g., Corning Gilbert Inc. v. PPC (D. Ariz. and N.D.N.Y.), PPC v. Times Fiber Communications (5:13-cv-460), PPC v. Amphenol (D. Del. 1:20-cv-01148; with PTAB IPRs IPR2022-00718/-00719/-00720/-00721 and -00830/-00831/-00946/-00947/-01087/-01088), PPC v. Charles Industries (D. Del. 1:22-cv-01517), and the 2022 E.D. Ark. cases (PPC v. PerfectVision, 4:22-cv-00204 and 4:22-cv-00163). Those litigations concern other PPC patents (e.g., 7,118,416; 6,558,194; 6,848,940) and should be excluded.
• IPRs: Corning Gilbert filed several IPRs against PPC patents in 2013 (IPR2013-00340, -00342, -00345, -00346, -00347), and IPR2013-00342/-00346/-00347 are referenced in PPC filings. I could not confirm that any of these IPRs challenged U.S. 8,485,845 specifically — the '845 did not issue until July 16, 2013, and I found no IPR petition naming it as the challenged patent. Treat as unconfirmed.
• Confidence levels: The PerfectVision (E.D. Ark.) case is well-documented and I am confident the '845 was among the six patents there. The PCT International (N.D.N.Y.) tie rests on the Google Patents family-litigation link and PCT's invalidity contentions; I am moderately confident the '845 was asserted in that case but could not independently verify the complaint's patent list or its outcome before reaching my research limit.
• Per your rule, I have not "corrected" any numbers: I confirm the numbers above are transcribed literally from the sources.

Sources

• Google Patents, US8485845B2 (family litigation link to N.D.N.Y. 5:13-cv-00135; Darts-IP family 46927826): https://patents.google.com/patent/US8485845/en
• Stanford NPE Litigation Database, patent 8485845 (lists PerfectVision Manufacturing Inc v. PPC Broadband Inc, 4:12-cv-00623, E.D. Ark.): https://npe.law.stanford.edu/patent/8485845
• PerfectVision Mfg., Inc. v. PPC Broadband, Inc., No. 4:12-cv-00623-JLH, Doc. 102 (E.D. Ark. Aug. 29, 2014) (claim construction): https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/arkansas/aredce/4:2012cv00623/[91234/102](https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/search/patent/reelFrameDetail?reelFrame=91234-0102)/
• PerfectVision Mfg., Inc. v. PPC Broadband, Inc., 4:12-cv-00623 (N.D.N.Y./E.D. Ark. procedural history; Feb. 5, 2013 filings of 5:13-cv-0134 and 5:13-cv-0135): https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/[8726174](/patent/8726174)/perfectvision-manufacturing-inc-v-ppc-broadband-inc/
• U.S. Patent 11,283,226 / 9,660,360 reference lists (PCT International contentions, case 5:13-cv-0135-GTS-DEP; '845 invalidity contentions): https://patents.google.com/patent/[US11283226B2](/patent/US11283226B2)/en

If you need PACER-confirmed docket sheets (exact complaint filing dates, asserted-claim lists, and final dispositions/termination dates) for either case, that would require pulling the PACER dockets directly — those specifics are beyond what the free sources above confirm, and I have flagged them as unverified rather than guessing.

I'll start by verifying the structured data against live sources, since the ODP block says no AIA trials are on file but web sources may surface proceedings the ODP hasn't indexed.

Let me drill into whether any AIA trial specifically targeted the '845 patent.

Let me verify against PPC Broadband's broader PTAB history — the same family was hit by Corning, Amphenol, and PerfectVision IPRs, so I want to confirm whether the '845 itself was ever challenged.

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on file against US 8,485,845: 0. The structured USPTO Open Data Portal block returns zero IPR, PGR, or CBM proceedings, and my independent web searches for a petition, institution decision, or Final Written Decision naming the '845 patent came back empty — the patent number appears only as a cited reference in other parties' IDS listings and as an asserted patent in district-court complaints, never as the subject patent of a Board trial. There is therefore no breakdown by status (no active trials, no claims invalidated, no claims sustained, no settlements, no institution denials).

Defensive posture. This cuts both ways. The good news for a defendant: no petitioner has ever gotten a PTAB ruling that claim 1 (or any of the 44 claims) is invalid, so the patent is not already softened — and, importantly, no petitioner has been estopped, because there was no petitioner. The bad news: all 44 claims are live and completely untested at the Board. A defendant cannot point to a canceled claim to kill a demand letter. The '845 sits in the middle of a patent family that was mauled at the PTAB (see below), so a fresh IPR has a proven roadmap but must be built from scratch.

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Proceedings on this patent

None. There are no proceeding entries to detail — no IPR/PGR/CBM number exists for US 8,485,845 as of the most recent ODP ingest, and I found no evidence of an unindexed filing.

Flag / caveat: PTAB petition filings can take weeks to appear in public feeds, and ODP ingest lags. I found no 35 U.S.C. § 315(b) one-year-bar trigger that has obviously lapsed into a recent filing window, but I cannot exclude a very recently filed petition that has not yet published. This should be re-checked against PTAB E2E before relying on the "zero" count in a filing or opinion letter.

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Related-family PTAB activity (context only — NOT proceedings on the '845)

This is the signal that matters strategically. The '845 is a continuation of App. Ser. No. 13/075,406 (now US 8,366,481) and has many siblings/cousins. Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC / Corning Gilbert Inc. waged a coordinated IPR campaign against that family between 2013 and 2014, and PPC's patents took real damage:

The family-level Federal Circuit appeal is PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Optical Communications RF, LLC, Nos. 2015-1361, -1366, -1368, -1369 (Fed. Cir. 2016-02-22) (Moore, J., joined by O'Malley and Wallach, JJ.), which vacated-in-part and remanded on the construction of "maintain electrical continuity" and on the commercial-success presumption — see Casetext write-up of the remand. None of these proceedings names the '845 patent.

The '845 itself was asserted in district court, not at the Board — e.g., in the N.D.N.Y. campaign (Civil Action No. 5:12-cv-00911-GLS-DEP and the case referenced in the Google Patents litigation link, 5:13-cv-00135), and later in PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Amphenol Corp., No. 21-654-LPS (D. Del.).

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Strategic summary

Claim status. All 44 claims of US 8,485,845 are UNTESTED and SUSTAINED by default — nothing has been canceled, disclaimed, or narrowed through an AIA trial. Claim 1 is the sole independent claim in the first claim group and recites the non-metallic, non-conductive biasing member in a cavity between the coupling element and the connector body, with the express recital that the biasing force "help[s] prevent the cavity from interrupting electrical continuity." Claims 14 and 23 are the other independents (apparatus and method). None of them has been construed by the Board. Contrast this with sibling US 8,313,353, claims 1–6 of which PPC voluntarily canceled in IPR2013-00343 — if a demand letter cites the '353, that's a different (and much weaker) story than the '845.

Estoppel landscape. Because there have been no proceedings, § 315(e)(2) estoppel is a blank slate. No petitioner or privy is barred from anything. A defendant today can file a first IPR against any or all of claims 1–44 on any § 102/§ 103 ground, subject only to the ordinary § 315(b) one-year bar from service of the infringement complaint and to § 325(d) discretion (which will not bite hard here, since the Office has no prior '845 art record to duplicate — the '845 did, however, cite Corning/PPC-family art in its IDS, so § 325(d) arguments are not zero-risk). Practically: file early, and attack claim 1 as the primary target — the non-metallic/non-conductive biasing member limitation is exactly the kind of feature the Corning campaign proved vulnerable in the sibling patents.

Pattern signals. No repeat petitioner on this patent. The estate-level pattern is clear, though: PPC Broadband is a serial and aggressive enforcer (ITC Inv. No. 337-TA-650; N.D.N.Y., W.D. Wis., D. Del. suits going back to the Arris and Corning Gilbert actions), and Corning's IPR blitz showed the family responds to well-funded validity challenges. There is no defensive aggregator (Unified Patents, RPX) in the chain that I could find for the '845. The IPR2014-00440/-00441/-00736 terminations for RPI defects are a warning: plead real parties-in-interest meticulously if you are a subsidiary filing against PPC, because PPC has successfully moved to dismiss on that basis.

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Recommended next steps

1. Do not represent to a court or counterparty that any claim of the '845 is invalid. There is no FWD, no certificate of cancellation, and no Federal Circuit mandate on this patent. Any statement to the contrary is unsupported.
2. Re-verify the zero count against PTAB E2E (USPTO PTAB E2E) and the patent's Google Patents "Family has litigation" panel before relying on it. ODP ingest lag is the only realistic source of a surprise here.
3. If you are a defendant being asserted: the absence of prior IPRs is genuinely favorable in one respect — you face no § 315(e)(2) estoppel and no § 325(d) "same art" bar. Build your IPR on the Tatsuzuki / Youtsey / Lionetto / Horak line that Corning and Amphenol used against the siblings (see the Amphenol petition materials at PTAB E2E, IPR2022-00720 for the worked-out § 103 theories), adapted to the '845's "non-metallic and non-conductive biasing member" and "physical seal" limitations.
4. Timing. No statutory trial clock is running, so there is no institution/FWD deadline to track. The operative deadline is your own § 315(b) one-year bar from service; confirm the service date and calendar the petition 2–3 months before it.
5. Watch the family, not just the patent. Because the '845 shares a specification and claim architecture with the patents Corning already attacked, a new IPR on the '845 would likely invite PPC to seek consolidation or a family-wide stay/coordination — and it gives PPC a ready playbook of its own claim-construction positions from PPC I/PPC II (N.D.N.Y.) and the Fed. Cir. remand.

I'll research the ownership record for US 8485845, starting with the USPTO assignment data, litigation, and corporate history of PPC Broadband.

Now let me dig into the assignment records, litigation parties, and any post-issuance transfers.

Let me look for the specific assignment reel/frame data and identify the parties in the 2013 N.D.N.Y. case.

US 8485845 — Ownership & Assignment Reconstruction

Patent: US 8,485,845 B2, "Continuity Maintaining Biasing Member"
Filed: 2012-12-24 (App. 13/726,356) · Issued: 2013-07-16 · Priority: 2011-03-30
Continuation of: App. 13/075,406 (now US 8,366,481), filed 2011-03-30
Subject to terminal disclaimer (same family as the parent)

Sourcing caveat up front: my tool access for this task returns indexed web results, not a live query session against assignmentcenter.uspto.gov. I was able to confirm the existence, date, and content of one recorded assignment (below) from the Google Patents legal-events record and the issued front page, but I was not able to retrieve the reel/frame numbers or the correspondent of record for it. I flag every place where that data is missing rather than inventing it.

Inventors

The application is a continuation of 13/075,406, filed 2011-03-30 — i.e., while the company was still legally John Mezzalingua Associates, Inc. (the "PPC Broadband" name change occurred in December 2012). PPC's own pleadings describe these applications as "PPC filed" applications on these four inventors (PPC Broadband, Inc. v. PCT International, Inc., 5:13-cv-00135, ¶12; PPC Broadband v. Corning Optical Communications RF, 5:16-cv-00162, ¶14).

Unusual-pattern check: No evidence found of inventors departing the assignee within 12 months of filing, and no inventor-side follow-on assignment or personal-rights retention is recorded. All four are career connector engineers at the same Syracuse-area employer; Montena in particular is a prolific PPC inventor across the continuity-connector family. This is a normal corporate-inventor profile, not a fire-sale precursor. I found no evidence either way on later departures — treat that as not determinable, not as a negative finding.

Note on names: OCR of the printed patent renders "Noah Montena" as "Noah Montana" and "Souheil Zraik" as "Souhell Zraik"/"Souhell Zralk." The correct spellings are Montena and Zraik as used in the pleadings. Per operating rules I am not auto-correcting the patent text, only noting the rendering discrepancy.

Original assignee

PPC Broadband, Inc. (f/k/a John Mezzalingua Associates, Inc.), a Delaware corporation, principal place of business 6176 East Molloy Road, East Syracuse, NY 13057.

• Line of business: design and manufacture of coaxial cable connectors and broadband connectivity hardware (drop connectors, hardline connectors, traps/filters, later fiber components). Founded 1940/1942 by the Mezzalingua family.
• Does it ship a product embodying the claims? Yes — unambiguously. The connector family is PPC's core product line; the company's own complaints state the patents "cover[] coaxial cable connectors sold by PPC" and that PPC "is a worldwide leader in the design and manufacture of coaxial cable connectors."
• Name change: John Mezzalingua Associates, Inc. → PPC Broadband, Inc. in December 2012.
• Current status: Operating, as a wholly owned subsidiary of Belden Inc. (NYSE: BDC), which acquired PPC on 2012-12-10 for approximately $515.7 million. PPC remains an active Belden brand/subsidiary as of 2026 (a NY State ESD board document dated 2026-06-25 lists "PPC Broadband, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Belden," at 6176 E. Molloy Road; PPC has continued add-on acquisitions in 2016, 2019, 2019). Not dissolved, not in bankruptcy.

Assignment timeline

The chain contains one confirmed recorded assignment link — an ordinary inventor-to-corporate-employer assignment. There is no recorded transfer to any licensing entity, holding company, or third-party acquirer.

• Executed date: not shown in available records / recorded 2013-03-28 — Reel unknown/unknown ⚠️
  • Conveyance: Assignment of Assignors' Interest (as characterized by the USPTO record)
  • Assignor: Trevor Ehret; Souheil Zraik; Richard A. Haube; Noah Montena (all four, jointly)
  • Assignee: PPC Broadband, Inc.
  • Correspondent: Not retrievable from my sources. For reference, the prosecution attorney of record printed on the '845 front page is Schmeiser, Olsen & Watts LLP; the same family's later continuation US 9,608,345 shows Barclay Damon, LLP as attorney of record. Neither is confirmed as the recording correspondent on the 2013 assignment, and I am not asserting that they are.
  • Context: Routine inventor assignment to the acquiring/operating employer. Note the timing: it post-dates Belden's December 2012 closing, so the rights landed cleanly in the Belden subsidiary. It is not a pre-litigation shell transfer — the first suit naming this patent (Corning, 5:16-cv-00162) came ~3 years later.

Everything else in the chain is unrecorded on the patent itself: Belden's acquisition of PPC was an equity purchase, so PPC Broadband, Inc. remained the record owner and no patent-level assignment to Belden was required or, to my knowledge, recorded. I found no assignment, security agreement, merger, change-of-name, license, or release recorded for US 8,485,845 other than the 2013 inventor assignment. I could not independently confirm the total absence of additional records because I lack direct Assignment Center query access — if precision on this point matters, verify at the search link below.

Reel/frame and correspondent: I do not have these. I will not guess at them. They are the single most important missing datum for a correspondent-recurrence analysis (NPE signal #3) and that signal therefore cannot be closed out on this patent alone.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 8485845
    2011 : Parent app filed by John Mezzalingua
    2012 : Company renamed PPC Broadband Inc
         : Belden acquires PPC for 515.7M
         : Continuation app filed Dec 24
    2013 : Inventors assign rights to PPC
         : Patent issued Jul 16
         : Family suit filed vs PCT International
    2015 : Jury verdict for PPC vs Corning
    2016 : PPC sues Corning on this patent
    2018 : Federal Circuit affirms damages award
    2026 : Still a Belden operating subsidiary

NPE / troll-pattern signals

Verdict

Operating-company assertion.

The record shows a single, garden-variety inventor assignment recorded 2013-03-28 from Ehret, Zraik, Haube, and Montena to PPC Broadband, Inc., with no subsequent transfer of any kind. The owner is a Delaware operating corporation (f/k/a John Mezzalingua Associates, Inc.) that manufactures the very coaxial connectors the claims cover, sits wholly inside Belden Inc. following a ~$515.7M equity acquisition closed 2012-12-10, and has asserted the '845 and its family against genuine competitors — PCT International (5:13-cv-00135) and Corning (5:16-cv-00162, culminating in a willful-infringement award affirmed by the Federal Circuit in 2018). No NPE signal is present; the only unresolved items are the reel/frame and recording correspondent for the 2013 entry, which I could not retrieve and have deliberately left blank.

Verify at: USPTO Assignment Center (search "8485845" or "13/726,356"); cross-check Google Patents legal events for US8485845B2 and Unified Patents portal entry for US-8485845-B2.

I'll research this patent and its prior art citations. Let me start with several searches.

Let me get the specific cited references on the patent's face.

I found the key search report. Let me dig deeper into the specific citations.

US 8,485,845 — "Continuity Maintaining Biasing Member"

1. Identity confirmation (literal identifiers)

This is the patent you asked about, not a similar number — no auto-correction was applied to any identifier.

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2. Method and source note

The Google Patents "front page" reference list for US 8,485,845 is unusually long (hundreds of U.S. patents and published applications, plus foreign documents such as CA 2096710, CN 101060690, and others, and a Non-Patent Citation: "Digicon AVL Connector," ARRIS Group Inc.). I could not retrieve that entire list verbatim in this session; the most authoritative, retrieval-grounded prior-art mapping I obtained is the International Search Report and ISR citation categories for the parent PCT application PCT/US2012/031185 (WO 2012/135482), which claims priority to the same 13/075,406 filing and therefore governs the same disclosure. That ISR expressly categorizes the references below, including one "X" (anticipatory) reference. Where I could not independently confirm a full front-page citation, I say so rather than inventing it.

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3. The most relevant prior art (from the ISR for the parent PCT/US2012/031185)

The ISR legend defines "X" as: "document of particular relevance; the claimed invention cannot be considered novel or cannot be considered to involve an inventive step when the document is taken alone." That is the § 102-type citation category. "A" documents "define the general state of the art" and are not considered particularly relevant.

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4. Detailed entries

A. US 2004/0077215 A1 — Palinkas et al. (the key § 102 reference)

• Full citation: US 2004/0077215 A1, "Coaxial cable F connector with improved RFI sealing," Raymond Palinkas et al. Published 2004-04-22. Same disclosure granted as US 6,716,062 B1 (Apr. 6, 2004). Filed 2002 (priority 2002-10).
• Description: A coaxial F-connector with a nut, a post having a flange, a coil spring, a connector body and a compression ring. The nut is axially movable between a rest position (held by a spring) and a second position displaced by compression of the spring upon threading onto a port. Palinkas describes a spring acting between the nut and the post/body so the nut is biased toward its rest position and metal-to-metal contact is maintained between the post flange and the port shaft.
• § 102 mapping (per the ISR's "X" designation): Palinkas was cited as anticipating claims 1, 5, 8, 14, 17, 19, and 20 of the PCT claim set — i.e., the independent connector claim (post + connector body + coupling element + biasing member biasing the coupling element toward the post), plus dependent claims directed to the biasing member being an oversized O-ring (claim 8-type), the biasing member resisting degradation/rust (17-type), and the biasing-force direction / grounding-reliability limitations (19, 20-type).

B. US 7,794,275 B2 — Julio Filipe Rodrigues (secondary/background art)

• Full citation: US 7,794,275 B2, Julio Filipe Rodrigues. Granted 2010-09-14. (Family includes CA 2628652 A1, published 2008-11-01, and US 2008/0274644 A1.)
• Description: Coaxial cable connector art dealing with connector-body/post/nut engagement and continuity structure in the same general field (inner sleeve/coupling and grounding contact).
• § 102 mapping: Cited only as "A" against claims 1–23 — i.e., general background, not anticipation. Cited for context on the connector architecture, not as a § 102 reference.

C. US 7,455,550 B1 — Michael Timothy Sykes (secondary/background art)

• Full citation: US 7,455,550 B1, "Coaxial cable connector," Michael Timothy Sykes. Granted 2008-11-25. (Family: CN 101552386 A, published 2009-10-07.)
• Description: Coaxial cable connector structure cited for its abstract and claim 1.
• § 102 mapping: Cited as "A" against claims 1–23 — background art only, not an anticipation reference.

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5. Bottom line on § 102

• US 2004/0077215 A1 (Palinkas) / US 6,716,062 B1 is the single most relevant prior-art patent citation identified for the US 8,485,845 family. It is the only reference the examiner/search authority placed in the "X" (anticipation) category, mapped to the independent connector claim and several dependent claims (1, 5, 8, 14, 17, 19, 20 of the PCT set). Any § 102 challenge to US 8,485,845 would center on Palinkas.
• US 7,794,275 B2 (Rodrigues) and US 7,455,550 B1 (Sykes) were cited only as "A" — relevant field background but not anticipatory.
• Note the practical caveat: the ISR claim numbers refer to the PCT claim set (23 claims). The U.S. granted claim set is different (44 claims), with rewritten independent claims 1, 14 and 23 and added limitations (e.g., the "substantially orthogonal shaped cavity," the "non-circular cavity," "over-sized O-ring having an axial dimension larger than the axial depth of the cavity/gap," and the non-metallic/non-conductive sealing limitation). Palinkas's spring-based disclosure maps primarily onto the broader, earlier claim language; its fit against the granted U.S. claims is what the related reexamination papers (PTAB/USPTO proceedings in the PPC family) argue about, and those papers show the examiner declined to adopt several proposed Palinkas-based rejections (e.g., for lack of disclosure that Palinkas's metal-to-metal flange contact is resiliently deformable).

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6. Limitations / confidence

• High confidence: the identity of US 8,485,845; the ISR's X/A categorization of Palinkas, Rodrigues, and Sykes for the parent PCT/US2012/031185.
• Lower confidence / not confirmed: the complete front-page "References Cited" list of US 8,485,845. I confirmed it is very extensive (hundreds of U.S. patents/applications, foreign documents such as CA 2096710 and CN 101060690, and the ARRIS "Digicon AVL Connector" non-patent citation) but did not retrieve every entry. If you need the exhaustive front-page list enumerated with individual § 102 mappings, I would pull the granted patent's column-1/column-2 (56) reference block directly from the USPTO PatentCenter/patent PDF rather than infer it.

Would you like me to retrieve the complete front-page reference block for US 8,485,845 (all US/foreign patent documents and the NPL citations) and run a per-reference § 102 mapping against the granted 44-claim set?

I'll start by gathering the prior-art references associated with this patent, since the page text provided omits the "References Cited" / "Prior Art" listings.

Let me pull the specific prior-art references cited against this patent family, including the PCT search report and any IPR proceedings involving the '845 patent.

Obviousness Analysis — U.S. Patent No. 8,485,845 B2

"Continuity maintaining biasing member" — Ehret, Haube, Montena & Zraik; PPC Broadband, Inc. (originally John Mezzalingua Associates); App. No. 13/726,356, filed Dec. 24, 2012; priority Mar. 30, 2011 (parent 13/075,406, now U.S. 8,366,481); 44 claims.

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0. Threshold note on the "Prior Art" section (read this first)

Two honesty caveats before the analysis:

1. The Google Patents page for US8485845 does not contain a conventional "Prior Art" listing of references. Its "Prior Art" panel renders only prior-art keywords — "coupling element; connector; post; connector body; biasing" — and the full text supplied to me reproduces the description, claims (through claim 23, truncated mid-sentence) and drawings list, but omits the front-page "References Cited" block. I therefore reconstructed the art of record from (a) the USPTO/docket copy of the '845 front page, (b) the PCT search report for the family (WO2012/135482 A3), and (c) the PTAB/Federal Circuit record on sibling patents. Where I could not verify a reference's substance, I say so.

2. The claim text supplied is incomplete. Claim 23 breaks off at "…wherein t", and claims 24–44 are absent. My analysis of the independent claims (1, 14) is complete; my analysis of claim 23 is necessarily partial, and I cannot opine on claims 24–44 at all.

Sources: https://patents.google.com/patent/US8485845/en ; https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/39/02/e5/2682829c516928/WO2012135482A3.pdf ; https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/New_York_Northern_District_Court/5--16-cv-00162/PPC_Broadband_Inc._v._Corning_Optical_Communications_RF_LLC/docs/1/6.pdf

Art of record / closely related art identified

The PCT ISR designated Palinkas alone (US 2004/0077215 A1 / US 6,716,062) as "X" — i.e., taking novelty/inventive step alone — against claims 1, 5, 8, 14, 17, 19, 20 of the PCT claim set, with Rodrigues '275 and Sykes '550 listed as "A" (background). Caution: those are the PCT claim numbers and must not be mapped 1:1 onto the '845's U.S. claim numbers without the PCT claim text in hand.

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1. Governing standard and the POSITA

• §103 / KSR: a claim is obvious where the differences between the claimed subject matter and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious to a POSITA at the time of invention. Motivation may come from the references themselves, from the "ordinary creativity" of a POSITA, from design incentives/market forces, or from a finite number of identified, predictable solutions. KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398 (2007).
• Objective indicia must be considered and weighed. In PPC Broadband, Inc. v. Corning Optical Commc'ns RF, LLC, 815 F.3d 734 (Fed. Cir. 2016) ("PPC I"), the court held that substantial evidence supported the Board's finding that long-felt need, failure of others, and copying did not overcome the strong obviousness case on PPC's sibling continuity patents (the '320, '060 and '353), but that the Board erred on commercial success (improper refusal to apply the presumption where the commercial product was shown to practice the claims). On remand (IPR2013-00345, Decision on Remand) the Board again found the '353 claims obvious; a 2018 nonprecedential Federal Circuit remand repeated the criticisms. https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/IPR2013-00345/.../Order-86-Decision_on_Remand.pdf
• POSITA: per the unrebutted IPR record — an engineering bachelor's degree plus several years' experience in the cable/telecommunications industry relating to design, manufacture or use of coaxial cable connectors. Corning Ex. 1062 (Eldering Decl.), ¶10.
• Presumption of validity / clear-and-convincing: this is an examiner-side, preponderance-style analysis. In litigation the same grounds must be proved by clear and convincing evidence.

Priority date for art purposes: March 30, 2011. All references below pre-date it.

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2. Claim 1 decomposed (the limitations that need to be met)

Claim 14 is a parallel independent apparatus claim adding: an internal wall whose axial length exceeds the radial length of the lip contact surface; a gap between body contact surface and nut lip shaped to permit relative axial movement and to permit continuity disruption; the biasing structure in that gap; non-metallic/non-conductive with a physical seal; and an over-sized O-ring whose axial dimension exceeds the gap depth.

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3. Ground 1 (primary): Palinkas alone, or Palinkas + ARRIS Digicon AVL

3.1 What Palinkas teaches

US 6,716,062 (preferred embodiment) is a five-piece F connector: internally threaded nut 12, post 14 with flange 26 and stem 28, coil spring 16, body 18, compression ring 20.

• "the nut is axially movable to a limited degree with respect to the post … between a first, or rest position, in which it is held by the spring prior to threading the nut onto the shaft, and a second position, wherein the nut is axially displaced by a maximum distance from the rest position" → limitation (c)'s two-position axial nut movement.
• Spring captured between the underside of the post flange and the deformed (peened) end of the nut (emb. 1), or between the post flange and an integrally formed flange on the inside of the nut (emb. 2) → a biasing member in a cavity bounded by a radial shoulder and an axial wall.
• "the connector of the invention permits further threaded engagement of the nut and shaft by compression of the spring upon continued rotation of the nut as the latter moves axially" → exactly claim 1's "as the coupling element moves between the first position … and the second position" and claim 4's force-opposing-threading relationship, and Palinkas expressly contemplates rotation during axial movement.
• "Conversely, when the threaded connection is removed, the spring moves the nut back to its … rest position" → biasing toward the post/flange.
• Title and stated purpose: improved RFI sealing at the interface port → the same problem the '845 addresses (continuity/RF leakage/grounding).
• Common assignee (John Mezzalingua Assocs. → PPC). This does not remove it as prior art — it published/issued in 2004, well before the March 30, 2011 priority date, so it is §102(b) art notwithstanding common ownership.

Gap analysis vs. claim 1. Palinkas' spring reacts against the post flange, not against a body contact surface; and its spring is metallic. Claim 1's limitations (b)/(d) (body contact surface as the reaction surface) and (g) (non-metallic, non-conductive) are therefore not squarely met by Palinkas alone. The PCT ISR's "X" designation against PCT claims 1/5/8/14/17/19/20 is therefore best read as directed at a broader PCT claim set; for the issued U.S. claim 1 as written, a second reference is the cleaner path.

3.2 Why a POSITA would modify Palinkas

1. Same field, same problem, same solution family — all references are F-type coaxial connectors addressing RF leakage/grounding when a nut is not fully seated.
2. A finite, predictable set of design options: a person seeking a "constant force" nut in 2011 had essentially (i) a coil spring, (ii) a Belleville/wave washer, or (iii) a resilient elastomeric element (O-ring). Choosing (iii) is not inventive discovery; it is selection among known, predictable alternatives. KSR, 550 U.S. at 421.
3. The '845's own background supplies the motivation (see §6 below).

3.3 The ARRIS Digicon AVL Connector (NPL)

The Digicon AVL connector datasheet — retrieved from ARRIS's public website on April 22, 2010, and cited on the face of the '845 itself — describes an F-connector product marketed around constant-force/axial "AVL" nut travel and continuity maintenance. It is admissible as a printed publication and is the kind of industry product literature that a POSITA would consult. Its presence in the applicant's own IDS is an implicit admission that it is analogous art; Corning likewise relied on it in district-court invalidity contentions against this family (US9203167.pdf, LIT-contentions list). Caveat: I have not re-verified the Digicon AVL's exact internal structure from primary source in this session, so I would not rest claim 1 on it standing alone; it is best used as corroborating evidence of the industry trend toward resilient, non-metallic, spring-equivalent biasing elements.

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4. Ground 2: Palinkas + Matthews (US 2006/0110977 A1), optionally + Tatsuzuki (JP 2002-015823)

This is the combination the Board actually adjudicated across PPC's sibling continuity patents, and the Board's and Federal Circuit's treatment maps directly onto the '845's claim language.

• Matthews discloses a coaxial connector having post 40 (with flange 46), a coupler/nut 30, and connector body 50, and expressly teaches that a connector may be formed of conductive or non-conductive materials or combinations, including a metal coating on a polymer. Corning's petition relied on Matthews ¶0030 for the "conductive coating" limitation and on its disclosure of the body/post/nut geometry as the structural host for a continuity element. Corning Ex. 1004/1007, reproduced in the IPR2013 filings.
• Tatsuzuki discloses a continuity member 13 comprising a disc-like portion 13a and resilient, arched flexible portions 13b that "flex and retain consistent physical and electrical contact," "ensuring continuity of an electrical path … even when the coupler 30 moves." That is a resilient member seated in the nut/body region, deflecting axially as the nut moves — structurally and functionally the same role as the '845's biasing member.
• The Board found this combination rendered the '353/'320/'060 claims obvious under BRI. The Federal Circuit's only reversal was on the temporal requirement of the phrase "maintain electrical continuity," which the court construed to require continuity during specified periods of operation — a construction the Board had not applied. PPC I, 815 F.3d at 743–45.

Why this matters for the '845: claim 1 recites precisely that temporal/dynamic element — biasing "…as the coupling element moves between the first position … and the second position … and electrically contacts the post." Palinkas supplies that dynamism expressly ("by compression of the spring upon continued rotation of the nut as the latter moves axially"), which is a stronger teaching on the temporal point than Tatsuzuki was found to be. Palinkas+Matthews (+Tatsuzuki) therefore attacks claim 1's core from two directions at once.

Motivation to combine (articulable, per KSR and the Board's approach):

• Both are in the same field of art and address the same problem (maintaining a ground/RF path across a movable threaded interface).
• Matthews' body/nut cavity provides the very reaction surface (body contact surface) that Palinkas' spring lacks — the combination is a simple substitution of a cooperative structural environment, not a redesign.
• The Digicon AVL product literature shows the industry was already moving to integrated constant-force biasing, supplying a market/design incentive.

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5. Ground 3: Palinkas + Rodrigues '275 and/or Sykes '550 (the sealing-element route)

Claims 1(f) ("physical seal") and 14 (seal) require an elastomeric seal, and claim 1(g)/14 require a non-metallic, non-conductive body.

• Rodrigues US 7,794,275 discloses an O-ring cooperating with a sleeve-ring/ramp arrangement (FIGS. 3–4, 4a) — an elastomeric O-ring deployed in the nut/body/post region of an F-connector.
• Sykes US 7,455,550 (an "A" reference on the ISR) is a coaxial-connector sealing/grounding reference.
• The '845's own specification admits the pre-existence of metallic conductive O-rings used in coaxial connectors to maintain continuity, calling them "insufficient over time due to the corrosion, rusting, and overall degradation of the metallic O-ring." An express admission that O-rings for continuity/sealing were known; swapping the metallic O-ring for an elastomeric one is textbook substitution of a known material for a known purpose with predictable results (KSR; In re Harza).

Combined rationale: From Palinkas take the axially displaceable, spring-biased nut on a flanged post; from Rodrigues/Sykes (or Matthews' O-ring disclosure) take the resilient, non-metallic O-ring seated in the nut/body cavity; the substitution both (i) provides the recitation-foreseen bias and (ii) inherently yields the claimed seal — a known technique used to improve a similar device in the same way (KSR).

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6. Motivation supplied by the patent's own admissions (a strong §103 lever)

The '845's Background is, in substance, an articulation of the problem statement and a roadmap:

These are applicant-admitted prior-art problems. Under KSR, where the patent itself frames the invention as selecting a resilient, non-corrodible material to solve two admitted problems, the non-obviousness case must rest on something more than the material choice.

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7. Dependent claims — where the grounds land

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8. Anticipation overlay (§102)

The PCT search report's "X" rating of Palinkas against PCT claims 1, 5, 8, 14, 17, 19, 20 signals that the examiner considered Palinkas to disclose the whole of those claims (either anticipating or depriving of inventive step as a single reference). If the PCT claims correspond to the '845's independent and dependent claims on the spring-in-a-cavity-pointing notion, then a §102(a)/(b) anticipation attack on at least some claims is available in parallel with the §103 grounds — and, importantly, an anticipation finding by the ISA is evidence that the sole remaining delta for the issued claims is the material selection and the body-side reaction surface, both of which are the subject of Grounds 1 and 3.

I have not verified the PCT claim text in this session, so I do not assert a specific 1:1 mapping to the '845's claim numbers.

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9. Objective indicia in the family — and how they cut

The '845 belongs to the same commercial/technical program (PPC "SignalTight") that was litigated:

• In PPC I (Fed. Cir. 2016) the court held substantial evidence supported rejecting PPC's long-felt but unresolved need, failure of others, and copying as insufficient to overcome the strong obviousness challenge; the commercial-success determination was vacated and remanded because the Board wrongly refused to apply the presumption of nexus where the product was shown to practice the claims.
• On remand (IPR2013-00345, 11/16/2016) the Board again found the claims unpatentable over Matthews + Tatsuzuki; a 2018 nonprecedential remand (Nos. 2017-1362/-1363/-1364, decided July 3, 2018) again vacated for the same repeated errors (insufficient factual findings on the combination; mishandling commercial success; failure to weigh copying/failure-of-others).

Bottom line on secondary considerations for the '845: the strongest available counterweight is commercial success with a presumption of nexus (a large installed base of PPC continuity connectors) plus copying and failure of others. But PPC I instructs that those latter two were already found insufficient once, so the realistic battleground is the nexus/scope of the commercial-success evidence for the specific products alleged to practice the '845's claims (as opposed to the '353/'320/'060 claims).

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10. Conclusion

(1) Strongest single combination: Palinkas (US 6,716,062 / US 2004/0077215) in view of Matthews (US 2006/0110977 A1), optionally further in view of Tatsuzuki (JP 2002-015823) — a combination already adjudicated against PPC's sibling continuity patents and reversed only on a construction of "maintain electrical continuity" that the '845's claim 1 dynamism (Palinkas' spring compressed "upon continued rotation of the nut") arguably satisfies.

(2) Strongest alternative combination: Palinkas in view of Rodrigues '275 and/or Sykes '550 (or Matthews' O-ring disclosure) for the non-metallic, non-conductive, sealing O-ring limitation — supported by the applicant's own admission that metallic O-rings in coaxial connectors corrode, degrade and permanently deform under torque.

(3) Motivation is well supported by (i) identity of field and problem; (ii) a finite set of predictable alternatives (coil spring / Belleville / elastomeric ring); (iii) the '845's own admissions of the problem and of metallic O-rings in the art; (iv) the ARRIS Digicon AVL commercial "constant-force" product literature cited in the patent's own IDS; and (v) the KSR-sanctioned design incentive to integrate the seal and the bias function into one part.

(4) Likely-fatal limitations for the patentee: claim 1's material limitation ("substantially non-metallic and non-conductive"), the "physical seal," and the "result-effective variable" force relationships. Likely-survivable (or at least genuinely contestable): claim 23's "non-circular cavity," and whatever claims 24–44 recite — neither of which I could evaluate from the supplied text.

(5) Required verification before relying on this opinion in a filing: (a) the full text of claims 23–44 of the '845; (b) the PCT claim set referenced by the ISR so the "X" ratings can be mapped onto the U.S. claims; (c) primary-source confirmation of the ARRIS Digicon AVL disclosure; (d) the priority dates of any secondary references (e.g., US 8,636,541, "Enhanced coaxial connector continuity," whose snippet discloses an O-ring in a body groove "for contacting the nut … to tension contact between the nut and the post" and which, if its priority pre-dates 3/30/2011, would be highly material to claims 1, 8 and 14, but which I have not date-verified).

This is a technical/analyst assessment, not a legal conclusion of invalidity; validity is presumed and any litigation ground must be proven by clear and convincing evidence.