Invalidity dossier
US 8285961
Dynamic performance virtualization for disk access
Current assignee: Grid Iron Systems Inc
Added 10/21/2026, 12:01:04 PM
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Patent summary
Title, assignee, inventors, filing/issue dates, abstract, and a plain-language overview of the claims.
Patent Overview: US 8,285,961 B2
Title: Dynamic performance virtualization for disk access
Patent number: US 8,285,961 B2 (application US 12/616,705; published also as US 2010/0122020 A1)
Inventors: Som Sikdar and Erik de la Iglesia
Assignee (original): Grid Iron Systems Inc. The source lists current assignee as "Grid Iron Systems Inc" and "Innovations in Memory LLC."
Key dates: Priority date 2008-11-13; filing date 2009-11-11; publication date 2012-10-09. Google Patents lists legal status as "Active" with an adjusted expiration of 2030-08-05, noting this is an assumption, not a legal conclusion.
Purpose: The patent addresses managing how block-level storage on disk storage arrays is delivered to servers. The background explains that such storage is organized as volumes of logical units (LU) accessed as blocks, and that the principal performance metrics for a volume are capacity, IOPs (input/output operations per second), latency, and throughput. It gives an example of a typical SCSI-disk array volume with latency of roughly 2–4 ms.
Plain-language scope (based on supplied text): The described system is a Performance Virtualization Appliance (PVA) providing "dynamic performance virtualization for disk access." Figures describe a tiering media, a virtualization controller with functional modules including a performance monitor, service enforcement logic, and resource allocation logic. The enforcement logic reportedly enforces service level agreements (flow diagrams in FIGS. 6–8), allocation logic performs resource allocation (FIG. 10), and a metric table is used (FIG. 11). Classification codes emphasize virtualization at the volume level, improving I/O performance, allocating resources to storage systems, monitoring storage devices, and distributed/networked storage such as SAN/NAS. The prior-art keywords listed are storage, different, disks, volumes, and performance. Specific claim language is not included in the supplied excerpt, so the precise scope of the claims is not established.
Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US8285961/en
What the excerpt does not establish: The full text of the claims; the detailed algorithms in FIGS. 6–10; the complete specification and figures; and any characterization of validity, enforceability, or prior art beyond the listed keywords and classifications.
Generated 10/21/2026, 12:01:09 PM
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Litigation summary
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PTAB challenges
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Assignment history
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Prior art
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Obviousness
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Extensions
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Derivative works
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