US 8393029

I'll search for authoritative information on US 8,393,029, including any 2026 CAFC activity.

Let me verify whether any 2026 Federal Circuit (CAFC) appeal involving this patent exists.

US 8,393,029 — Summary

Identifier note: The number in scope is US 8,393,029 B2 (seven digits after the comma‑separated 8). I did not find any 2026 Federal Circuit docket for this patent (see "CAFC 2026 docket" below). A separate search hit referred to a "'839 patent" in ST Case1Tech v. Squires, No. 23‑2305 (Fed. Cir. Oct. 9, 2025) — that is an unrelated Techiya/Samsung audio‑forensics patent, not 8,393,029, and should not be conflated.

Bibliographic data

Abstract

A device for cleaning an immersed surface includes a body, members for driving the body over the surface in a longitudinal direction including a wheel, a brushing device, and a mechanism for rotating the brushing device about a brushing axis. The rotating mechanism includes an internally toothed ring fixedly joined to a wheel, and a brush pinion fixedly joined to the brushing device and engaged in the ring of the drive wheel, such that rotation of the drive wheel brings about rotation of the brushing device about its brushing axis in the same rotation direction.

Independent claim 1 — plain language

A swimming-pool cleaner that travels along an immersed surface, comprising:

1. a body with an inlet and a separate outlet;
2. a pumping device that moves water from the inlet to the outlet;
3. a wheel with an internally toothed ring;
4. a brush assembly that contacts the surface, comprising a brush and a shaft the brush rotates about; and
5. a pinion that engages the internally toothed ring and is connected to the shaft, so that rotation of the wheel in a first direction causes the pinion and the brush to rotate in that same direction.

In short: the cleaner's drive wheel is also the power source for a separate scrubbing brush via a ring‑and‑pinion (internal gear) coupling, with no dedicated brush motor.

Dependent claims (2–7), briefly:

• 2: adds a filtering device between inlet and outlet through which water flows under action of the pumping device.
• 3: adds an electric motor and a wheel pinion engaging the internally toothed ring, rotated by the motor.
• 4: the motor has a drive shaft with a drive pinion, plus an intermediate pinion engaging the drive pinion.
• 5: adds an intermediate transmission shaft carrying both the intermediate pinion and the wheel pinion.
• 6: the brush pinion and wheel pinion have identical pitch and identical diameter.
• 7: the body has a forwardmost portion, and the wheel extends forward of that forwardmost portion.

(Plain-language claim readings are my own paraphrase of the granted claim text; the claim language itself is authoritative.)

Enforcement / litigation context (searches of public dockets)

• ITC Inv. No. 337‑TA‑1326 — instituted Aug. 29, 2022 on Zodiac's July 29, 2022 complaint, asserting claims 1, 2 and 7 of the '029 patent (and claims 1–4 of the '031 patent) against Wybotics Co. Ltd. (d/b/a Winny Pool Cleaner), Tianjin Pool & Spa Corp., and Shenzhen Aiper/Aiper Intelligent/Aiper Inc. Terminated as to Wybotics (Feb. 21, 2023) and the parallel C.D. Cal. case, No. 2:22‑cv‑05271, was voluntarily dismissed without prejudice (Mar. 29, 2023).
• E.D. Tex., Zodiac Pool Systems LLC v. Wybotics Co. Ltd., No. 2:25‑cv‑00582 — complaint filed May 23, 2025, amended Sept. 22, 2025; asserts the '029 patent (claim 1 and reservation of others) plus the '031 and camera patents, alleging willfulness tied to a Feb. 12, 2016 notice letter and to the prior ITC action.
• C.D. Cal., Wybotics Inc. v. Zodiac Pool Systems LLC, No. 2:25‑cv‑08526 — Wybotics declaratory-judgment action filed Sept. 9, 2025 seeking non‑infringement and invalidity of the '029 and '031 patents.
• PTAB: the IPR petitions filed Nov. 25, 2025 (IPR2026‑00158/‑00159/‑00160) challenge only the camera/vision patents (11,003,191; 11,262,766; 11,880,207) — not the '029 patent.

CAFC 2026 docket — uncertainty flag

I could not locate any Federal Circuit docket in 2026 involving US 8,393,029, and I found no appellate ruling, briefing, or docket entry referencing this patent. Based on the available 2026 information, the '029 patent is being litigated at the district-court and (previously) ITC levels, with IPR activity centered on the later camera patents. If a 2026 Federal Circuit appeal tied to this patent exists, it is not reflected in the sources I retrieved, and I cannot confirm it — treat any such assertion as unverified.

Note: bibliographic and claim data above are taken from the authoritative patent text; litigation details come from public docket/reporting sources and should be confirmed against the live dockets before being relied upon.

I'll research litigation involving US patent 8393029 using the litigation databases and patent records.

Let me dig deeper into each specific case.

Let me verify the two 2025 cases and confirm which patents each asserts.

Litigation Involving U.S. Patent No. 8,393,029

I searched litigation databases (Unified Patents litigation portal, Justia Dockets, Federal Register notices, ITC records, and law-firm case descriptions). US 8,393,029 ("the '029 patent," Pichon et al., assigned to Zodiac Pool Care Europe SAS) has been asserted in the following matters. All known assertions involve the same patent family (U.S. 8,393,029 and its sibling U.S. 8,393,031) against robotic pool-cleaner competitors.

Note: The four matters below are exactly the litigation entries listed on the patent's Google Patents record. The '029 and '031 patents were asserted together in the 2022 matters; the 2025 matters add camera/"vision" patents.

1. ITC Investigation No. 337‑TA‑1326 — Certain Robotic Pool Cleaners and Components Thereof

Sources: 87 Fed. Reg. (Notice of Investigation, Aug. 29, 2022); ITC termination notice (Mar. 17/20, 2023); law-firm case descriptions (Kilpatrick Townsend; Vinson & Elkins).

2. Zodiac Pool Care Europe v. Wybotics Co. Ltd. et al., No. 2:22‑cv‑05271 (C.D. Cal.)

Sources: Unified Patents litigation portal (2:22-cv-05271); law-firm case descriptions (Kilpatrick Townsend; Vinson & Elkins); Justia/Ex Parte docket summaries.

3. Zodiac Pool Systems LLC et al. v. Wybotics, Co. Ltd., No. 2:25‑cv‑00582 (E.D. Tex.)

Sources: Justia Dockets (2:2025cv00582); Ex Parte complaint-analysis page; Wybotics HKEX listing document (Apr. 2026).

4. Wybotics Inc. v. Zodiac Pool Systems LLC, No. 2:25‑cv‑08526 (C.D. Cal.)

Sources: USPTO PTAB stipulation referencing "CDCA 2:25-cv-08526 CAS (AGRx)" litigation; Wybotics HKEX listing document (Apr. 2026).

Summary

• Total known matters touching the '029 patent: four (one ITC investigation, three district-court actions) — all involving Zodiac (patent owner) against Wybotics/Tianjin Wangyuan and/or Aiper.
• Concluded: ITC 337‑TA‑1326 (terminated Mar. 2023) and C.D. Cal. 2:22‑cv‑05271 (closed/settled) — both part of the same 2022 enforcement campaign, resolved without a final merits ruling on the '029 patent.
• Pending: E.D. Tex. 2:25‑cv‑00582 and C.D. Cal. 2:25‑cv‑08526, both filed in 2025.
• No Federal Circuit appeal specific to the '029 patent appears in the record.

Confidence and caveats

• High confidence: the existence, parties, case numbers, jurisdictions, and 2022/2023 outcomes of items 1–3, drawn from Federal Register notices, ITC termination orders, and docket records.
• Moderate confidence: item 4's precise contours. The case number 2:25‑cv‑08526 and its existence are corroborated by a USPTO PTAB filing, but I could not confirm the full caption in a docket entry within my searches.
• I did not find, and cannot represent, that any case produced a judgment of infringement or invalidity of the '029 patent; the record indicates the 2022 matters ended by settlement/consent order/withdrawal before trial.
• If you need certified docket-level detail (e.g., PACER complaint exhibits confirming which claims of '029 are charted in each 2025 suit), that would require direct PACER retrieval, which I could not complete here.

I'll verify the structured "no proceedings" signal against live sources before concluding.

Let me run a couple more targeted checks to rule out any older or differently-indexed AIA proceeding on the '029 patent.

Proceedings overview

Zero AIA trial proceedings on file for US 8,393,029. The structured USPTO ODP block returns no IPR, PGR, or CBM for this patent, and my independent searches of PTAB filings, PTAB E2E/docket aggregators, and Zodiac-related docket reporting surfaced none — not a single petition, institution decision, FWD, or appeal. Breakdown by status: active 0, claims invalidated 0, claims sustained 0, settled 0, institution denied 0. Bottom line for a defendant: all seven claims of the '029 patent — including independent claim 1 — remain untested in any AIA forum. The patent is not "hardened" by a PTAB win, and it is not weakened by a PTAB loss; its validity is an open question that has never been put to the Board. That cuts against the patent owner on one narrow point (the claims have never been scrubbed, and the Board has never blessed them) and against a defendant on a bigger one: there is no cancellation order, no estoppel-laden FWD, and no PTAB record to mine for invalidity arguments. There is no short "the claims are dead" answer here.

Proceedings on US 8,393,029

None. I will not manufacture proceeding numbers to fill this section. There is no IPR20XX-XXXXX naming 8,393,029 as the challenged patent in any source I retrieved, so there is nothing to report under the requested per-proceeding headings (type, panel, grounds, institution, FWD, settlement, appeal, defensive value).

What I checked, and what I found instead (adjacent matters — NOT on this patent)

The Wybotics petitions were filed the same day Wybotics filed its parallel stipulation, in which it agreed that if the Board institutes the three camera-patent IPRs it "will not pursue invalidity grounds with respect to the challenged claims under 35 U.S.C. §§ 102 or 103 or for indefiniteness" in Zodiac v. Wybotics, No. 2:25-cv-00582 (E.D. Tex.) and Wybotics v. Zodiac, No. 2:25-cv-08526 (C.D. Cal.), reserving those grounds if institution is denied. See the stipulation PDF at ptacts.uspto.gov petitions/1558741. Reporting indicates institution was granted in IPR2026-00158/‑159/‑160 (aggregator status "Trial Instituted" as of 2026-08-24, ipverse.greyb.com); I could not retrieve the Board's institution decision text itself, so verify the institution date and any § 314(a)/§ 325(d) reasoning directly on PTAB E2E before relying on it.

Why the '029 patent was left out of that IPR wave is itself the single most useful fact here. Wybotics' C.D. Cal. declaratory-judgment complaint (filed 2025-09-09) asked for a declaration that US 8,393,029 and US 8,393,031 are invalid, and Wybotics filed its IPRs on 2025-11-25 against only the three camera patents. That is consistent with the 35 U.S.C. § 315(a)(1) bar: a petitioner that files a civil action challenging validity before its IPR petition is barred from IPR on that patent. In plain terms, Wybotics litigated the § 315(a)(1) sequencing and bought its IPR rights on the camera patents at the cost of its IPR rights on the '029 and '031 patents. Also note the 2026-04-24 Hong Kong Stock Exchange listing document (Wybotics prospectus) stating Zodiac's amended U.S. complaint asserts the '029 and '031 patents for "prior gear configuration" and "prior filter-basket configuration."

⚠️ Contradiction check: The prior summary's "no 2026 CAFC docket" conclusion is consistent with everything I found. I found no Federal Circuit appeal, and none could exist for this patent absent a Board decision, which has not occurred.

Strategic summary

Claim status: 100% untested. Claims 1–7 of US 8,393,029 are neither canceled nor sustained in any AIA proceeding — there is no PTAB narrowing, no certificate of cancellation, no substitute claims. Every claim Zodiac has asserted (claim 1 alone in the current E.D. Tex. case; claims 1, 2 and 7 in the 2022 ITC investigation) is live and unadjudicated. Any statement that claims of this patent "have been invalidated" or "survived IPR" is unsupported.

Estoppel landscape: essentially empty. Because no petitioner has taken an IPR to FWD against the '029 patent, no § 315(e)(2) estoppel attaches to this patent at all — not against Wybotics (which is instead locked out of IPR by § 315(a)(1)) and not against anyone else. Practically, that means a defendant in a current or future case retains the full prior-art universe for invalidity: IPRs, § 282 district-court defenses, and any DJ counterclaim are all unconstrained by a prior Board record. The inverse is also true: there is no IPR-driven stay leverage and no FWD findings a court must respect. The only estoppel-adjacent artifact is the Wybotics stipulation, and by its terms it reaches only "the challenged claims" of the three camera patents — not '029.

Pattern signals. (1) An accused infringer (Wybotics) did file IPRs against this patent family — just not this patent, and the § 315(a)(1) bar explains the gap. (2) No defensive aggregator (Unified Patents, RPX, etc.) appears anywhere in the '029 chain; the IPR filers here are a directly accused competitor. (3) Patent owner Zodiac has a long PTAB history in both directions — it was a prolific petitioner in the pool-cleaner space (IPR2013-00159 against Aqua Products, In re Aqua Products, Fed. Cir. 2016) and is now a patent owner facing three instituted camera-patent IPRs. It has not been forced to defend the '029 patent at the Board, so there is no evidence yet of how aggressively it would litigate a PTAB trial on this patent.

Recommended next steps

• Defendant / accused infringer: Do not assume the absence of IPRs means the patent is strong; it means it is untested. The most valuable immediate step is a § 315(b) / § 315(a)(1) sequencing analysis before you file anything. If you are sued first, the one-year § 315(b) clock runs from service of the complaint; if you file a DJ action first, you may bar yourself from IPR (that is precisely the trap Wybotics appears to have fallen into on the '029 patent). Sequence IPR before DJ if you want Board review.
• Invalidity posture: With no FWD and no estoppel, you can present the strongest art in whichever forum you choose. The references already cited in the Zodiac IPR ecosystem — e.g., US 4,168,557 (Rasch), US 3,322,787 (Myers), US 3,936,899 / US 3,822,754 (Henkin), EP 0 905 334 (Weda), EP 0 565 226, FR 2 729 995, and US 5,337,434 — are the obvious starting points against claim 1's ring-and-pinion/wheel-driven-brush combination, along with the prosecution-history citation of US 2,123,3xx and US 3,093,383 to Taylor.
• If you are the patent owner (Zodiac): The absence of PTAB activity on '029 is a defensive asset — no cancellation order to work around, and claims 1–7 remain available to assert. The exposure is symmetric: an accused infringer who sequences correctly can take a first swing at these claims at the Board with no prior estoppel and no adverse precedent.
• Verify before relying. No per-proceeding sections are provided because there are none; confirm the null result yourself on PTAB E2E (search by patent number 8,393,029) and on the USPTO Patent Center / ODP AIA-trial endpoint, since the ODP index occasionally lags recently filed petitions.

Confidence: High that no AIA trial proceeding on US 8,393,029 exists as of the sources retrieved (2026-10-01). Medium on the exact institutional status/dates of IPR2026-00158/‑159/‑160, which concern different patents and should be verified on PTAB E2E.

I'll research the assignment record for US 8,393,029 across USPTO records, SEC filings, and corporate-history sources.

Assignment & Ownership Analysis — US 8,393,029 B2

Scope note / sourcing limitation (stated up front): The live USPTO Assignment Center record could not be fully rendered through the retrieval tools available in this session (direct queries to assignmentcenter.uspto.gov returned no parseable record payload). What follows is built from (a) the authoritative patent text's own legal‑events table, which is derived from USPTO assignment data, and (b) corroborating corporate filings (INPI/RNE, Fluidra/Zodiac corporate disclosures) and the litigation record already established. Where I could not retrieve a field — notably the correspondent of record — I say so rather than infer it. All reel/frame citations are to the record as reported in the patent's legal‑events data; a live verification pass at https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ is recommended before any of this is relied upon.

Inventors

Pattern notes — no red flags:

• Both inventors executed the assignment in favour of Zodiac Pool Care Europe, i.e., the operating employer, which is the standard employee-invention fact pattern for a company-owned French priority filing (FR 0708993, filed 2007‑12‑21).
• No evidence of inventor departure within 12 months of filing, and no evidence of any inventor-entity (e.g., a Pichon/Mastio holding company) appearing anywhere in the chain. There is no "inventor assigns to his own LLC, LLC sells to a litigator" pattern here.
• Timing of the assignment is not a fire-sale tell: effective 2010‑09‑08 / recorded 2010‑09‑20, i.e., ~2 years 9 months after the 2007 priority date and around U.S. national-phase entry — consistent with routine recordation for a PCT national-phase case, not with a liquidation.
• The only oddity is a bibliographic data artifact: the Google Patents priority table lists a stray "DE0708993" entry alongside FR0708993 and PCT/FR2008/052336. This appears to be a database artifact rather than a distinct German priority filing, and it has no bearing on the assignment chain.

Original assignee

Zodiac Pool Care Europe (rendered on the face of the patent and in current‑assignee data as Zodiac Pool Care Europe SAS), ZA de la Balme, 31450 Belberaud, France.

• Legal form / status: Société par actions simplifiée unipersonnelle (SASU), SIREN 395 068 679, registered with the RNE since 1999‑02‑24, business commenced 1994‑05‑01. Per the INPI extract dated 2025‑10‑05, the entity is active (corporate term to 2093), with a single shareholder and ZPES Holdings (SIREN 498 376 284, Bron, FR) as Président. So the French registrant is itself operating inside a small holding structure one level up — a normal group structure, not an NPE artifact.
• Line of business: Design, manufacture and commercialization of swimming-pool and basin equipment ("Conception, fabrication, commercialisation des matériels pour équipement de piscines et bassins"), APE 4669B / 2229A. This is a product company.
• Does it ship a product embodying the claims? Yes — Zodiac is a first-tier branded pool-equipment manufacturer (Zodiac®, Jandy®, Polaris®, AstralPool®, Cepex®, CTX Professional®, Gre® under the current parent). The '029 patent is one of a family of six sibling U.S. patents issued 2013‑03‑12 (US 8,393,030 / ‑031 / ‑032 / ‑033 / ‑034 / ‑035) all directed to the same submerged-surface cleaner platform, which is itself strong evidence of a real manufactured product line rather than a paper portfolio.
• Corporate history / current ownership:
  • Zodiac Pool Care Europe has been part of the Zodiac pool group (Zodiac Pool Solutions) since the late 1990s.
  • Corporate disclosures state that in 2012 Zodiac Pool Solutions and its European entity Zodiac Pool Care Europe separated from Z Marine, which went to Open Gate Capital. (I flag this as reported by the company's own marketing/legal notices rather than by a registry filing I retrieved directly — treat the exact 2012 mechanics as moderate confidence.)
  • In 2018 Zodiac combined with Fluidra, S.A. (Spanish-listed multinational). Fluidra is therefore the current ultimate parent of the record owner.
  • Crucially: this change of control is a share/acquisition event and does not appear as a recorded patent assignment. The '029 patent was not re-recorded to Fluidra or to any Fluidra subsidiary. That is why Google Patents still lists current assignee = Zodiac Pool Care Europe SAS = original assignee.
• Current status: Operating. No bankruptcy, no dissolution, no assignment out.

Assignment timeline

The Assignment Center record for this patent is thin: one recorded conveyance. This is itself the central finding.

• 2010‑09‑08 (executed) / recorded 2010‑09‑20 — Reel 025012 / Frame 0278
  • Conveyance: Assignment (Assignment of Assignors' Interest)
  • Assignors: Philippe Pichon, Mr.; Emmanuel Mastio, Mr. (joint inventors)
  • Assignee: Zodiac Pool Care Europe, Belberaud, France
  • Correspondent: Not retrievable from the sources available. The legal‑events record reports only "ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS' INTEREST (SEE DOCUMENT FOR DETAILS)" and does not expose the recording attorney/agent of record. I will not guess this field. Practical note: for a PCT national-phase case of this vintage, the correspondent is usually the U.S. firm prosecuting the national-phase entry, but the document itself must be pulled at https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ to confirm.
  • Context: Routine inventor-to-employer assignment on U.S. national-phase entry. Not a fire-sale, not a reorg, not a transfer to an asserter.

No further assignments are recorded. Specifically, and these are negative findings worth stating explicitly:

• No change-of-name recordation from "Zodiac Pool Care Europe" to "Zodiac Pool Care Europe SAS" (the SAS suffix appears in patent metadata but is not reflected as a recorded conveyance in the events data).
• No assignment to Fluidra, S.A. or any Fluidra/Zodiac U.S. affiliate (e.g., Zodiac Pool Systems LLC) following the 2018 combination.
• No security agreement, license, or release recorded against the patent in the retrieved data.
• No assignment to any entity in the years immediately preceding the 2022 or 2025 litigation.

Because there is a record (one), I continue to the analysis sections rather than stopping.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 8393029
    2007 : French priority filing FR0708993
    2008 : PCT application filed
    2010 : Inventors assign to Zodiac Pool Care Europe
    2011 : US pre-grant publication
    2013 : US patent issued
    2018 : Zodiac group combines with Fluidra
         : No patent assignment recorded
    2022 : First infringement action filed
    2025 : Follow-on suits filed

NPE / troll-pattern signals

One nuance worth stating so the analysis is not naive: the fact that a U.S. affiliate (Zodiac Pool Systems LLC) is a co-plaintiff while the French parent (Zodiac Pool Care Europe SAS) is the record owner is not an NPE tell — it is ordinary intra-group enforcement choreography (group entity holds title; U.S. operating subsidiary brings the case and supplies the market harm showing).

Verdict

Operating-company assertion.

The chain consists of a single recorded conveyance — inventor-to-employer, Reel 025012/0278, executed 2010‑09‑08 / recorded 2010‑09‑20 — leaving title with Zodiac Pool Care Europe SAS, the original applicant, a product-manufacturing SASU (INPI SIREN 395 068 679, active) that ships the claimed cleaner family and whose ultimate parent since 2018 is the operating group Fluidra, S.A. The patent was asserted ~11 years after its only assignment and has never passed through a shell LLC, an NPE list entity, or a defensive aggregator — the inverse of every classic troll-chain signal. The absence of any post-2018 recordation despite the Fluidra combination is expected (share purchase, not patent assignment) and confirms the record owner is unchanged.

Verify at: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (search patent number 8,393,029; request the underlying document for Reel 025012/0278 to capture the correspondent of record, which is the one field this analysis could not source). Mirror search interface: https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html

Confidence: High on the single-assignment finding, the assignee identity, and the operating-company verdict. Moderate on the 2012 Z Marine/Open Gate intermediate corporate step and on the corresponding INPI/HKEX-sourced litigation-side details (carried over from the prior sections and not re-verified here). Explicitly unresolved: the correspondent attorney/firm of record for Reel 025012/0278, which — if it were to recur across a Zodiac-family assignment pattern — would be the one place a repeat-player tell could hide. On the present record there is no recurrence to report.

I'll research the prior-art references cited on the face of US 8,393,029, verifying each citation where possible.

Let me verify the remaining cited references.

Prior-Art Analysis for U.S. Patent No. 8,393,029 B2

Patent in scope: US 8,393,029 B2 (not a similar number) — "Apparatus for cleaning a submerged surface including a brushing device driven by members for driving the apparatus on the submerged surface." Application 12/808,419; PCT/FR2008/052336; priority FR 0708993 (2007‑12‑21); filed 2008‑12‑17; issued 2013‑03‑12; inventors Pichon & Mastio; assignee Zodiac Pool Care Europe SAS.

Method / caveats. I used the authoritative citation lists on the face of the patent (Google Patents record for US 8,393,029, fetched 2026‑10‑01) as the definitive set of references, and verified individual references against Espacenet, FreePatentsOnline, and Google Patents where I could retrieve them. § 102 anticipation requires that a single reference disclose every limitation of a claim, arranged as claimed. My per‑claim anticipation calls below are preliminary screening conclusions, not formal invalidity opinions. Two citations on the face of the patent (US 21,233 A and US 3,097,383 A) are very old and/or carry garbled OCR metadata; I flag those explicitly rather than guess.

A. The 13 references cited on the face of US 8,393,029

The patent lists 13 "Patent Citations." Marked (E) = cited by examiner; the remainder are applicant/third‑party citations.

Non‑patent citation: International Search Report in PCT/FR2008/052336 (the ISR for this very application).

B. Reference‑by‑reference detail and § 102 assessment

Recall what independent claim 1 requires: (a) a body with inlet and separate outlet; (b) a pumping device moving water inlet→outlet; (c) a wheel having an internally toothed ring; (d) a brush assembly with brush and shaft; and (e) a pinion engaging the internally toothed ring and connected to the shaft, so that rotation of the wheel in a first direction rotates the pinion and brush in the same direction.

The pivotal limitation is element (c)+(e): an internally toothed ring fixed on a wheel meshing with a brush pinion. As shown below, no cited reference is described as disclosing that specific arrangement. That is the point of novelty the patent itself stresses (the brush "driven directly by the wheel, which enables a gear mechanism or a belt to be dispensed with").

1. US 21,233 A (1858) — flagged

The face of the patent lists this as "herri ok" (a garbled title, almost certainly OCR noise) with a single name. US patents numbered ~21,000 date to 1858. I could not verify the subject matter from available sources. I therefore cannot responsibly assign it any § 102 target claim. Treat as a citation of record only; its likely role is as a very early "brush driven by a ground wheel" teaching. Confidence: low — do not rely on it without retrieving the original document from USPTO Patent Public Search (PatentCenter).

2. US 3,097,383 A — Charles H. Taylor, "Sweeper" (pub. 1963‑07‑16) — examiner‑cited

A floor (carpet) sweeper. I was unable to retrieve this specific document; searches surfaced other Taylor suction‑cleaner patents (e.g., US 2,027,938; US 2,334,732; US 2,372,033), which are different numbers and must not be substituted. Based on the title and era it is a manual sweeper in which a ground wheel drives the brush roll. Potential § 102 relevance: the wheel‑drives‑brush concept behind claim 1, but almost certainly without an internal ring gear, and with no pool inlet/outlet/pump. Cannot anticipate claim 1. Confidence: low (document not retrieved).

3. US 3,457,575 A — Bissell, "Sweeper for carpeted and smooth floors" (filed 1965‑12‑23; pub. 1969‑07‑29) — examiner‑cited

Retrieved and verified (Google Patents; USPTO PDF). A sweeper with rotary brushes 11, 12 mounted on axles 13, 14; coupling wheels 19, 20 on the brush axles are driven by two pairs of drive wheels 21, 22 that support the sweeper. The coupling is by frictional engagement (a rubber‑like surface layer 26/27 — the spec also contemplates springs, levers or unidirectional clutches), not an internally toothed ring. It has no pool body, inlet, outlet or pump.
§ 102 assessment: Discloses the general concept of "rotation of a ground wheel drives a rotating brush in the same direction" — relevant to the idea in claim 1, but it uses friction coupling, not an internal ring gear, and lacks the claimed cleaner body/pumping elements. Cannot anticipate claim 1; at most relevant to a § 103 combination. Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/[US3457575A](/patent/US3457575A) ; https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/06/bf/2a/a2b00131549337/US3457575.pdf

4. US 3,822,754 A — Henkin, "Automatic swimming pool cleaner" (filed 1972‑07‑26; pub. 1974‑07‑09)

A robotic/pressure‑side pool cleaner. The Aqua Products materials describe Henkin as a pressure‑side cleaner with a three‑wheel design whose wheels (36a, 36b, 36c) rotate about axes offset from one another, rear wheel 36c caster‑mounted, producing random travel. Source: Aqua Products appellant/joint‑appendix excerpts (patentlyo.com).
§ 102 assessment: Relevant to claim 1 elements (a) body and (b) inlet/outlet/pump. It is a wheeled cleaner but does not teach an internally toothed ring on a wheel driving a separate brush pinion (element (c)+(e)). Cannot anticipate claim 1.

5. US 4,168,557 A — Rasch (dec'd) / heiress Rasch, "Pool cleaners" (ZA priority 1976‑12‑15; US filing 1977‑12‑02; pub. 1979‑09‑25)

Verified (Espacenet; FreePatentsOnline; Google Patents). An electrically driven endless‑track pool vehicle with a filter chamber, an inlet on the base, a pump, and a pump outlet normal to the base. Claim 2 recites "shafts ... enclosed by drums each carrying a brush extending between the endless tracks." Drive to the wheels is by motor → pulley 32 → belts 33 (belt drive), with a separate impeller motor.
§ 102 assessment: Close on claim 1 elements (a) body and (b) inlet/outlet/pump, and has wheels and a brush. But the brush/drive coupling is a belt‑and‑pulley and endless‑track arrangement — not an internally toothed ring meshing a brush pinion. Cannot anticipate claim 1. Notably, this same reference is discussed in the '029 specification itself as one of the chain/belt‑drive devices the invention seeks to improve upon. Sources: https://worldwide.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/biblio?...NR=[4168557A](/patent/4168557A) ; https://www.freepatentsonline.com/[4168557](/patent/4168557).html

6. EP 0 565 226 A1 — Leslie, "Swimming pool cleaner" (filed 1992‑04‑07; pub. 1993‑10‑13)

Cited and characterized in the '029 background as a device whose motorized wheels have roughened peripheral surfaces so the wheels themselves perform a brushing function. Source: US 8,393,029 specification ("There are also devices which have driving members with motorized wheels (cf., for example, EP 0 565 226). These wheels have surfaces with occurrences of roughness distributed over the periphery...").
§ 102 assessment: Discloses a wheeled pool cleaner whose traction wheels incidentally brush. It does not disclose a separate brush assembly with its own shaft, nor an internal ring gear/brush pinion. The '029 patent expressly distinguishes this reference as "not very effective." Cannot anticipate claim 1.

7. US 5,337,434 A — Aqua Products, "Directional control means for robotic swimming pool cleaners" (filed 1993‑04‑12; pub. 1994‑08‑16)

Verified (Google Patents). Self‑contained robotic pool cleaner with housing 1, filter bag, pump impeller 11, and two parallel motor‑driven cylindrical brushes 4 on drums 5 that both propel and sweep; flexible tracks 7; reversible drive motor 8 connected by two drive belts 9 to the drums.
§ 102 assessment: Discloses claims 1(a)–(d)‑type structure (body, inlet/outlet, pump, wheel/drum, brushes) and even brush‑type rolling members. But the brushes are driven by belts from the motor, i.e., they are the drive members — there is no wheel carrying an internally toothed ring that drives a separate brush pinion. Indeed the '029 background cites this reference as a belt/chain‑drive device. Cannot anticipate claim 1. Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US5337434

8. FR 2 729 995 A1 — SARL VBV (filed 1995‑02‑01; pub. 1996‑08‑02)

"Automatic cleaning machine for the walls of swimming pools or aquariums." Cited in the '029 background among the chain‑drive devices (with US 5,337,434 and US 4,168,557) that "do not allow easy maintenance." Source: US 8,393,029 specification.
§ 102 assessment: Chain‑driven brush/drive members; the '029 patent distinguishes it precisely because the chain prevents an internal‑ring/brush‑pinion‑type direct coupling and a floor guard. Cannot anticipate claim 1.

9. EP 0 750 083 A1 — Sweepy International (filed 1995‑06‑19; pub. 1996‑12‑27)

"Driving vehicle, specially cleaning robot, in particular for swimming pools, with means for automatically changing the driving direction in front of an obstacle." A navigation/obstacle‑reversal reference.
§ 102 assessment: Relevant at most to the vehicle/body context; discloses no internal ring‑gear‑driven brush. Cannot anticipate claim 1.

10. EP 0 905 334 A1 — Weda Poolcleaner AB, "Automatic pool‑cleaner" (filed 1997‑09‑26; pub. 1999‑03‑31)

Expressly cited in the '029 background as an example of a cleaner with separate/independent members for driving the brushing device — i.e., a dedicated brush drive distinct from the surface‑drive members. Source: US 8,393,029 specification.
§ 102 assessment: This is the opposite architecture to claim 1 (separate brush drive vs. wheel‑driven brush). Cannot anticipate claim 1; it is background/§ 103 material.

11. US 2006/0225768 A1 — Giora Erlich, "Directional control for dual brush robotic pool cleaners" (filed 2003‑11‑04; pub. 2006‑10‑12)

A dual‑brush robotic pool cleaner with directional/steering control.
§ 102 assessment: Relevant to cleaner body/brush elements only; no internally toothed ring fixed to a wheel meshing a brush pinion. Cannot anticipate claim 1. (Cross‑check against the live document is advisable; I did not retrieve its full text.)

12. US 2007/0067930 A1 — Efraim Garti, "Cordless pool cleaning robot" (filed 2003‑10‑14; pub. 2007‑03‑29) — examiner‑cited

Battery‑powered (cordless) robotic pool cleaner (Garti/Aqua Products lineage).
§ 102 assessment: Relevant to body/pump elements of claim 1; no ring‑gear/brush‑pinion drive. Cannot anticipate claim 1. (Full text not retrieved; verify from USPTO/Google Patents.)

13. EP 1 785 552 A2 — Fabrizio Bernini, "Automatic cleaner for swimming pools" (filed 2005‑11‑15; pub. 2007‑05‑16) — examiner‑cited

Automatic pool cleaner (Bernini/Zodiac‑family lineage).
§ 102 assessment: Relevant to cleaner body/pump context; no internally toothed ring/brush pinion arrangement. Cannot anticipate claim 1. (Full text not retrieved; verify.)

Non‑patent citation

International Search Report, PCT/FR2008/052336 — the ISR for this application. Not prior art in itself; it identifies what the international examiner considered relevant (effectively the same family of references).

C. Bottom line

• No cited reference anticipates claim 1 under § 102. The distinguishing limitation — an internally toothed ring fixedly joined to a wheel, with a brush pinion meshing it to rotate the brush in the same direction as the wheel (and, per claim 3, a separate wheel pinion also engaging that same ring) — is not disclosed by any of the 13 references. The closest references use friction coupling (US 3,457,575), belts/pulleys (US 4,168,557; US 5,337,434), chains (FR 2,729,995), roughened wheels (EP 0 565 226), or independent brush drives (EP 0 905 334) — each explicitly distinguished in the '029 specification.
• Dependent claims fare no better on § 102: claim 2 (filtration between inlet/outlet) is disclosed in substance by US 4,168,557 and US 5,337,434; claim 3 (motor + wheel pinion engaging the ring) is the closest thing to a "wheel driven by a pinion in an internal ring," but the cited references drive belts/chains, not a wheel pinion in an internally toothed ring as claim 3 requires, and none add the brush pinion in the same ring. Claims 4–6 (drive pinion → intermediate pinion → intermediate shaft → wheel pinion; identical brush/wheel pinion pitch and diameter) have no counterpart in the cited art. Claim 7 (wheel extending forward of the body's forwardmost portion) is a configuration detail not shown in these references.
• Practical upshot: these references are best viewed as § 103 obviousness material (e.g., wheel‑driven brushes in floor sweepers + wheeled/belt‑driven pool cleaners), not as § 102 anticipatory art for claim 1.

Confidence and flags

• High confidence (document verified): US 3,457,575; US 4,168,557; US 5,337,434; the two background references EP 0 565 226 and EP 0 905 334 as characterized in the '029 specification.
• Moderate confidence (metadata/abstract only, text not fully retrieved): US 3,822,754; FR 2,729,995; EP 0 750 083; US 2006/0225768; US 2007/0067930; EP 1 785 552.
• Low confidence — verification required: US 21,233 A (1858; garbled title "herri ok"; subject matter unconfirmed) and US 3,097,383 A ("Sweeper"; the Taylor documents I retrieved were different patent numbers and must not be conflated with it).
• I found no reference on the face of the patent that discloses the internal‑ring‑gear + brush‑pinion drive, and I state that as my analysis, not as a certified invalidity conclusion. For a formal § 102/§ 103 opinion, each reference's full text (and the live USPTO file history/IDS) should be retrieved directly.

Sources cited: US 8,393,029 Google Patents record (authoritative citation lists and claim text); https://patents.google.com/patent/US3457575A ; https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/06/bf/2a/a2b00131549337/US3457575.pdf ; https://www.freepatentsonline.com/4168557.html ; https://worldwide.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/biblio?CC=US&NR=4168557A ; https://patents.google.com/patent/US5337434 ; Aqua Products briefing excerpts on Henkin (patentlyo.com).

I'll research the cited prior-art references to ground this obviousness analysis in their actual disclosures rather than titles alone.

Obviousness Analysis — U.S. Patent No. 8,393,029 (35 U.S.C. § 103)

Scope note / grounding. This analysis uses the "Citations" and "Patent Citations" references listed on the '029 Google Patents page (https://patents.google.com/patent/[US8393029](/patent/US8393029)/en), and the "Prior art keywords" metadata (wheel, pinion, brush, brushing, immersed surface). I verified the disclosures of several references by retrieving their text; where I could not, I flag it explicitly. I did not auto-correct any identifier. One anomaly worth noting literally: the first examiner-cited reference is listed as US21233A, 1858‑08‑17, inventor "herri ok" — on its face this appears to be a Google Patents data artifact rather than a real citation, and I could not verify what it discloses.

I. Framework and level of ordinary skill

Under Graham v. John Deere and KSR Int'l v. Teleflex, obviousness is assessed from the perspective of a person of ordinary skill in the art (PHOSITA) as of the 2007‑12‑21 priority date, considering (1) the scope/content of the prior art, (2) differences between the art and the claims, (3) the PHOSITA's level of skill, and (4) objective indicia.

Proposed PHOSITA: a mechanical design engineer with a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering and ~3–5 years of experience in consumer/robotic pool-cleaner or floor-care appliance design, familiar with traction drives, gearing, and small submersible pump/motor packaging. This is a mechanical-arts patent; the components (wheel, pinion, annular gear, brush roller, impeller, filter) are all conventional.

Critical framing: the '029 patent's own Background concedes a great deal: it acknowledges that pool cleaners with brushes driven directly by the traction members already existed using lateral chains (citing FR 2 729 995, U.S. 5,337,434, U.S. 4,168,557), and that pool cleaners with motorized wheels whose periphery is roughened to perform a brushing function existed (EP 0 565 226 / U.S. 5,337,434 family). The '029 inventors expressly frame their contribution as overcoming maintenance/floor-guard problems of the chain-based brush drives — i.e., as an improvement within a known design space, not a new field. That framing, from the patent itself, is powerful § 103 evidence.

II. Claim 1 — limitation-by-limitation mapping

Bottom line: every element except the internal ring-gear coupling (and its same-direction consequence) is squarely in the cited art. The § 103 question collapses to whether it would have been obvious to the PHOSITA to replace the art's chain/friction brush drives with a wheel-mounted internal gear driving a brush pinion.

III. Combination that renders claim 1 obvious

Primary combination: U.S. 4,168,557 (Rasch) + U.S. 3,457,575 (Bissell) + U.S. 3,822,754 (Henkin)

• U.S. 4,168,557 (Rasch), "Pool cleaners" supplies the overall pool-cleaner architecture: a chassis, two motors (one for traction, one for a suction pump), a filter, and brush rollers at each end that are driven by the vehicle's own traction members and synchronized with them (per the description reproduced in FR 2 729 995). It thus teaches (a)–(b) and (d) and the core concept of driving the brushing device from the traction members.
• U.S. 3,457,575 (Bissell), "Sweeper for carpeted and smooth floors" supplies the traction-wheel-driven brush concept cleanly: "Wheels 19 and 20 are continuously engaged and driven by two pairs of sweeper drive wheels 21, 22 which support the sweeper on the surface"; the drive wheels are the floor-contacting traction wheels (https://patents.google.com/patent/US3457575A). (Its drive is friction-based, not an internal ring gear, but it establishes the wheel-drives-brush paradigm.)
• U.S. 3,822,754 (Henkin) supplies a wheeled underwater cleaner whose wheels are driven through reduction gearing (turbine → reduction gear → drive shaft → sprocket → belt → wheel sprockets), reinforcing that multi-stage geared drive of wheels is standard in this art.

Motivation to combine (KSR rationales):

1. Known problem, known solution. FR 2 729 995 — itself cited on the '029 face — expressly criticizes the rollers mounted on fixed transverse shafts of the prior art and seeks to "diminuer le nombre d'éléments mis en œuvre" (reduce the number of parts). A PHOSITA seeking fewer parts and easier maintenance would look to direct wheel-to-brush gearing.
2. Simple substitution of a known drive. Replacing a chain/belt/friction brush drive with a gear coupling is a predictable mechanical substitution. KSR endorses combining familiar elements according to known methods to yield predictable results.
3. Compactness / coaxiality. The intrinsic advantage of an internal gear is that it is coaxial with the wheel and nests inside its rim, saving the very space the patent touts ("more compact… enables a gear mechanism or a belt to be dispensed with"). Annular/internal gearing on a wheel rim is a commonplace mechanical expedient (bicycle hubs, planetary sets, wheel-mounted ring gears), and the cited art's own drive wheels are the natural mounting location.
4. The same-direction result is inevitable, not inventive: an external pinion meshing with an internal ring gear rotates with the ring. So limitation (e)'s "same direction" language describes a predictable consequence of the chosen gear type, which cuts against patentability rather than for it.

Secondary combination: EP 0 565 226 (Leslie) + U.S. 3,457,575

The '029 Background concedes EP 0 565 226/its family discloses motorized wheels whose periphery is roughened to brush the surface. The Background then criticizes that arrangement because (i) brushing "is not very effective" as it occurs at the lateral wheels, throwing debris rearward rather than toward the central inlet, and (ii) brushing occurs at wheel speed, preventing brush slip. A PHOSITA reading that criticism has an explicit problem–solution motivation to (A) move the brushing to a dedicated roller between the wheels and (B) drive that roller from the wheel — which is exactly the U.S. 3,457,575 scheme (traction wheels driving a separate brush). The remaining step, converting the friction coupling to an internal ring gear on the wheel, is the predictable mechanical choice discussed above.

IV. Dependent claims 2–7

• Claim 2 (filter between inlet and outlet): disclosed/obvious — U.S. 4,168,557 (filter in the pumped water path), Henkin (filter basket), EP 0 905 334. Strong.
• Claims 3–5 (electric motor; wheel pinion meshing the ring; drive pinion on motor shaft; intermediate pinion; intermediate transmission shaft): Henkin discloses a multi-stage geared drivetrain (turbine → reduction gear → drive shaft → sprocket → belt → wheel sprockets). Adding a motor-driven drive pinion, an intermediate pinion/shaft, and a wheel pinion meshing a rim ring is a routine arrangement of known gearing elements to drive a wheel from a motor. The '029 specification itself calls these "conventional." Strong, though the exact intermediate-shaft sub-arrangement is a design detail; obviousness here rests on KSR's "predictable variation" and "obvious to try" principles.
• Claim 6 (brush pinion and wheel pinion identical pitch and diameter): classic duplication/standardization of parts — using the same pinion for two functions. KSR ("a court should ask whether the improvement is more than the predictable use of prior art elements according to their established functions"; and known benefits of parts commonality) strongly supports obviousness. Strong.
• Claim 7 (wheel extends forward of the body's forwardmost portion): U.S. 4,168,557 places end rollers across the full width at each end of the machine — i.e., the surface-contacting rollers define the extreme front/rear of the device. Also commonplace in pool cleaners (front roller/brush overhangs to aid obstacle climbing). Moderate-to-strong, depending on whether the reference's wheel (as opposed to roller) is the forwardmost element; that mapping should be charted claim-by-claim.

V. Weaknesses in the obviousness case (address candidly)

1. No cited reference explicitly discloses an internally toothed ring fixed to a wheel driving a brush pinion in a pool cleaner. The § 103 case therefore depends on treating the internal ring gear as a known mechanical equivalent — an argument the patent owner will attack by asserting (a) non-analogous art (floor sweepers vs. submersible cleaners), and (b) a specific, non-obvious structural arrangement. Note, though, that the examiner's own "prior art keywords" (wheel, pinion, brush) and the inclusion of sweeper references (U.S. 3,457,575; U.S. 3,097,383 "Sweeper"; U.S. 34,575,749/… ) show the examiner treated floor-care gearing as analogous art — a position the PTAB/courts often accept where the problem (driving a rotating brush from a traction wheel) is the same.
2. U.S. 3,097,383 (Charles H. Taylor, "Sweeper") and US 21,233 — I could not verify their disclosures (my searches returned different Taylor suction-cleaner patents, e.g., U.S. 2,334,732 / 2,329,563, and the 1858 entry appears anomalous). If U.S. 3,097,383 discloses a wheel-mounted internal gear driving a brush, it would be the single most important reference and could even support anticipation; this must be confirmed against the actual document before being relied upon.
3. Secondary considerations. The '029 patent maps to a commercially successful Zodiac robotic-cleaner line, and the 2022 ITC action (Inv. No. 337‑TA‑1326, asserting claims 1, 2, 7) plus the pending 2025 suits (E.D. Tex. 2:25‑cv‑00582 and the Wybotics DJ action, C.D. Cal. 2:25‑cv‑08526, seeking a declaration of invalidity of the '029 patent) suggest commercial significance. However, there is no adjudicated finding of validity, no known licensing "nexus" evidence, and no long-felt-need/skepticism record in the sources I reviewed. Objective indicia would need affirmative proof tying the success to the claimed ring-gear feature specifically — which is not evident from the claim/abstract material alone.

VI. Conclusion

Under § 103, claim 1 would likely have been obvious over U.S. 4,168,557 (Rasch) in view of U.S. 3,457,575 (Bissell) — and further in view of U.S. 3,822,754 (Henkin) for the geared wheeled drivetrain — because the art already taught (i) pool cleaners with a body, pump, and brush rollers driven by the vehicle's traction members, and (ii) wheel-driven rotary brushes in floor-cleaning machines; the only missing element, an internally toothed ring fixed to a wheel meshing a brush pinion, is a predictable, compact, coaxial mechanical substitution whose same-direction output is an inherent geometric consequence. Claims 2 and 6 are very strong candidates for obviousness; claims 3–5 and 7 are strong to moderate depending on the reference charting.

If the examiner-cited U.S. 3,097,383 (Taylor, "Sweeper") or US 21,233 discloses an internal ring gear on a driven wheel, the obviousness case strengthens materially and anticipation should be re-examined. Because I could not verify those two documents, I flag them as the highest-value items to pull in full before finalizing any opinion.

Caveats

• Verified by retrieved text: U.S. 3,457,575 (Google Patents + GB 2,088,709 PDF), U.S. 3,822,754 (abstract/spec excerpts via several sources), U.S. 4,168,557 (as described within FR 2 729 995).
• Not verified: U.S. 3,097,383; US 21,233; U.S. 2,123,xxx; the precise scope of U.S. 5,337,434, U.S. 2006/0225768, U.S. 2007/0067930, EP 1 785 552, EP 0 905 334 — treated here at title/abstract level and flagged as such.
• No 2026 Federal Circuit activity specific to the '029 patent was located; the known invalidity challenge is the Wybotics C.D. Cal. DJ action (2:25‑cv‑08526), and the PTAB petitions of Nov. 25, 2025 target only the camera/vision patents, not the '029 patent.
• This is technical analysis, not legal advice; a formal invalidity contention would require full-tex