US 8667894

I'll run targeted searches for this exact patent number, then summarize.

US 8,667,894 B2 — Verified Record

Note on sourcing: The number was searched literally as 8667894. Live searches returned the patent's full text (Google Patents, FreePatentsOnline) and its WO/EP family equivalents. Searches aimed at USPTO Patent Center and CAFC 2026 dockets returned no results for this patent — see the litigation caveat at the end. Where the search record and my training data conflict, I use the search record.

Bibliographic data

Family: EP 2611696 B1 (granted 2014-08-20), CA 2807091 C (granted 2018-07-31), DK 2611696 T3, WO 2012/028553 A1 (published 2012-03-08). The earlier EP 2423113 A1 was withdrawn; the WO application ceased.

Abstract (as published)

"System and methods for piling and compressing pieces of insulation wool. The system includes a piling tower for receiving and piling multiple pieces of insulation wool and compression plates for compressing multiple pieces of insulation wool. The system includes a first and a second compression plate having plane and smooth upper and lower surfaces, whereby the compression plate can be slid out from between two compressed pieces of insulation wool. The compression plates receive a batch between the compression plates and compress the batch by moving one compression plate towards the other. The pressure on the insulation wool does not need to be relieved after the pieces have been compressed once as the system and method makes it possible to gradually increase compression toward the bottom of the piling tower by shifting between the first and second compression plate being used for compressing a batch of pieces of insulation wool."

Independent claims in plain language

Claim 1 — the apparatus (system). A machine for stacking and squashing pieces of compressible material (insulation wool is the worked example). It has a piling tower that receives pieces and accumulates them into "batches" (multi-piece stacks), plus two compression plates. Key limitations:

1. Two plates, each with a plane and smooth upper and lower surface — the smoothness is functional, not cosmetic: it is what lets a plate be slid out from between two compressed pieces without tearing the wool.
2. The two plates sit on different sides of the tower, so each can be driven independently up and down along the tower — i.e., not a single fixed press ram.
3. The plates cooperate as a pair: a batch is received between them, and it is compressed by moving one plate toward the other.
4. The tower's sides are defined by flexible sidewalls that include sliding drawers; the sidewalls wrap around those drawers, and the drawers can travel up and down parallel to the tower while the plates keep access to the pile at any position. This is the core structural trick — a rigid-walled tower would pin the plates to a fixed opening height.

Claim 7 — the method. A cycling piling/compressing process performed in a tower:

1. Pile a first batch of multiple pieces onto a first plate (plane, smooth surfaces).
2. Bring the second plate down on top of that batch, sandwiching it.
3. Drive the second plate toward the first to compress the batch.
4. Slide the first plate out from underneath the compressed batch.
5. Pile a second batch on top of the second plate (now acting as the floor).
6. Bring the first plate down on top of the second batch.
7. Compress by moving the first plate toward the second.
8. Slide the second plate out from underneath the compressed second batch.

The point is that the roles of "floor plate" and "press plate" swap each cycle, so compression is never released after the first squeeze. Dependent claims 2–6 add belts as the flexible sidewalls (2), belt rollers as the sliding means (3), holding arms at the tower top (4), wedge-shaped plates (5), and a sliding-varnish surface layer (6). Dependent claims 8–10 tie the cycle to a predefined batch count (8) or pile height (9) and to gradually increasing compression during piling (10) — the commercial benefit being fewer fibres broken and greater final density.

Prior art of record

Cited on the face: CA 952495 (Vachon), US 3,908,539 (Patco Packing), US 4,378,272 (sic — record shows US 4,372,201, Reinhard Mohn GmbH), US 4,408,438 (Hoechst), US 4,738,078 (Ferag), US 4,953,344 (Fiberglas Canada), US 5,311,724 (Lipton/Conopco), US 6,397,738 (Brown), DE 102005001130 A1 (Heidelberger Druckmaschinen). Non-patent citations: the EPO Extended Search Report for 10008974.7 (completed 2011-02-17) and the PCT International Preliminary Report on Patentability for PCT/EP2011/064736 (completed 2012-11-29). Forward citations: US 2018/0016041 A1 and US 10,787,281 B2 (both Ishida Co., boxing apparatus).

Caveats — where I do not have authoritative confirmation

• No CAFC 2026 (or any) docket activity for US 8,667,894 was found. My searches for Seelen-related Federal Circuit appeals and 2026 docket entries returned nothing. This is absence of evidence, not evidence of absence — free web search is a weak instrument for district court and CAFC docket coverage, which lives behind PACER/CourtListener and USPTO Patent Center (both of which I could not query directly here). Anyone relying on litigation posture should verify against PACER and the USPTO Patent Center docket rather than treat my null result as dispositive.
• One citation discrepancy: the record as retrieved lists "U.S. Pat. No. 4,378,272 (Reinhard Mohn G.M.B.H.)" in one tabulation and US 4,372,201 A in the citation table. I have reproduced US 4,372,201 A as the literal cited document and flag the inconsistency rather than silently resolving it.
• The specification's own prior-art discussion references US 4,953,344, US 3,908,539 and CA 952495 by number; I have reproduced those numbers exactly as printed.
• Assignee name appears in both forms ("Seelen AS" and "SEELEN A/S") in the source; I have not normalized either.

I'll search for litigation involving US patent 8667894 across patent litigation sources.

The first results returned data for a different patent number (8867894), which is not the patent in question. Let me search more specifically.

The searches so far return only the patent itself. Let me check dedicated litigation databases directly.

Findings: Litigation involving US Patent No. 8,667,894

No litigation involving US Patent No. 8,667,894 was found.

I searched patent-litigation resources (Unified Patents litigation portal references, the Stanford NPE Litigation Database, general docket/web searches for the patent number, its assignee Seelen AS/A/S, and its inventor Per Nissen). Nothing identified any district-court case, CAFC appeal, ITC action, or PTAB proceeding (IPR/PGR) asserting or challenging this specific patent.

Important disambiguation warning

My searches surfaced a superficially similar but different patent — US 8,867,894 (YesVideo, Inc.), which appears in the Stanford NPE Litigation Database in:

• YesVideo, Inc. v. iMemories, Inc., 2:15-cv-00809 (E.D. Tex.)
• YesVideo Incorporated v. IMR16 Incorporated, 2:16-cv-00865 (D. Ariz.)

Those cases involve 8,867,894, not 8,667,894. Per the strict "interpret identifiers literally" rule, I am not treating those as litigation against the patent you asked about. They belong to a different patent and a different technology (video), and should not be attributed to Seelen's insulation-compression patent.

What I could confirm about US 8,667,894

• Patent: US 8,667,894 B2, "Piling and compressing pieces of compressible material"
• Inventor: Per Nissen
• Assignee: Seelen AS / Seelen A/S (Denmark)
• Application: US 13/817,457 (national stage of PCT/EP2011/064736)
• Priority: 2010-08-30 (EP 10008974)
• Grant: 2014-03-11; anticipated expiration 2031-08-26
• Family members: EP 2423113 A1 (withdrawn), EP 2611696 B1 (granted/active), CA 2807091 C, DK 2611696 T3, WO 2012/028553 A1
• Forward citations (patent documents only, not litigation): US 2018/0016041 A1 and US 10,787,281 B2 (both Ishida Co., Ltd., "Boxing apparatus"); CN 103895247 B; FR 3025134 B1; EP 3560843 B1; GB 2577859 B

Limitations / confidence

• I was not able to directly query PACER or the full Unified Patents litigation case list within the available search steps. My conclusion rests on general and database-driven web searches.
• A definitive negative cannot be fully guaranteed because (a) quiet settlements and unindexed state/small-claims disputes may not appear in public databases, and (b) this is an industrial-machinery patent held by a non-U.S. (Danish) company, a category in which any enforcement is often handled outside U.S. courts or via licensing rather than litigation.
• If you need a court-grade negative, the reliable next step is a Docket Navigator or Lex Machina search keyed to the patent number 8,667,894 and to assignee Seelen A/S, plus a PACER/CAFC docket lookup — resources I could not fully access here.

Bottom line: Based on the sources I could search, there is no known litigation involving US 8,667,894. Please do not confuse it with the unrelated US 8,867,894 (YesVideo) cases that appear in the litigation databases.

I'll verify the structured data's "no proceedings" finding against public sources before concluding.

Let me run additional targeted checks on PTAB-specific sources and any adversarial activity that would typically spawn an AIA trial.

PTAB proceedings — US 8,667,894 B2

Sourcing note. The canonical list in the structured "PTAB proceedings on file" block (USPTO Open Data Portal) is empty: no AIA trial proceedings are indexed against this patent. I attempted to corroborate with web searches targeting the patent number, the assignee (Seelen AS / Seelen A/S), and the inventor (Per Nissen) across PTAB and litigation sources. Those searches returned no IPR, PGR, or CBM petition, institution decision, FWD, or appeal referencing this patent. Searches for the number did, however, surface unrelated matters involving different patents (e.g., the '866 patents in Shionogi v. Lupin and Tobinick v. Olmarker, Interference No. 105,866) — these are not US 8,667,894 and are excluded. Where the ODP record and the web agree (both negative), I report the negative; where I could not confirm something, I say so.

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Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on US 8,667,894: 0. Breakdown: 0 active, 0 with claims invalidated, 0 with claims sustained, 0 settled, 0 institution-denied. The patent stands completely untested at the PTAB — all 10 claims (independent claims 1 and 7 plus dependents 2–6 and 8–10) are live and unadjudicated, and the statutory presumption of validity is fully intact. For a defendant, the defensive posture is the inverse of "hardened by survival": there is no PTAB record to lean on at all — no estoppel ammunition against the patent owner, no canceled claims to point to, but also no adverse FWD constraining your own future petition. The patent is an open, if inert, target.

Because there are no proceedings, the per-proceeding template does not apply. I set out below what the absence means and what a defendant should do instead.

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(No proceedings to report)

No proceeding numbers exist to list. I will not generate placeholder or speculative numbers. If a proceeding surfaces in a later ODP ingest or web search, the format should be: proper case number (e.g., IPR20XX-#####), petitioner v. Seelen AS, type, filing date, status verbatim from ODP, panel, grounds, institution ruling, FWD at claim level, settlement, and any CAFC appeal.

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Strategic summary

Claim status. Every claim of US 8,667,894 is UNTESTED. Claims 1 and 7 (the independent system and method claims) have never been construed by the Board, never been the subject of an institution decision, and never been canceled. Dependent claims 2–6 (belts as flexible sidewalls; belt rollers as sliding means; holding arms; wedge-shaped plates; sliding-varnish surface) and 8–10 (predefined batch count; predefined height; gradually increasing compression) are likewise untouched. There is accordingly no claim to omit from an invalidity analysis and no claim that is "safe" to ignore — the full claim set is in play.

Estoppel landscape. With no FWD, no § 315(e)(2) or § 325(e)(2) estoppel has attached to anyone. That cuts both ways: no prior petitioner is barred, but neither are you — you may raise any § 102/§ 103 ground on patents and printed publications in a fresh IPR without concern that a predecessor's petition has walled off art. No § 315(b) one-year bar has been triggered by any IPR, so the only § 315(b) clock that matters is your own: if Seelen serves an infringement complaint on you, the one-year window to petition starts running from that service date. The on-sale/public-use and § 112 grounds that an IPR cannot reach remain available only in district court or (for the pre-AIA patent, effectively) not at the PTAB at all.

Pattern signals. No repeats, no aggregator. There is no evidence of a serial petitioner, and no sign of a defensive aggregator (Unified Patents, RPX, etc.) in the chain — searches pairing the patent number with those entities returned nothing on point. Seelen's portfolio is small (roughly a few IP-family items tracked by public IP databases, mostly EP/WO/AU filings), and the technology — B30B/B65B industrial wool-compression machinery — is a low-litigation, low-NPE sector. That is the most likely explanation for the nil result: well-asserted patents eventually attract IPRs, and this one has never been asserted (the prior litigation search likewise found no case). A single Danish mid-size machinery owner enforcing a niche apparatus patent rarely generates the volume that pulls in an IPR.

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Recommended next steps

1. Treat "no PTAB activity" as the finding, not a gap. The absence is itself a signal that the patent has not been commercially asserted in the U.S. If you have received a demand, that demand is likely a first assertion — meaning there is no roadmap of prior constructions or invalidity wins to copy, and you would be building the record from scratch.

2. Do a fresh prior-art / § 112 search now. Because no estoppel exists, you have maximum freedom. The face-of-patent art is worth re-examining: US 3,908,539 (Patco Packing), US 4,953,344 (Fiberglas Canada), CA 952495 (Vachon), US 4,408,438 (Hoechst), and US 4,738,078 (Ferag) were cited during prosecution, but the flexible-sidewall / sliding-drawer limitation of claim 1 — the actual point of novelty — is the limitation to attack, and it is the one least likely to have been fully explored at the EPO (see next point).

3. Mine the EPO record — but verify it. The family's European counterpart EP 2 611 696 B1 granted on 2014-08-20, which opened a 9-month opposition window (closing ~2015-05-20). I could not confirm within the available search steps whether any EPO opposition was actually filed or how it was decided — and I will not assume one was. The EPO opposition file, if it exists, is a goldmine: it would show the closest art the examiner and opposers used, and its outcome could be persuasive if any of the same art is § 102/§ 103-eligible at the PTAB. Check the EPO Register for EP 2 611 696 directly. Also note the earlier EP 2 423 113 A1 was withdrawn and WO 2012/028553 A1 ceased — worth understanding why, as it may bear on prosecution history estoppel or on the scope actually secured.

4. Check the up-to-date ODP / PTAB E2E yourself before relying on this negative. The ODP block was the canonical source and it was empty, but ODP ingest can lag newly filed petitions by days-to-weeks. Confirm at the USPTO PTAB E2E case-search portal and USPTO Patent Center for application 13/817,457 (the US national-stage application): PTAB E2E · USPTO Patent Center. For any CAFC appeal, search CourtListener keyed to the patent number and to Seelen A/S.

5. Watch the FR / GB / EP family enforcement signals. Forward-citing family members show the technology is being built on by others — EP 3 560 843 B1 (L&P Swiss Holding, flat-packing machine for innerspring units) and GB 2 577 859 B (The Furniture Recycling Group, compressing mattresses) are conceptually adjacent compressible-material packers. If Seelen ever enforces, challengers in those adjacent industries would be the likely petitioners.

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Bottom line for a defendant: There is no PTAB proceeding — past, present, or pending — on US 8,667,894. Do not expect an existing FWD to hand you invalidity; equally, do not fear estoppel or a § 315(b) bar from anyone else. The patent is a blank slate: fully live, fully presumptively valid, and fully open to a first-filed IPR if you are served within the § 315(b) window. Verify the null result against ODP/E2E at the time you actually need it, and prioritize confirming whether an EPO opposition exists on the EP 2 611 696 counterpart.

I'll search for the assignment records for this patent, starting with the specifically-cited reel/frame in the source text.

Assignment & Ownership Chain — US 8,667,894 B2

Sourcing note. The patent record itself (Google Patents legal-events tab, reproduced in the authoritative full text) confirms one recorded assignment: recorded 2013-02-18, assignor NISSEN, PER, assignee SEELEN A/S, Reel/Frame 029820/0816, conveyance "ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST (SEE DOCUMENT FOR DETAILS)." I was not able to execute a direct query against the Assignment Center's underlying record viewer in this session, so the correspondent of record, the document execution date (as distinct from the recording date), and any later records that Google Patents may not mirror could not be independently pulled and verified. Everything below is anchored to reel 029820/0816 plus the corporate-succession facts I could corroborate from public sources. Where I am inferring, I say so.

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Inventors

Unusual patterns: none of the fire-sale precursors. There is no evidence Per Nissen ceased association with the assignee, and no evidence of a named-inventor departure cluster. Two points worth flagging, however:

1. Timing of the assignment is national-stage-driven, not distress-driven. The assignment was recorded 2013-02-18, the same date the US national-stage entry (37 CFR 371(c)) was perfected for PCT/EP2011/064736. A single-inventor assignment executed and recorded at US national-stage entry is the ordinary, benign pattern for a PCT applicant perfecting title before the US filing date is set — not a portfolio fire-sale tell. Contrast with the classic fire-sale signature (inventors all out the door within 12 months of the original priority filing).
2. Single-inventor, no co-inventor disputes on the face of the record. No inventor has ever been added or deleted, and no second assignment from any other natural person exists.

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Original assignee

Seelen AS / SEELEN A/S (both forms appear in the record; I have not normalised either — see the earlier section's caveat).

• Business: Seelen is a Danish industrial-automation manufacturer — specifically automation equipment for the insulation industry (stacking/compressing/bagging lines for insulation wool), later also bioenergy automation. Qubiqa's own corporate history describes the surviving business as developing and producing "automated packaging solutions for the insulation industry."
• Did it ship a product embodying the claims? Yes — this is a real commercial machine, not a paper asset. The specification is written as an engineering description of a production line (falling-distance control to avoid fibre damage, sliding drawers, belt sidewalls, wedge-shaped plates with sliding varnish, computer-timed stacking cycle). This is a clothes-on machine spec, not an NPE claim chart.
• Current status / corporate succession (corroborated, but dates partly approximate):
  • Founded 1945 by Svend O. von Seelen in Esbjerg.
  • Sold in the 1980s to son-in-law Lars Schou; sold again in 2006 to holding company Industrial Automation Group A/S.
  • Subsequently merged into the Qubiqa group; per Qubiqa's own history page, "Seelen A/S changed names to Qubiqa Esbjerg A/S", with Seelen CEO Axel Manøe Jepsen becoming CEO of the Qubiqa Group. Clearwater CF publicly lists "Adviser to Seelen A/S on its sale to Qubiqa" (Denmark, Industrial & Chemicals). The precise completion year of that sale/merger was not verified to my satisfaction in this session — treat the mid-2010s placement as approximate.
  • 2017/18: a costly US market push forced a substantial reconstruction/reorganisation and a reported DKK 36m post-tax loss (Danish trade press). At that point majority owner was BWB Partners with Jyske Bank a minority holder. Note: this was a Danish rekonstruktion / solvent restructuring — not a Chapter 7/11 liquidation and not a patent-escrow sale.
  • 2021-08-24: BWB Partners divested Qubiqa to a board/management buy-in group (PitchBook deal date). Still operating today.
• Status: Operating, closely held, non-US-parented. Not acquired by a patent aggregator, not dissolved, not in bankruptcy.

Critical title caveat: the name-change/merger from Seelen A/S → Qubiqa Esbjerg A/S was a corporate succession by operation of law, which does not require a USPTO-recorded assignment. Title therefore passes even though no post-2013 assignment appears in the US record. Do not read the absence of a 2014+ record as Qubiqa lacking title.

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Assignment timeline

Only one recorded assignment exists on the face of the US record. I state that plainly rather than manufacture links.

• 2013-02-18 (executed — same date as recording per the legal-events entry) / recorded 2013-02-18 — Reel 029820/0816
  • Conveyance: Assignment of assignors' interest (see document for details)
  • Assignor: NISSEN, PER (sole inventor)
  • Assignee: SEELEN A/S, Denmark
  • Correspondent: ⚠️ Not retrievable in this session. The reel/frame summary page at Assignment Center carries the correspondent field, but I could not pull it. I will not guess a name. For a solo-inventor-to-company assignment perfected at national-stage entry, the correspondent is typically the PCT/US national-stage attorney of record; the front-page correspondence address of the granted patent is the best proxy and should be read off the printed patent.
  • Context: Inventor-to-employer title perfection at US national-stage entry — internal/administrative, not an acquisition, fire-sale, securitization, or transfer-to-asserter.

No further US assignments recorded. The corporate events that follow (Seelen → Qubiqa Esbjerg A/S name change; BWB Partners ownership; 2021 management buy-in) are equity transactions at the parent level and a merger, and mergers/name changes frequently go unrecorded at USPTO because title vests by operation of law. The Google Patents legal-events tab shows no Change of Name, Merger, or Security Agreement record — consistent with an unbroken, unencumbered, operating-company-held title.

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Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 8667894
    1945 : Seelen founded in Esbjerg
    2006 : Seelen sold to Industrial Automation Group
    2010 : Priority application filed
    2011 : PCT application filed
    2013 : Nissen assigns rights to Seelen A/S
    2014 : US 8667894 B2 granted
    later : Seelen becomes Qubiqa Esbjerg A/S
          : No USPTO assignment recorded
    2021 : Qubiqa bought by management group
    2025 : 12th year maintenance fee paid

(The "later" period is deliberate — the merger/name-change year was not verified. No punctuation used in event text, per the parse constraint.)

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NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — NOT PRESENT. The only recorded assignee is Seelen A/S (reel 029820/0816), an operating Danish machinery manufacturer with a factory, an employee base, and named executives. No "IP / Holdings / Ventures / Licensing" successor appears anywhere in the chain. There is no single-purpose LLC, no registered-agent service address, and no Delaware/Texas formation in the record.
2. Known asserter in the chain — NOT PRESENT. Neither Seelen A/S, Qubiqa (Esbjerg), Qubiqa A/S, BWB Partners, nor Per Nissen appears on any of the named NPE lists (Acacia, Marathon, IV, IPNav, Wi-LAN, Conversant/Mosaid, Vringo, Pendrell, Innovatio, MPHJ, Lumen View, Round Rock, Document Generation, Spangenberg entities). Nothing in Unified Patents' or RPX's asserter directories surfaced these names.
3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — UNCLEAR (cannot be assessed). There is only one link, so "recurrence" is definitionally impossible to demonstrate. The correspondent field itself was not retrievable in this session. No finding either way. Anyone needing this signal must open reel 029820/0816's summary page directly and compare the correspondent against other Seelen/Qubiqa-family filings.
4. Cascading transfers (<24 months, chained LLCs) — NOT PRESENT. One assignment only; 2013-02-18. No chain, no shared correspondent address, no common principals to test.
5. Pre-litigation transfer (within 6 months of first suit) — NOT PRESENT. The earlier litigation section found no suit naming this patent, so there is no anchor date against which a transfer could be "pre-litigation." The 2013-02-18 date also predates any conceivable assertion window by a decade.
6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — NOT PRESENT. The nearest event is the 2017/18 Danish rekonstruktion reported in the Danish trade press (Qubiqa A/S, ~100 employees, DKK 36m loss, two directors out). That is a Danish restructuring of an operating company; the patent was never sold in insolvency proceedings, and no assignment to a liquidator, trustee, or stalking-horse buyer appears. Distinguished from Kodak/Nortel/Polaroid-type sales.
7. Privateering — NOT PRESENT. No transfer from an operating company to an NPE asserting on the transferor's behalf, no SEC 8-K/10-K disclosure, no Patent Progress/EFF coverage.
8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — NOT PRESENT. The chain does not terminate at RPX, AST, LOT, Unified Patents, or OIN. The opposite: it terminates (by succession) at Qubiqa Esbjerg A/S, an operating manufacturer, and the 12th-year maintenance fee was paid 2025-09-02 with entity status set to SMALL ENTITY on 2025-08-11 — the behaviour of a small operating company that still wants the patent through its 2031-08-26 expiry, not of a shell being wound down.

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Verdict

Insufficient data — formally, because the US record contains only the original inventor-to-employer assignment (Per Nissen → Seelen A/S, executed/recorded 2013-02-18, reel 029820/0816) and no post-issuance transfers to analyse. Substantively, every available indicator points away from an NPE: the sole recorded assignee is an operating Danish insulation-machinery manufacturer; the corporate succession (Seelen → Qubiqa Esbjerg A/S) is a merger/name change that vests title by operation of law rather than a recorded shell-entity hop; zero of the eight troll-pattern signals are present; and the patent is being actively maintained (12th-year fee paid 2025-09-02) by a small-entity operating owner. This is best characterised in substance as an operating-company, non-asserting asset — but I select "Insufficient data" over "Operating-company assertion" because the rubric requires an actual assertion, and I found no suit, ITC action, or PTAB proceeding naming this patent (and, per the earlier section, must warn against conflating it with the unrelated US 8,867,894 YesVideo litigation).

Verification links (please confirm the two fields I could not retrieve — execution date vs. recording date, and correspondent):

• Assignment Center: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/
• Legacy Assignment Search (same underlying records): https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html
• Reel/Frame to open: 029820/0816

Residual uncertainty, stated honestly: (a) I could not directly query the Assignment Center record viewer, so a post-2013 record I failed to surface remains possible — the merger/name-change is the most likely candidate for a record I could not see; (b) the correspondent of record is unknown to me and I have deliberately left it blank rather than invent one; (c) the Seelen→Qubiqa merger year is approximate and is the single weakest factual link in the corporate-succession narrative above.

I'll search USPTO and related sources for this patent and its cited prior art, being careful to keep the number literal (8667894, not 8867894 or 105866).

Now let me verify the remaining cited references and the exact petition/citation tables.

Prior-Art Analysis — US 8,667,894 B2

Sourcing note. I searched the patent literal 8667894 (USPTO/Google Patents/FreePatentsOnline fetch + the EPO Global Patent Index for the EP counterpart). Searches returned the patent and its family, not similar numbers — the YesVideo 8,867,894 red herring is not involved here. The full citation set below is taken from the patent's own "Patent Citations (9)" table and corroborated against the EPO GPI entry for EP 2423113 A1. Four of the nine references (US 4,408,438; US 4,738,078; US 5,311,724; US 6,397,738) were cut off by a tool-step limit before I could open full text; for those I rely on the title/assignee/date of record plus my own knowledge, and I flag confidence accordingly. This section builds on the earlier summary/litigation/PTAB sections and does not repeat them.

Legal framework (important). Application 13/817,457 has an international filing date of 2011-08-26, i.e. before the AIA first-inventor-to-file date of 2013-03-16, so pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § 102/§ 103 governs. Under 35 U.S.C. § 363, the PCT international filing date is the U.S. filing date, making the § 102(b) critical date 2010-08-26. Every cited reference published before 2005, so all nine are at minimum § 102(b) printed-publication art (several also § 102(a)).

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At-a-glance citation table

Non-patent citations of record: the EPO Extended Search Report for EP 10008974.7 (completed 2011-02-17) and the PCT International Preliminary Report on Patentability for PCT/EP2011/064736 (completed 2012-11-29). Both are prosecution documents, not § 102 art.

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1. CA 952 495 A — Gilles L. Vachon (the closest art)

Full citation: Canadian Patent 952,495 A, "Insulation packaging machine," Gilles L. Vachon; priority 1973-04-17; published 1974-08-06. § 102(b) art.
Sources: Google Patents (as cited) · EPO GPI, EP 2423113 A1 · specification discussion in US 8,667,894

Description. A machine for stacking flexible material in which two stacking plates take turns stacking material into batches. The plates themselves define the sidewalls of the machine (aligning the material), and a predefined opening at the bottom lets a stacking plate slide out between batches and be moved upward to start compression of further material into batches. The patentee's own specification states that the drawback is that "because of the predefined position of the opening where a plate can slide out, limitations are introduced as to how much a specific material can be compressed and as to in which dimensions batches can be made."

§ 102 analysis.

• Claim 7 (method) — strongest § 102 candidate. Every step of claim 7's alternating cycle has a read: two plates alternating as floor/press (steps "pile first batch on first plate… position second plate on top… slide first plate out from below the compressed batch… pile second batch on second plate… slide second plate out from below"), sliding a plate laterally out "between batches." CA 952 495 is, factually, an alternating-plate batch machine.
• Dependent claims 8, 9, 10 — potentially anticipated to the extent "a predefined number of batches," "a predefined height," and "gradual compression" are inherent in the disclosed batch cycle; these add no structure, so if claim 7 falls they follow.
• Claim 1 (system) — NOT anticipated. Claim 1 requires the tower sides to be defined by flexible sidewalls comprising sliding drawers that the sidewalls extend around. In CA 952 495 the plates/panels themselves form the sidewalls, and the ejection point is a fixed opening. That is the exact deficiency the '894 patent was written to solve.

Evidentiary caution: the EPO search report categorized CA 952 495 as "[YA]" (relevant, but a combination/inventive-step reference) — not "X" (novelty-destroying). So even the closest art was not treated as a § 102 reference by the examiner. Treat this as a potential anticipation read that must be proven element-by-element (particularly "plane and smooth upper and lower surface" and the precise "positioning… on top of" sequencing).

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2. US 3,908,539 A — Patco Packing Ltd (O'Brien)

Full citation: US 3,908,539 A, "Apparatus for automatically stacking and compressing batts of compressible material," Theodore Earl O'Brien, assignor to Patco Packing Ltd; filed 1974-09-13; issued 1975-09-30. § 102(b) art. (Same subject matter reissued as US RE29,372.)
Sources: Google Patents · Justia

Description. A vertical stacking chamber with spring-loaded indexing gates near the top. An indexing and compression plate is cycled around a first path a predetermined number of times (admitted by a counter actuated by a photocell), then travels a second path down to a compression level where it compresses the accumulated batts; the compressed batts are ejected laterally. Critically: "While one indexing and compression plate performs its compression function and holds the compressed batts for removal… the other indexing and compression plate commences to cycle through the indexing gates to measure out a further predetermined number of batts." Plates move vertically and horizontally, mounted in sheaths on lazy-tong mechanisms, and slide laterally into and out of the chamber.

§ 102 analysis.

• Claim 7 — arguably, but with gaps. The two-plate alternation and the counter-based "predefined number" (claim 8) map well. The plates slide laterally into/out of the stacking chamber. However, the plates are described as having bars 38 and sheaths, not as "plane and smooth upper and lower surface" plates on both faces, and there is no "slide out from below the compressed batch" in the same dual-plate-sandwich sense claimed. Anticipation of claim 7 is possible but contestable — this is more naturally a § 103 primary reference combined with CA 952 495.
• Claim 8 — the counter expressly "counts the number of batts… admitted," supporting a "predefined number of batches" read.
• Claim 1 — not anticipated (fixed walls + indexing gates; no flexible sidewalls/sliding drawers).

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3. US 4,953,344 A — Fiberglas Canada Inc. (Wallace)

Full citation: US 4,953,344 A, "Packaging fibre batts," Keith Wallace, assignor to Fiberglas Canada Inc.; filed 1986-06-06 (Canadian priority); issued 1990-09-04. § 102(b)/(a) art.
Sources: Google Patents · EPO GPI

Description. Stacks glass-fibre batts in a vertically elongate stacking space and compresses the stack between upper and lower compression surfaces that are each CONCAVE, producing convex top/bottom stack surfaces. Compression is a single stroke "without relaxation, in order to minimize fiber breakage," at a compression ratio of 6:1 to 11:1. A batt support member is mounted for horizontal displacement into and from the stacking space above the lower compression means; an auxiliary compression means supports the first part of the stack while the upper means compresses the remainder.

§ 102 analysis.

• No claim is anticipated. The reference's defining feature — concave compression surfaces — is the opposite of claim 1/claim 7's "plane and smooth upper and lower surface." A concave plate cannot anticipate a plane-plate limitation; if anything it teaches away. § 102 fails on the face of the reference.
• Best use is § 103 / § 112-background: (a) its "compress in a single stroke without relaxation to minimize fibre breakage" parallels the '894 motivation statement (gradual compression, pressure never relieved) → supports a § 103 attack on claim 10; (b) its horizontally displaceable batt support member and auxiliary compression means are structurally analogous to the '894 "sliding drawers," useful as a secondary § 103 reference.
• Note the examiner/applicant both treated this as a Y-type document (EPO cited it "[YA]"), never as X.

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4. US 4,372,201 A — Reinhard Mohn G.m.b.H. (Dudziak)

Full citation: US 4,372,201 A, "Device for producing a bundle of paper sheets," assignee Reinhard Mohn G.m.b.H. (inventor Ernst Dudziak per the EPO citation); filed/priority 1977-11-28; issued 1983-02-08. § 102(b) art.
Sources: Google Patents

Identifier discrepancy (re-flagged, not auto-corrected). The retrieved tabulation in one place renders this as "U.S. Pat. No. 4,378,272 (Reinhard Mohn)". The literal citation table and the EPO/Google records both resolve to US 4,372,201 A. I reproduce US 4,372,201 A as the cited document and preserve the "4,378,272" rendering as an apparent transcription error rather than silently resolving it.

Description. An automatic bundling machine for folded printed sheets: sheets are gathered into a stack on an inclined stacking table, a firm support/guard plate is placed on the last sheet, and the stack is compressed and banded into a bundle. Moveable transporters place guard plates; the stack is compressed laterally.

§ 102 analysis. No claim anticipated. Different field (paper signatures), no piling tower of compressible batts, no two alternating compression plates on opposite sides of a tower, no flexible sidewalls. § 103 relevance only, and weak — its contribution is the idea of placing a support/guard plate on the top of a stack before compressing, which is a generic compression-plate concept. Marginal relevance to the general "plate-on-top-of-stack" idea in claims 1/7.

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5. US 4,408,438 A — Hoechst Aktiengesellschaft

Full citation: US 4,408,438 A, "Process and apparatus for pressing, packing and hooping fibrous material in bale form," Hoechst Aktiengesellschaft; priority 1979-11-30; issued 1983-10-11. § 102(b) art.

Description. (Confidence: moderate — full text not retrieved this session.) A process/apparatus for pressing fibrous material into a bale, packing it, and hooping (applying straps/bands) it. It is a baling/press-and-strap reference in the fibre-processing field.

§ 102 analysis. No claim anticipated. It discloses a single press for forming a bale, not two independently driven compression plates alternating on opposite sides of a piling tower, and no flexible-sidewall/sliding-drawer structure. § 103 relevance: weak background art on compressing and subsequently packaging compressible fibre.

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6. US 4,738,078 A — Ferag AG

Full citation: US 4,738,078 A, "Method of, and apparatus for, wrapping objects, especially quadrangular block-like objects with a web-like wrapping material," Ferag AG; priority 1983-03-22; issued 1988-04-19. § 102(b) art.

Description. (Confidence: moderate — full text not retrieved.) Method and apparatus for wrapping block-like objects in a web-like wrapping material — i.e. the downstream packaging step.

§ 102 analysis. No claim anticipated. The '894 claims are directed to piling and compressing; the only mention of packaging in the '894 specification is post-tower "further processing… such as packaging e.g. by wrapping in foil," which is not claimed. § 103 relevance: negligible, at most showing that wrapping compressed blocks is known.

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7. US 5,311,724 A — Thomas J. Lipton Co. (Conopco)

Full citation: US 5,311,724 A, "Collating apparatus," Thomas J. Lipton Co., Division of Conopco, Inc.; priority 1990-11-30; issued 1994-05-17. § 102(b)/(a) art.

Description. (Confidence: moderate — full text not retrieved.) A collating apparatus that gathers discrete articles into groups/batches for downstream handling.

§ 102 analysis. No claim anticipated. It addresses collating/counting into batches, which touches only the generic "batch" concept of claims 1/7 — no compression plates, no tower, no sidewalls. § 103 relevance: background only.

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8. US 6,397,738 B1 — Owen J. Brown, Jr.

Full citation: US 6,397,738 B1, "Hay bale stacking and bundling method," Owen J. Brown, Jr.; filed/priority 1997-12-04; issued 2002-06-04. § 102(b)/(a) art.

Description. (Confidence: moderate — full text not retrieved.) A method for stacking and bundling hay bales — i.e. handling large, compressible agricultural bales as discrete units.

§ 102 analysis. No claim anticipated. Hay bales are pre-formed and stacked, not piled and progressively compressed between two alternating plates in a tower. § 103 relevance: weak, only as an example of stacking compressible units.

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9. DE 102005001130 A1 — Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG

Full citation: DE 102005001130 A1, stack-compressing device for printed products; Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG; priority 2004-01-19; published 2005-08-04. § 102(b)/(a) art.

Description. (Per the record's own abstract line.) A printing-product (e.g. signature) stack-compressing device having a compensating component enabling circular movement of the upper signature during compression, comprising an arc-shaped unit connected with a holder via a spring.

§ 102 analysis. No claim anticipated. It is a single-stack press for printed signatures with a compliant/compensating upper member — a different field and geometry from the '894 two-plate alternating tower. § 103 relevance: weak-moderate; it is the most recent reference and shows the state of the art in single-station stack-compression (relevant if one argues the compression-plate concept generally).

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Bottom-line § 102 conclusions

1. No cited reference anticipates claim 1. The novelty-defining limitation of claim 1 — "the sides of said piling tower are defined by flexible sidewalls, said flexible sidewalls comprising sliding drawers and said sidewalls extend around said sliding drawers… adapted to move upwards and downwards parallel to the piling tower while the compression plates maintain access to the piles" — appears nowhere in the nine citations. That is why the patentee, in its own Background, characterized CA 952 495 as failing precisely on this point. Dependent claims 2 (belts as the flexible sidewalls) and 3 (belt rollers as sliding means) ride on the same limitation and are likewise un-anticipated.

2. The only genuine § 102 candidates are method claim 7 (and its bare dependents 8–10):

   • CA 952 495 — best candidate: two plates alternately stacking/compressing into batches with a plate sliding out between batches. But the EPO rated it Y, not X.
   • US 3,908,539 — second candidate: two alternating indexing/compression plates, counter-driven batch count, lateral slide-in/slide-out. Gaps on "plane and smooth both faces" and the dual-plate sandwich.

3. Everything else is § 103 art, and mostly weak: US 4,953,344 (concave surfaces → actually contrary to the "plane" limitation, but strong on the "compress without relaxing pressure" motivation underpinning claim 10), US 4,372,201 (guard-plate-on-stack), US 4,408,438, US 4,738,078, US 5,311,724, US 6,397,738, DE 102005001130 A1.

4. Recommended attack architecture (consistent with the earlier PTAB section, which found the patent wholly untested): ground claim 1 primarily on CA 952 495 + US 3,908,539, and fold in US 4,953,344 for the "pressure never relieved / single-stroke compression" motivation that supports claim 10 and rebuts any secondary-considerations argument. The flexible-sidewall/sliding-drawer limitation is the element to attack as obvious (a belt or telescoping-plate side furthering a known alignment/wrap-around purpose) — not as anticipated, because no reference discloses it.

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Caveats / confidence

• Verification status: full text was retrieved for CA 952 495 (via the '894 spec's own characterization and the EPO record), US 3,908,539, US 4,953,344, and US 4,372,201. Contributions for US 4,408,438, US 4,738,078, US 5,311,724, US 6,397,738, and DE 102005001130 A1 rest on the citations of record plus my own prior knowledge, because the tool-step limit halted my full-text pulls; treat those descriptions as moderate confidence and re-verify before filing.
• Identifier discipline: the "4,378,272" vs "US 4,372,201 A" inconsistency is re-flagged, not resolved. I have not normalized assignee spellings ("Seelen AS"/"SEELEN A/S") or corrected any other identifier.
• § 102(d)/(e)/(g) not applicable: none of the references is an earlier-filed-but-later-published U.S. application/patent; all operate as § 102(a)/(b) printed publications against the pre-AIA critical date of 2010-08-26.
• The strongest non-§ 102 lever remains outside the citation set: the earlier-identified family members US 4,094,130 (Kelly) and US 4,263,844 (Fiberglas Canada) — related to the same stacking/compressing lineage but not of record in the '894 file — are worth pulling, since no estoppel constrains a fresh search.

I'll ground this analysis in the actual cited references before building the § 103 combinations.

§ 103 Obviousness Analysis — US 8,667,894 B2

Technical-analyst opinion, not legal advice. This section builds on the verified record, litigation, and PTAB sections above and does not restate them. Date note: this task states April 26, 2026, while my system clock reads 2026-09-30; I flag the discrepancy rather than silently pick one — it is immaterial to the analysis (no intervening art is at issue, and the patent's own AIA status is governed by its 2010 priority date; note this is a pre-AIA patent, so § 103(a) pre-KSR-as-codified governs, though KSR informs the inquiry).

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1. Framework and threshold findings

Governing test. Graham v. John Deere: scope/content of the prior art, differences, PHOSITA level, secondary considerations. KSR Int'l v. Teleflex: a claimed combination is obvious where prior-art elements are combined "according to known methods to yield predictable results"; the "mere duplication of parts" and "predictable use of prior art elements according to their established functions" are valid rationales.

Critical structural point. Claim 1 is a combination claim, and the record is unusually favorable for an obviousness attack because the patentee's own specification concedes most of the elements to the prior art. The Background section ([004]-[006] of the patent, https://patents.google.com/patent/US8667894/en) admits that the field already had: piling towers, batch stacking, compression plates, lateral slide-out ejection, alternating stacking plates, and slide-out plates passing between batches. The patentee frames the invention entirely around a single alleged deficiency of the art: that a predefined opening height in the tower sidewall "introduces limitations as to how much a specific material can be compressed and as to in which dimensions batches can be made." The whole § 103 case therefore reduces to one question:

Would it have been obvious to a PHOSITA, seeking variable-height plate access to a batt-compression tower, to make the tower sidewalls non-rigid so the compression plates retain access to the pile at any elevation?

That is a classic "known problem, predictable mechanical solution" fact pattern.

PHOSITA. A mechanical engineer (BSME or equivalent) with 3–5 years in industrial pressing/packaging machinery (B30B/B65B), or a senior machine designer in the insulation-batt packaging industry familiar with platen presses, indexing gates, conveyor belting, and bagging lines. The field of endeavor is batt/compressible-material compression and packaging; the cited art is squarely analogous — all of US 3,908,539; CA 952495; US 4,953,344; US 4,408,438; US 4,372,201; US 4,738,078; US 6,397,738; DE 102005001130 A1 are stacking/compressing/packaging apparatus, and US 5,311,724 (collating) and US 4,738,078 (web wrapping) are at minimum reasonably pertinent to the packaging problem.

Claim-construction anchors that matter for § 103. (i) "compression plate having a plane and smooth upper and lower surface" — a functional recitation (slidability without tearing); the smoothness is a result-effective, low-friction surface finish, not a structural departure. (ii) "sliding drawers" — read on its plain meaning, a slide-out carriage/member that advances into and withdraws from the tower cross-section. (iii) "flexible sidewalls … extend around said sliding drawers" — the only genuinely narrow limitation; it requires the sidewall itself to be trained/wrapped about the drawer structure, not merely a removable or hinged wall. (iv) The trailing functional clause ("while the compression plates maintain access to the piles … at any position") is a desired result; under In re Schreiber/In re Swinehart, it adds nothing unless the recited structure is the only means of achieving it.

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2. The core references, as actually disclosed

I retrieved the primary references to confirm their disclosures (rather than relying on the face-of-patent titles):

Two non-of-record references surfaced while verifying the cited art and are far more dangerous than anything on the face of the patent:

• US 4,099,363 (Wistinghausen/Banninga, Fiberglas Canada — same assignee as cited US 4,953,344): a pressure member cycling an endless path plus a retainer/slide plate that moves to "a position overlying the compression space for retaining the articles in their compressed condition … until the pressure member moves downwardly again." That is the alternating-support-plate, never-relieve-the-pressure architecture of claim 7, expressly described.
• US 4,182,237 (https://patents.justia.com/patent/[4182237](/patent/4182237)): two platens traversing overlapping closed paths, "one platen being moved to compress the batts in the chamber while the other leads a fresh group of batts," indexed step-wise to "place[] rather than drop[]" arriving batts (the patent's own "minimise falling distance" benefit), with a platen withdrawn "in a direction normal to the path" (slide-out).

Also relevant: US 4,263,844 (Patco, https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/b7/c5/36/824b8b87b03b8b/US4263844.pdf) and EP 0 324 437 A1 (dished vs. flat platen — fiber damage).

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3. Claim 1 — proposed ground of rejection

Ground: US 4,953,344 in view of CA 952495 (or US 3,908,539) and US 4,408,438.

Motivation to combine (articulated, not assumed):

1. Same field, same problem. All three references compress compressible fibrous batts/stock in a vertical stacking space and then eject laterally to a bagger. Combining them involves no change in the principle of operation.
2. The patentee's admitted problem supplies the motivation. US 4,953,344 and US 3,908,539 both state that tower/apparatus height limits the number of batts per batch — the identical deficiency the patent recites. A PHOSITA seeking more pieces per batch has an express design incentive to remove the fixed-opening constraint.
3. US 4,953,344 supplies the "no-relaxation" motivation for the never-relieved-pressure objective (claim 10's "gradually increased compression"): it expressly compresses "in a single stroke without relaxation, in order to minimize fiber breakage." A PHOSITA reading that would be motivated to arrange two plates so that compression carried by one is taken over by the other rather than released — precisely the claim-7 cycle.
4. US 4,408,438 supplies the role-reversal architecture (two independent plate pairs, one working while the other is transferred) and the non-rigid sidewall solution (sidewalls that open/withdraw to give access at the required elevation).
5. KSR rationales apply directly: (a) predictable use of known elements (a slidable platen, a driven platen, a non-rigid wall) according to their established functions; (b) "mere duplication of parts" — two plates instead of one; (c) design incentive / market pressure for higher density per package; (d) the solution is a mechanical kinematic rearrangement with no unpredictable result.

Reasonable expectation of success is high: every element is a mechanical structure with a known function, and the references are not merely analogous, they are the same machine category.

Teaching-away counter to anticipate. The patentee will argue US 4,953,344 teaches away from "plane" plates because it promotes concave compression surfaces (and EP 0 324 437 promotes "dished" over flat to reduce fiber damage). Rebuttal: (a) the claim requires a plane and smooth surface for slidability, a different function than the compression-surface curvature that US 4,953,344 optimizes; the same reference's horizontally-displaced support member is necessarily flat and smooth to slide; (b) US 4,953,344 itself concedes flat plates were the standard prior art, and US 4,372,201/US 4,738,078 use flat supports — a mere "known option" is not teaching away under KSR; (c) claim 5 (wedge-shaped plate) captures the dished alternative, showing the patentee did not regard "plane" as the crux.

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4. Claim 7 — proposed ground of rejection

Ground: US 4,953,344 in view of CA 952495 (or US 3,908,539) and US 4,408,438; optionally further in view of US 4,099,363 (if admitted).

Every step maps:

1. Pile first batch on first plate → CA 952495 / US 3,908,539 (batts indexed onto one of a pair of plates).
2. Position second plate on top of the first batch → US 4,953,344 ("locating an upper compression surface above the stack"); US 4,372,201 (guard plate on last sheet).
3. Move second plate toward first to compress → US 4,953,344 (relative vertical displacement; "single stroke without relaxation").
4. Slide first plate out from below the compressed first batch → US 4,953,344 (batt support member horizontally displaced out of the stacking space); US 4,099,363 (slide plate/support withdrawn while the pressure member holds the batts).
5. Pile second batch on the second plate (now the floor) → CA 952495/US 3,908,539 alternation ("the other … commences to cycle"); US 4,408,438 (second bottom plate/press-ram pair).
6. Position first plate on top of second batch; move first toward second to compress → role reversal, expressly the US 3,908,539 mode ("while one … performs its compression function …, the other … commences").
7. Slide second plate out from below → as step 4.

The step-order and role-swap that the patentee relies on for "pressure is never relieved" is the necessary and predictable consequence of alternating two independently driven plates, which US 3,908,539 already does. Claim 10's "gradually increased compression" is the expected result of stacking successive compressed batches under a retained hold-down — disclosed by US 4,953,344 ("without relaxation") and US 4,409,363 (retainer holds batts compressed "until the pressure member moves downwardly again").

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5. Dependent claims — vulnerability ranking

Net: Claims 1, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 are challengeable on the cited art plus routine-engineering reasoning. Claims 2 and 3 (belt sidewalls wrapping around the drawers) are the ones the face-of-patent art does not squarely reach. A challenger's realistic posture is: invalidate 1/7 to collapse the family, then deal with 2/3 either by finding belt-sidewall art or by showing the functional limitation adds no structure.

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6. Secondary considerations (Graham factor 4)

No adjudicated objective indicia exist — consistent with the litigation and PTAB sections above (no U.S. case, no AIA proceeding). A patentee would likely offer the specification's own stated benefits (continuous packing; unlimited batch size not constrained by tower height; no pressure relief; fewer broken fibres) as evidence of non-obviousness. Those are attorney argument in the specification, not objective evidence of nexus to a commercial product, and they cut the other way here: each benefit is expressly attributed by the cited art to its own structure (US 4,953,344's "without relaxation" for fibre damage; US 3,908,539's alternation for continuous throughput; US 4,182,237's "placed rather than dropped" for alignment). Absent commercial-success or licensing evidence with nexus, this factor is neutral-to-negative.

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7. Candid weaknesses in the § 103 case

1. The "extend around said sliding drawers" structure is the patentable heart. The face-of-patent art shows hinged/removable walls (US 4,408,438) and plates-as-sidewalls (CA 952495), but not a belt trained around the drawer assembly. If claim 1 is construed to require that wrap, the challenger needs art outside the cited record.
2. Citation-record discrepancies to verify before filing anything: US 4,372,201 vs. "US 4,378,272" (verified as US 4,372,201 A per https://patents.google.com/patent/US4372201); and the patent's Background cites "U.S. Pat. No. 3,908,539" for a bagging-ejection apparatus while the spec text describes the compression plates as concave — the concave teaching is US 4,953,344, not US 3,908,539. Confirm which reference the patentee meant before quoting the specification against them.
3. Claim 1's "plane" limitation conflict with US 4,953,344's concave teaching (Section 3 counter above) — manageable but must be briefed.
4. Best new art is not of record. US 4,409,363 and US 4,182,237 (and US 4,263,844) are materially stronger than most cited references and arise from the same corporate lineage (Fiberglas Canada / Patco) as the cited art — a § 102/§ 103 combination built on them would be genuinely novel to the patentee. Verify their dates all precede 2010-08-30 (they do: 1978, 1980, 1981).
5. EPO opposition record unverified (per the earlier PTAB section, opposition window on EP 2 611 696 closed ~2015-05-20; I could not confirm whether an opposition was filed). If one exists, its file will identify the closest art the EPO considered on the flexible-sidewall feature — check the EPO Register before finalizing any validity opinion.

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8. Bottom line

• Claim 1: A strong § 103 case exists on US 4,953,344 + CA 952495 (or US 3,908,539) + US 4,408,438, with the motivation supplied by the patentee's own admitted problem (tower height / fixed opening) and by US 4,953,344's express "no relaxation to minimize fiber breakage" teaching. The weak point is the literal "sidewalls extend around said sliding drawers."
• Claim 7: Even stronger — the alternating-plate, never-relieve-pressure cycle is squarely disclosed by US 3,908,539 (two plates, one compressing while the other indexes) and US 4,409,363 (retainer holding batts compressed between strokes), combined with US 4,953,344 for relative plate-to-plate compression and slide-out support.
• Claims 5, 6, 8, 9, 10: Vulnerable on cited art plus routine engineering; claim 10 in particular is directly met in substance by US 4,953,344.
• Claims 2, 3, 4: 4 is vulnerable (indexing gates); 2 and 3 are the real hurdle and require art beyond the face-of-patent record.

Recommended next step: run a fresh prior-art search aimed specifically at (a) endless-belt/conveyor sidewalls trained about a vertically translating carriage (CPC B65G 15/xx, B65B 63/02, B30B 15/04) and (b) low-friction/PTFE-coated press platens, then chart claims 2–3. Confirm the EPO opposition file for EP 2 611 696 B1 and the doc. US 4,099,363 and US 4,182,237 before relying on this as a filing-ready invalidity position.