In addressing the first step of the Supreme Court of the United
States' § 101 framework in Alice (
IP Update, Vol. 17, No. 7) evaluating whether the
claimed subject matter is an abstract idea, the US Court of Appeals
for the Federal Circuit reversed a decision invalidating claims
directed to a heads-up display patent as being patent ineligible
under 35 USC § 101. Thales Visionix Inc. v. U.S.,
Case No. 15-5150 (Fed. Cir., Mar. 8, 2017) (Moore, J).
Thales Visionix, a developer of helmet-mounted display systems
(HMDS), sued the United States for patent infringement in the US
Court of Federal Claims (Claims Court). The asserted claims are
directed to HMDS used by fighter jet pilots. The claims utilize
mathematical equations to determine the orientation of the helmet
relative to the frame of a moving vehicle through inertial sensors
such as accelerometers and gyroscopes. Elbit Systems, the
government contractor that produced the HMDS for the government,
joined the case as
