Akamai Cements Win in Internet-Routing Patent Case on Appeal

MediaPointe Inc. failed to show its internet-traffic-routing patents provided objective standards for choosing the “best” path, a federal appeals court ruled, voiding key claims and affirming Akamai Technologies Inc.'s win in the case.

The since-expired patents—which covered an “intelligent distribution network” for directing streamed content—used terms such as “optimal” and “best” without explaining how engineers should weigh metrics such as hops, latency, or reliability, Judge Richard G. Taranto wrote for a three-judge panel in a precedential opinion issued Tuesday in the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

That lack of guidance led the panel to invalidate as indefinite ...