Amazon Fails to Sway Judge on Voice-Tech Patent’s Validity

Amazon.com Inc. failed to convince a federal judge that a magistrate erred in finding that the claims at issue in a suit by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute over a patent related to smart-speaker technology aren’t indefinite.

Judge Brenda K. Sannes, in a March 18 opinion in the U.S. District for the Northern District of New York, adopted the report and recommendation Magistrate Judge David E. Peebles issued Sept. 30, which found that the disputed claims recited acts rather than functions.

Rensselaer filed the suit in 2018, alleging Amazon’s Alexa, a cloud-based voice service on Amazon’s Echo and other enabled devices, processes ...