By Michael Borella — Introduction Packet Intelligence sued NetScout in the Eastern District of Texas, alleging infringement of U.S. Patent Nos. 6,665,725, 6,839,751, and 6,954,789. The District Court ruled that all three patents were valid under 35 U.S.C. §§ 101 and 102, and infringed. The § 101 dispute was tried at the bench. NetScout appealed. The core technological aspects under dispute are described reasonably well in the ‘789 patent as follows: Some prior art packet monitors classify packets into connection flows. The term “connection flow” is commonly used to describe all the packets involved with a single connection. A conversational…
