Samesurf, Inc. v. Intuit Inc.

N OTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.
United States Court of Appeals
for the Federal Circuit
______________________
SAMESURF, INC.,
Appellant
v.
INTUIT INC.,
Appellee
______________________
2024-2268, 2024-2269
______________________
Appeals from the United States Patent and Trademark
Office, Patent Trial and Appeal Board in Nos. IPR2023-
00339, IPR2023-00342.
______________________
Decided: May 21, 2026
______________________
ALAN P ETER BLOCK, McKool Smith, P.C., Los Angeles,
CA, argued for appellant. Also represented by RYAN B.
MCBETH , ARCHIS VASANT O ZARKAR , Houston, TX; STEVEN
P OLLINGER, Austin, TX.
MICHAEL J OHN SACKSTEDER, Fenwick & West LLP, San
Francisco, CA, argued for appellee. Also represented by
P AYAM AHMADI, SHANNON T URNER; G EOFFREY ROBERT
MILLER, New York, NY; J ONATHAN G. T AMIMI, Seattle, WA.
______________________
Case: 24-2268 Document: 51 Page: 1 Filed: 05/21/2026

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SAMESURF, INC. v. INTUIT INC. 2
Before D YK, CHEN, and STARK, Circuit Judges.
STARK, Circuit Judge.
Samesurf, Inc. (“Samesurf”) is the owner of U.S. Patent
No. 9,185,145 (“’145 patent”), entitled “Method and Appa-
ratus for the Implementation of a Real-Time, Sharable
Browsing Experience on a Guest Device.” J.A. 202. In an
inter partes review (“IPR”), the Patent Trial and Appeal
Board (“Board”) issued a final written decision (“FWD”)
finding that all claims of the ’145 patent were obvious over
World Intellectual Property Organization International
Publication No. WO 00/48110 (“Lebrun”) in view of U.S. Pa-
tent Application Publication No. 2005/0033656 (“Wang”).
Samesurf argues that the Board’s unpatentability determi-
nation rests on an incorrect claim construction. Because
the Board correctly construed the disputed claim term, we
affirm.
I
The ’145 patent generally relates to “the implementa-
tion of a synchronized browsing session.” J.A. 224 at 1:15-
19. Claim 1 recites:
A method performed by a guest device for joining a
synchronized browsing session administered by a
synchronization server, comprising:
receiving from the synchronization server a
session invitation including a session iden-
tifier associated with a host device;
activating the session invitation to send a
request to join said synchronized browsing
session to said synchronization server;
receiving web browsing interaction data
from said synchronization server, wherein
said web browsing interaction data is asso-
ciated with:
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SAMESURF, INC. v. INTUIT INC. 3
a website server that is independ-
ent of the synchronization server,
and
the host device that has initiated
the session invitation; and
operating an application based on said web
browsing interaction data received from
said synchronization server to access a
website server independent of the synchro-
nization server subsequent to the activa-
tion of the session invitation.
J.A. 234-35 at 22:62–23:15. (emphasis added).
On Intuit Inc.’s (“Intuit”) petition, the Board instituted
IPR of all claims of the ’145 patent. In their briefs, the par-
ties disputed the meaning of “web browsing interaction
data.” The Board, in its FWD, held that this claim term
“would have been understood by one of ordinary skill . . . as
data related to web browsing interactions.” J.A. 39. In a
thorough 20-page claim construction analysis, the Board
explained that the term was sufficiently broad to encom-
pass “data resulting from host device interactions per-
formed on a website (including webpages or partially filled
webpages related to web browsing interactions).” J.A. 39.
As it was undisputed that “Lebrun expressly discloses
. . . sending a partial webpage without multimedia ele-
ments to the web clients,” application of the Board’s con-
struction led inexorably to the conclusion that Lebrun
“disclose[d] or suggest[ed] ‘web browsing interaction data.’”
J.A. 60. Hence, the Board determined that the “combina-
tion of Lebrun and Wang discloses or suggests” all limita-
tions of the challenged claims, meaning that Intuit “has
shown by a preponderance of the evidence that all chal-
lenged claims are unpatentable.” J.A. 60-63, 99.
Samesurf timely appealed. We have jurisdiction under
28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(4)(A).
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SAMESURF, INC. v. INTUIT INC. 4
II
Claim construction is a question of law that may in-
volve underlying factual inquiries. See Teva Pharms. USA,
Inc. v. Sandoz, Inc., 574 U.S. 318, 326 (2015). We review
the Board’s claim construction de novo and its subsidiary
factual findings for substantial evidence. See Dionex
Softron GmbH v. Agilent Techs., Inc., 56 F.4th 1353, 1358
(Fed. Cir. 2023).
III
Samesurf argues that the Board erred by not limiting
“web browsing interaction data” to “data describing inter-
actions performed on a website by a host device.” Open. Br.
at 51. In particular, Samesurf insists that under the
proper construction, “web browsing interaction data” can-
not include data resulting from host device interactions
performed on a website, such as Lebrun’s partially filled
webpages. Samesurf asserts it would not make sense for
the web pages delivered to the user, or partial web pages
(stripped of multimedia data), to be considered “web brows-
ing interaction data” because that data does not itself ena-
ble the user to participate in a synchronization session.
Intuit disagrees, and so do we.
Samesurf provides no persuasive reason for why a per-
son of ordinary skill in the art, reviewing the ’145 patent,
would understand the claim term “web browsing interac-
tion data” to include anything less than all data related to
web browsing interactions, including webpages and par-
tially filled webpages. “The patentee is free to choose a
broad term and expect to obtain the full scope of its plain
and ordinary meaning unless the patentee explicitly rede-
fines the term or disavows its full scope.” Thorner v. Sony
Comput. Ent. Am. LLC, 669 F.3d 1362, 1367 (Fed. Cir.
2012). Neither party here suggests the patentee acted as a
lexicographer to redefine the disputed term, nor that there
has been a disclaimer.
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SAMESURF, INC. v. INTUIT INC. 5
We discern nothing in the claim language that would
cause a skilled artisan to understand the broad term “web
browsing interaction data” to be limited to interaction data
generated by the host device, and not to also include data
resulting from the interactions. None of the other claim
limitations – which require that “web browsing interaction
data” is received by the “guest device” from the “synchroni-
zation server,” associated with a “website server” and a
“host device,” and used by the “guest device” to “access a
website server” – describes the content of the “web brows-
ing interaction data” nor suggests that “web browsing in-
teraction data” cannot include partially filled websites.
J.A. 235 at 23:4-15. Dependent claim 5 additionally states
that “web browsing interaction data further comprises in-
formation related to shared user input web browsing inter-
actions depicted in a first web browsing window.” J.A. 235
at 23:24-27. As the Board explained, Samesurf’s narrower
construction would limit control of the synchronized web
browsing session to only the host, despite the patent pur-
porting to allow control by multiple devices.
The specification, which does not even use the term
“web browsing interaction data,” does not help Samesurf.
Samesurf points to a statement in the specification describ-
ing the “present invention” as a guest device “receiving in-
formation related to a shared web browsing interaction
performed by a host device from a synchronization server,
and performing the shared web browsing interaction based
on the information received from the synchronization
server.” J.A. 225 at 3:10-16 (emphasis added). We see no
merit to Samesurf’s unexplained assertion that “‘infor-
mation related to a shared web browsing interaction’ is nar-
rowly understood to refer to ‘information describing a
shared web browsing interaction.’” Open. Br. at 44.
Even accepting as true Samesurf’s contention that “the
only thing described in the specification that constitutes
‘web browsing interaction data’ as described in the claims
is ‘communication message 64,’” Open. Br. at 52, and even
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SAMESURF, INC. v. INTUIT INC. 6
assuming “communication message 64” is narrowly limited
to “‘a duplicate of website request 60 . . . or . . . the URL
address of [the] website server,’” Open. Br. at 50 (quoting
J.A. 231 at 16:42-47), the specification does not decisively
support Samesurf’s construction. “Even when the specifi-
cation describes only a single embodiment, the claims of
the patent will not be read restrictively unless the patentee
has demonstrated a clear intention to limit the claim
scope,” which has not occurred here. Liebel-Flarsheim Co.
v. Medrad, Inc., 358 F.3d 898, 906 (Fed. Cir. 2004). Indeed,
the specification expressly refers to the embodiment on
which Samesurf relies as exemplary. J.A. 231 at 16:45-51.
Finally, Samesurf provides no support for its insistence
that the Board’s construction renders the invention “inop-
erable.” Open. Br. at 40. Samesurf argues that “a shared
web browsing interaction cannot be performed based on the
webpage or partially filled webpage that would result from
the interaction to be performed.” Id. However, what the
claims require is “operati[on] [of] an application based on
said web browsing interaction data . . . to access a website
server.” J.A. 235 at 23:11-15. Samesurf identifies no evi-
dence that would allow us to conclude that partially filled
webpages would be unable to do this.
Therefore, we agree with the Board that the correct
construction of “web browsing interaction data,” as used in
the claims of Samesurf’s ’145 patent, is “data related to web
browsing interactions.”
IV
We have considered Samesurf’s remaining arguments
and find they lack merit. Accordingly, for the reasons given
above, we agree with the Board’s construction of the dis-
puted term and, thus, its conclusion that all claims of the
’145 patent are unpatentable based on obviousness. The
Board’s judgment is affirmed.
AFFIRMED
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