July 2013

Back in January, we alerted you to a patent infringement case brought in the U.S. International Trade Commission by Acacia Research subsidiary Adaptix.  Adaptix accused Ericsson of infringing U.S. Pat. No. 6,870,808, which Adaptix asserted to be essential to the ETSI 4G Long-Term Evolution (LTE) wireless standard.  The ITC later instituted the investigation as…

Earlier this week, we caught up on summary judgment motions filed by both Microsoft and Motorola in advance of next month’s breach of contract jury trial, set to take place in Seattle.  Yesterday, both parties filed reply briefs in support of these motions:

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It’s July (and brutally hot on the East Coast), so you’ll have to excuse us if we’re moving a little slower than normal catching up on all the SEP litigation going around.  Earlier this month we posted about submissions by Microsoft and Motorola concerning the meaning of the “duty of good faith and fair dealing,” specifically as it applies in RAND-encumbered standard-essential patent licensing.  Not surprisingly, the parties followed up these briefs with dueling summary judgment motions, seeking to narrow issues or even potentially completely eliminate the need for the breach of contract jury trial set to take place next month in Seattle.  Last week, the parties also filed their respective oppositions to these motions.  You can take a look at the parties’ motions and oppositions below — and after the jump, we’ll give a brief synopsis of the arguments that each is making.

13.07.03 (D.E. 727) Microsoft Motion for Partial SJ and 13.07.15 (D.E. 758) Motorola Response to MS Partial SJ Motion

13.07.03 (D.E. 720) Motorola Motion for SJ and 13.07.12 (D.E. 740) MS Response to Motorola SJ MotionContinue Reading With dueling summary judgment motions, Microsoft and Motorola seek to eliminate issues from next month’s RAND trial

This past Friday, Judge Richard Andrews of the District Court of Delaware held a hearing on InterDigital’s motions to dismiss several FRAND-related counterclaims in three district court cases InterDigital brought against Huawei, ZTE, and Nokia over 4G-essential patents.  For a brief refresher on the issues raised in InterDigital’s motions to dismiss — which have been…

A couple weeks ago, we posted about an interesting pretrial damages ruling in a patent infringement case (actually, several cases) brought by non-practicing entity Wi-LAN against a number of standards-compliant device makers (Sony, Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent, and HTC).  But yesterday, an Eastern District of Texas jury decided that the damages issue was irrelevant, finding that all…

Earlier this week, we took a quick look at the U.S. International Trade Commission’s landmark opinion in In the Matter of Certain Electronic Devices, Including Wireless Communication Devices, Portable Music and Data Processing Devices, and Tablet Computers (Inv. No. 337-TA-794) — and we promised an annotated version of the Commission’s rather lengthy opinion.  Well, without…

Late last week, the ITC finally released the public version of its Final Determination and Commission Opinion in In the Matter of Certain Electronic Devices, Including Wireless Communication Devices, Portable Music and Data Processing Devices, and Tablet Computers (Inv. No. 337-TA-794) — the case where the Commission last month issued a controversial exclusion order based on Apple’s infringement of a Samsung 3G-essential patent.  The document, linked to below, includes both the Commission’s determination of a violation of Section 337 and its decision to issue an exclusion order despite the fact that Samsung had previously pledged to license the patent at issue on FRAND terms, along with a dissent by Commissioner Dean A. Pinkert from the decision to issue an exclusion order.

[337-TA-794 Commission Opinion (Public Version)]

As you can see, the Commission’s opinion is long and detailed, and we are in the midst of preparing an annotated version of the opinion that we’ll be posting later this week (similar to what we did with the Microsoft-Motorola RAND opinion).  But after the jump, we’ll give you a quick overview of the Commission’s determination and the dissent’s views on the FRAND and SEP-related public interest issues.


Continue Reading ITC releases public version of the Commission opinion (and dissent) in Samsung-Apple case (337-TA-794)

Later this summer, the second phase of the Microsoft v. Motorola RAND breach of contract trial will take place in Judge James L. Robart’s courtroom in Seattle, WA.  A jury will decide whether Motorola breached its SSO-related RAND licensing obligations by offering what Microsoft deems “blatantly unreasonable” licensing terms for its 802.11- and H.264-essential patents, and then following up with patent infringement suits.

In a prior summary judgment order, Judge Robart already concluded that in order to be permissible under its RAND obligations, Motorola’s license offers “must comport with the implied duty of good faith and fair dealing inherent in every contract.”  He noted that this inquiry is heavily fact-intensive, and best left to the jury to decide.  To this end, Judge Robart recently requested that both Microsoft and Motorola present background briefing on the parameters of what is required by the duty of good faith and fair dealing in contractual disputes.  This week, the parties complied with this request:

Both parties acknowledge that the issue of good faith and fair dealing is complicated — but understandably, the parties also differ quite a bit in their views on what should be considered.  After the jump, we’ll take a brief look at the filings.


Continue Reading In Microsoft-Motorola RAND dispute, “good faith and fair dealing” is in the eye of the beholder

Over the past few years, courts have begun cracking down on improper damages theories.  The Federal Circuit’s 2012 opinion in LaserDynamics v. Quanta is instructive on this point, noting that in the absence of evidence that the patented functionality is the source of the demand for the entire product, then damages must be based on…

On Friday, U.S. International Trade Commission Administrative Law Judge David P. Shaw issued a Notice of Initial Determination in In the Matter of Certain Wireless Devices with 3G Capabilities and Components Thereof, Inv. No. 337-TA-800.  This investigation was originally instituted nearly two years ago based on a complaint filed by InterDigital against Huawei, Nokia, ZTE, and LG, in which InterDigital accused the companies of infringing several InterDigital patents alleged to be essential to various 3G cellular communications standards.  The evidentiary hearing was held in January 2013, and the case involves the intersection of a two issues that have drawn a lot of attention lately — the assertion of standard-essential patents at the ITC (and what if any relevance FRAND licensing obligations have to the proceedings), as well as patent infringement cases brought by non-practicing entities (InterDigital is an NPE that has been deemed a “patent troll” by some, while others take a more favorable view of the company’s activities).

So far, it appears that InterDigital’s SEP infringement assertions have failed (at least for now).  While the public version of ALJ Shaw’s Initial Determination won’t become available for at least a few weeks, Friday’s Notice indicates that ALJ Shaw found no violations of Section 337 with respect to any of the seven remaining asserted patents. 
Continue Reading ITC rules against InterDigital’s claims of 3G-essential patent infringement in preliminary finding