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Yesterday Arris filed a declaratory judgment action in D. Del. against Rockstar based on Rockstar asserting alleged standard essential patents (SEPs) against cable operators who purchased Arris equipment (recall our Jan. 21, 2014 post about Rockstar lawsuits with cable operators).  Among other things, Arris seeks a declaration of the essentiality of Rockstar patents, what standard…

Last week, District of Nebraska judge Joseph F. Bataillon entered an order preliminarily enjoining the Nebraska Attorney General (AG) from enforcing a cease and desist order that would prevent or impede the law firm of Farney Daniels from representing patent assertion entity MPHJ Technology Investments, LLC (MPHJ) to license or litigate MPHJ’s U.S. patents with…

Today, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its opinion in Medtronic, Inv. v. Mirowski Family Ventures, LLC, unanimously reversing the Federal Circuit’s decision below and resolving two issues that are commonly disputed in the lower courts.  First, the Court held that the Federal Circuit had subject-matter jurisdiction over an appeal of an action for a…

Last Friday, several cable operators filed a Complaint against Rockstar in D. Del. alleging that Rockstar’s assertion against them of patents breached obligations owed to various standard setting organizations (“SSOs”) based on prior owner Nortel’s commitment to license patents on RAND, FRAND or royalty-free terms.  Our Jan. 2 and Nov. 1 posts discussed Rockstar’s purchase…

On New Year’s Eve, Magistrate Judge Stephen Crocker of the W.D. Wis. ruled that a patent pool’s demand letter listing hundreds of standard-essential-patents was not enough for the patent owner to provide its recipients with actual notice of alleged acts of patent infringement under the patent statute.  Ruling on Defendants’ Motion for JMOL regarding pre-suit…

Yesterday patent monetization entity MPHJ filed a Complaint in W.D. Tex. against the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) for threatening an enforcement action against MPHJ premised on MPHJ’s extensive letter campaign to accumulate license fees on its scanner patents by threatening small end-users with litigation that MPHJ allegedly did not actually intend to pursue.  We…

Judge Whyte recently issued his final ruling on Daubert and other evidence regarding RAND issues for the upcoming Realtek v. LSI jury trial based on his tentative ruling discussed in our Nov. 14 post.  Judge Whyte basically kept his tentative rulings and bases thereof, as discussed in our prior post.  He did provide additional…

Yesterday Judge Stark followed an approach used by Judge Holdeman in the Innovatio WiFi case by bifurcating FRAND issues from liability where essentiality and a RAND royalty rate will be tried first in hopes the result will spur settlement, followed by discovery and trial on liability issues if still necessary.  Recall that this case arose…

On December 30, 2013, InterDigital and Huawei filed a stipulation to dismiss the pending Delaware district court action (13-cv-00008) without prejudice, indicating the parties entered into a “binding settlement agreement and agreement to arbitrate”.  The Court promptly dismissed the case.

Yesterday, InterDigital and Huawei similarly moved to terminate the corresponding ITC action, Inv. No.…

Since Judge Holderman’s September 27, 2013 order setting a RAND rate in the sprawling Innovatio WiFi litigation (see our October 3 post), two of the five major device manufacturers involved in the case have settled-out.  Motorola settled with Innovatio after a November 22nd settlement conference and was dismissed on December 17th.  Less than a…