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CAFCEarlier this week, both Nokia and BlackBerry (formerly Research In Motion) were both granted leave to file amicus briefs with the Federal Circuit in the Apple v. Motorola appeal of Judge Posner’s June 2012 decision to dismiss the parties’ respective infringement claims.  BlackBerry’s brief is still confidential, but Nokia’s is now publicly available.

[2013.05.06 Nokia Amicus Brief]

While Nokia’s amicus brief is styled as being “in support of neither party,” it’s clear that Motorola should be the one happy here — Nokia asks the Federal Circuit to reverse Judge Posner’s decisions relating to Motorola’s standard-essential patents at issue, both with respect to damages and injunctive relief.  Nokia claims that Judge Posner’s ruling (1) creates a bright line rule against injunctions that violates Supreme Court precedent, and (2) unnecessarily devalues standard-essential patents by mandating that any damages be based on the smallest salable unit, which runs contrary to industry practices in SEP licensing.  A summary is after the jump.


Continue Reading Nokia amicus brief urges Federal Circuit to reverse Judge Posner’s standard-essential patent rulings

Much of the activity and attention in the standard-essential patent world over the last few days has been focused on Judge James L. Robart’s groundbreaking decision in the Microsoft-Motorola RAND breach of contract case.  But that wasn’t the only RAND-related bit of news happening this past Thursday — that same day, in the Federal Circuit, Apple filed its response to Motorola’s appeal of Judge Posner’s decision to deny both damages and injunctive relief to Motorola in a case involving Apple’s alleged infringement of Motorola standard-essential patents.

Due to the fact that the Federal Circuit has consolidated appeals by both parties, Apple’s brief is technically both a response brief and a reply brief — but we will only deal with the SEP-specific issues here.  In the brief, which we’ll delve into after the jump, Apple urges the Federal Circuit to uphold Judge Posner’s findings that, even if infringement could be proven: (1) Motorola failed to introduce a cognizable damages theory for infringement of the SEPs at issue; and (2) Motorola could not show entitlement to injunctive relief for its FRAND-encumbered patents.

Link: [Apple April 25, 2013 Appellate Brief]Continue Reading Apple asks Federal Circuit to affirm Judge Posner’s denial of injunctive relief and damages for Motorola FRAND-pledged standard-essential patents

(Note: the subject matter of this post is a bit off-topic for this blog, but with all of the attention being paid to non-meritorious patent lawsuits and potential solutions, we thought this warranted mentioning.)

Patent litigation, like most litigation in this country, is generally controlled by the “American Rule” — the general rule that each party pays its own litigation-related costs and attorneys’ fees.  This stands in contrast to the rules in other countries such as England, where the losing party generally pays the other’s attorneys’ fees.  There are exceptions to the American Rule in various jurisdictions and types of litigations, including the patent-related provision in 35 U.S.C. § 285.

Section 285 provides that “[t]he court in exceptional cases may award reasonable attorney fees to the prevailing party.”  However, it’s well-known that courts rarely award fees under Section 285 except in the most egregious circumstances (in fact, we recently posted a patent alert about a denial of fees).  Under current Federal Circuit precedent, cases are only deemed exceptional if there has been litigation misconduct or fraud in securing the patent, or if an infringer’s claim is both objectively baseless and brought in subjective bad faith.  See Highmark, Inc. v. Allcare Health Mgmt. Sys., Inc., 687 F.3d 1300, 1308 (Fed. Cir. 2012).

In a recent petition for certiorari, Octane Fitness LLC has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn this precedent and make it easier for prevailing patent infringement defendants to recover attorneys’ fees from infringement plaintiffs.
Continue Reading Is Section 285’s “exceptional case” requirement too exceptionally hard to satisfy?

A quick update for those interested in the Apple-Motorola Federal Circuit FRAND appeal:

Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its opinion in Gunn v. Minton, where the Court determined that a plaintiff’s patent litigation-related state law malpractice claim did not “arise under” the federal patent laws and did not create federal jurisdiction under…

Today, February 20, 2013, in Brilliant Instruments, Inc. v. GuideTech, Inc., No. 2012-1018, the Federal Circuit (Dyk (dissenting-in-part), Moore, and Reyna) reversed the Northern District of California’s prior grant of summary judgment of no infringement under the doctrine of equivalents based on fact issues regarding whether a capacitor that was “part of” a…

CAFCToday, Motorola Mobility filed a reply brief in support of its efforts to dismiss Apple’s Federal Circuit FRAND appeal (or at least transfer it to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals).  As you’ll recall, a few weeks ago, Motorola filed a unique motion to dismiss Apple’s appeal, claiming  the Federal Circuit lacked jurisdiction because (for more info, see our original post on Motorola’s motion).  Apple filed an opposition, asserting that the case was properly appealed to the Federal Circuit.  In its relatively short reply, Motorola targets two particular assertions that Apple claims vest the Federal Circuit with jurisdiction: (1) that Apple’s declaratory judgment complaint was filed “in response” to a hypothetical complaint of patent infringement; and (2) that the dismissal of certain Apple claims without prejudice does not divest the Federal Circuit of jurisdiction.


Continue Reading Apple, Motorola continue fight over Federal Circuit FRAND jurisdiction: Motorola’s Reply Brief

CAFCThis isn’t a necessarily a standard-essential patent issue (and it’s been covered by many others such as IPLaw360 and Groklaw over the past couple days), but as something that could affect how parties enforce standard-essential patent rights in U.S. courts, we thought it’d be worth a quick post.  Earlier this week, Apple filed its opening brief in its appeal of Judge Lucy Koh’s decision to deny Apple a permanent injunction against Samsung.  In her post-trial decision applying the eBay analysis and denying an injunction, Judge Koh found that Apple failed to demonstrate a “causal nexus” between Samsung’s infringement of Apple’s utility and design patents and the irreparable harm to Apple (e.g., loss of market share and downstream sales).  Apple argues in its brief to the Federal Circuit that there was no need for it to demonstrate such a causal nexus, and that even if there is, the evidence does show a nexus between infringement and irreparable harm.
Continue Reading Apple urges Federal Circuit to eliminate or minimize “causal nexus” requirement for permanent injunctions

CAFCOn February 11, 2013, in Semiconductor Energy Laboratory Co. v. Nagata, No. 2012-1245, the Federal Circuit (Lourie, Bryson, and Wallach) affirmed a decision by the Northern District of California that dismissed a complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. This case provides insight into the appropriateness of using a named inventor as a fact witness in an infringement action based on his or her patent.
Continue Reading Patent Alert: Assignor estoppel is not a federal cause of action (Semiconductor Energy Lab. Co. v. Nagata)

CAFC

Motorola and Apple are currently facing off over patent-related issues in several ongoing judicial proceedings, including multiple appeals before the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.  One of these Federal Circuit appeals was brought by Apple over Judge Crabb’s dismissal of Apple’s claims that Motorola violated the antitrust laws and breached its contracts with SSOs in conducting its SEP-related licensing and enforcement activities.  But on January 25, Motorola filed a motion with the Federal Circuit to dismiss Apple’s appeal (or transfer it to the Seventh Circuit), asserting that the Federal Circuit lacks jurisdiction to hear the case.  While at first blush this seems like just a mundane dispute over civil procedure issues, a decision on this motion may have significant consequences for future FRAND-related proceedings.Continue Reading Motorola disputes Federal Circuit’s jurisdiction over Apple’s FRAND-related appeal, argues for dismissal or transfer

Later this year, in the case of Apple Inc. v. Motorola Inc. (Nos. 2012-1548, -1549), the Federal Circuit is set to address several issues that could have a big effect on future licensing and assertion of standard-essential patents.  As explained in our previous post “catching up on” the details of this dispute, this appeal follows Judge Posner’s dismissal of both Apple’s and Motorola’s dueling infringement claims, which was based on the parties’ failure to prove entitlement to the remedies sought.  Because Motorola had asserted a FRAND-encumbered standard-essential patent against Apple’s UMTS-compliant products, the Federal Circuit is likely to decide at least two issues that may have widespread implications for SEP licensing and litigation for years to come: (1) whether injunctive relief may be an appropriate remedy for Apple’s alleged infringement of Motorola’s FRAND-pledged SEPs; and (2) how to calculate damages for Apple’s alleged infringement of Motorola’s FRAND-pledged SEPs.
Continue Reading Various amici weigh in on SEP-related issues in Apple-Motorola Federal Circuit appeal