A Blog About Intellectual Property Litigation and the District of Delaware


Entries for date: 2020

Update on Potential New Judgeship for the District of Delaware

Andrew E. Russell, July 21, 2020

Gavel
Gavel, Bill Oxford, Unsplash

Law360 reports bipartisan support for an upcoming bill that would create 65 new judgeships, including one in the District of Delaware.

It may not sound like much, but a single new DE judgeship would be a 25% increase in the number of district court judges here.

The District Court hasn't expanded since 1984, and it consistently ranks among the busiest district courts. This year it ranked third in weighted filings per judgeship (just barely behind number two, the S. D. Indiana). More than a quarter of all 2019 patent cases were filed in Delaware.

Of course, there has been talk of a new DE judgeship before and nothing has come of it. So we'll …

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Judge Andrews Relays Comments on Value of Predictability in a Judge

Andrew E. Russell, July 20, 2020
Precedent Protective Order

In ruling on a protective order dispute today, Judge Andrews wrote:

Urban legend has it that one of my predecessors said he is not bound by his own prior decisions. But I have also heard many times that lawyers believe that predictability in a judge is a really good thing. Thus, since it seems to me that the considerations here are no different than they were in the prior case, I should make the same ruling here.

IP/DE takes no official position as to which previous judge he may be referring...

His Ruling Was Also Worth Noting

The protective order dispute concerned cross-use by a plaintiff of defendants' confidential information in a multi-defendant ANDA action.

Plaintiff' proposal allowed …

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Another Jury Trial Postponement

Andrew E. Russell, July 20, 2020
COVID-19

COVID-19
COVID-19, CDC/Hannah A Bullock; Azaibi Tamin

Last week, in between Judge Stark's postponement of the Sunoco trial and the Court's extention of its ban on jury trials, Judge Andrews also postponed a scheduled August 18 jury trial, without setting a new trial date:

ORAL ORDER: The jury trial scheduled for August 18, 2020, is POSTPONED. Ordered by Judge Richard G. Andrews on 7/15/2020. (nms) (Entered: 07/15/2020)

ChanBond, LLC v. Atlantic Broadband Group, LLC, C.A. No. 15-842-RGA, D.I. 513 (D. Del. July 15, 2020).

He continued the trial after defendants' counsel filed an essentially unopposed request based on rising COVID-19 rates, the importance of live testimony, and the fact that plaintiff is an NPE.

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Appeal to Watch: Exclusion of Japanese Patent Office Publication as Not Publicly Accessible

Andrew E. Russell, July 17, 2020
§ 102 FRE

The reference at issue, JP 1992-136787

Japanese patent publications are typically considered to be fairly safe prior art references, as long as you prove up authenticity and offer sufficient evidence of publication.

But it turns out that that second part—showing publication—is kind of important.

In F'real Foods LLC v. Hamilton Beach Brands, Inc., C.A. No. 16-41-CFC, Judge Connolly excluded a Japanese Patent Office Utility Model Publication on a motion in limine because the defendants failed to show that it was publicly accessible under § 102, based largely on defendants' own position in opposing IPR estoppel.

Couldn't Have Found Reference = No IPR Estoppel

The F'real defendants had previously filed an unsuccessful IPR, and plaintiff moved to exclude the reference based on IPR estoppel. …

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D. Del. Extends Jury Trial Ban Through August 31

Andrew E. Russell, July 17, 2020
COVID-19

The District Court today extended its ban on jury trials through August 31.

Chief Judge Stark had previously scheduled at least one jury trial for early August, but then rescheduled it after plaintiff raised fairness questions and pointed out the continued rise in the number of COVID-19 cases.

The Delaware state courts are likewise still in Phase Two of their reopening plan (no jury trials). Yesterday Law360 also reported that the Court of Chancery pushed this months' Tesla/SolarCity 10-day bench trial out to 2021 due to Coronavirus safety concerns.

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No One Wants to Fly to Delaware in a Pandemic

Nathan R. Hoeschen, July 16, 2020
Jumara Transfer

Plane in turbulence
Turbulence, Joshua Hoehne, Unsplash

Judge Andrews recently dropped this intriguing paragraph modifying the balancing of the Jumara transfer factors in light of COVID-19:

Currently, the COVID-19 pandemic is ongoing. Hopefully, things will get better, but the pandemic has highlighted that there can be risks associated with travel. Some people who would not have been worried about travel before the pandemic are now reluctant to travel. I believe it is appropriate to give slightly greater weight to the possibility of less risk associated with less travel, which would favor the [transfer] venue.

The opinion is otherwise a bog-standard grant of transfer where both parties were incorporated in Delaware but had no other real connection. It's quite rare to see any …

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The Difference Between Equal and Equitable, Expert Edition

Jeff Castellano, July 15, 2020
Depositions Expert Discovery

When it comes time for expert depositions in multi-defendant cases, parties often disagree about how many deposition hours each side (or more specifically, each party) should get.

Judge Stark addressed this last week in H. Lundbeck A/S v. Apotex Inc., C.A. No. 18-088-LPS (D. Del.), where he permitted seven hours of expert deposition time for common issues and four additional hours for each of the nine defendants for defendant-specific issues.

Plaintiffs' depositions of certain of defendants' experts were expanded as well, to between 9 and 14 hours.

Judge Stark explained that the limits

reflect a reasonable and appropriate exercise of the Court's discretion, considering all circumstances, including the fact that this consolidated case is, in reality, …
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D. Del. Jury Trials Are Not Back After All

Andrew E. Russell, July 14, 2020
COVID-19

COVID-19
CDC / Alissa Eckert, MS; Dan Higgins, MAMS

Last week we wrote that jury trials are back, based on Judge Stark's detailed memorandum order scheduling an August 3rd jury trial in Sunoco.

Yesterday, Judge Stark ended up delaying that trial after all.

Plaintiff had filed a letter setting forth some interesting reasons why the Court cannot conduct a fair jury trial:

  • Video-conferenced witness testimony risks unfair results
  • The jury pool is affected by Coronavirus' disparate impact (e.g. to minorities and the elderly)
  • Plaintiff's Texas-based attorneys would have to quarantine; Defendants Delaware-based attorneys would not
  • Plaintiff's witnesses live in Philadelphia, and cannot travel to Delaware for in-person witness prep without having to quarantine

They also noted that Coronavirus cases …

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One Way That § 101 Motions Will Get Easier Over Time

Andrew E. Russell, July 13, 2020
§ 101

iPod
insung yoon, Unsplash

A few weeks ago, I suggested that, despite Berkheimer, courts are still taking § 101 motions to dismiss seriously when the facts warrant it. The Federal Circuit just affirmed the grant of one such motion in Data Scape Ltd. v. W. Dig. Corp., No. 2019-2161, 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 20630 (Fed. Cir. July 1, 2020).

Reading Data Scape, it is interesting that the Court was able to shortcut the Alice Step 1 analysis by simply citing a 2016 Federal Circuit decision holding that the exact idea at issue—"the concept of delivering user-selected media content to portable devices"—was abstract.

In my view, this is one way that, over time, § 101 motions are …

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