While Exmark invites a more flexible approach to apportionment, allowing, at least in some cases, a focus on the royalty rate to value the patented invention, the rate analysis itself must be properly supported. Indeed, Exmark serves as a cautionary reminder that any expert opinions on reasonable royalty damages must be closely tied to the facts of the case. Damages opinions that are purely speculative and unsupported by the facts of the case are likely to be found inadmissible. As a result, apportionment approaches will continue to be case-specific, variously focusing on the royalty base, the royalty rate, or a hybrid-model involving both elements.
The central issue before the Federal Circuit was whether there was a genuine issue of material fact that TSA’s performance of those steps could be attributed to Travel Sentry, such that Travel Sentry could be held singularly responsible for directly infringing Tropp’s method claims. Slip Op. at 13. The district court had answered this question in the negative… The Federal Circuit rejected the district court’s interpretation of divided infringement as too narrow and, accordingly, vacated its summary judgment of non-infringement.