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Christopher Bright
Partner
Snell & Wilmer
Christopher Bright has over 20 years of experience litigating patent cases for clients across the United States, as well as providing counseling for global patent licensing negotiations and patent due diligence for mergers and acquisitions. Drawing upon his deep scientific experience, degree in physics, and talent for simplifying complex concepts, he has skillfully tried numerous patent cases in U.S. federal district courts and before the International Trade Commission (ITC). Christopher has extensive experience positioning cases for trial, including crafting patent claim construction, and representing clients at summary judgment hearings.
Christopher also frequently appears before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in inter partes reviews (IPRs) and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, where he has argued as lead counsel. Applying his knowledge in IPR, litigation, and trial and appellate work, he also advises on U.S. patents, including global patent licensing negotiations. Christopher’s industry knowledge includes many years of litigating and negotiating licenses for alleged standard-essential patents (SEPs) on fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms. His patent knowledge and experience also extends to the corporate area, where he evaluates patent litigation and other patent due diligence issues arising from mergers and acquisitions as well as other corporate matters. Christopher has been recognized by Legal 500 for his deep experience in patent litigation, with clients noting that he is “very detailed in his analysis and work product; [with a] deep understanding of the litigation process.”
Christopher has experience across a variety of sectors and industries, with a particular focus on the electronics, life sciences, and technology sectors. He has litigated and counseled on a broad array of patents in the areas of automotive and mobility products, computers and computer networks, consumer electronics, mechanical devices, medical devices, semiconductors and integrated circuits, and software, including patented technologies concerning cloud computing, Internet of Things, LTE, secure data storage, streaming video and audio, USB, WiFi, smart devices, bioprosthetic heart valves, image-guided surgical navigation, needleless medical connectors, ultrasound medical imaging, light emitting diodes (LEDs), semiconductor processing, AI and Big Data driven internet marketing software, antivirus software, cloud computing software, eCommerce software, educational software, emergency notification software, location-based services software, product lifecycle management software, and SaaS, among many others.
Recent Articles by Christopher Bright
Earlier this month, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) affirmed a decision of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California in a patent infringement suit filed by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) against Broadcom Limited, Broadcom Corporation, and Avago Technologies (collectively “Broadcom) and Apple Inc. As part of that decision, the CAFC affirmed the district court’s decision barring raising invalidity challenges based on known prior art after an IPR litigation. The court took the opportunity to overrule Shaw Industries Group, Inc. v. Automated Creel Systems, Inc. (Fed. Cir. 2016) and clarify that estoppel applies to claims and grounds not in the IPR but which reasonably could have been included in the petition. On February 22, however, the CAFC published an errata to that opinion. While it did not include its reasoning for the clarification to the February 4 precedential opinion, the original opinion referenced the statute on estoppel, 35 U.S.C. § 315(e)(2), which addresses estoppel as a result of an IPR on a per claim basis rather than a per patent basis.
The safe harbor provision set forth in 35 U.S.C. § 271(e)(1) immunizes many types of activities in pursuit of a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) submission from patent infringement claims. Research tools are frequently used in pursuit of an FDA submission, such as drug development, testing and screening. But research tools themselves generally are not subject to FDA or other regulatory approval. Depending on the circumstances, using research tools to submit data to the FDA may not be protected by the safe harbor provision and thus may expose companies to patent infringement claims.