Posts Tagged: "samsung"

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) in In re Samsung today granted Samsung’s and LG’s writs of mandamus, which sought to order the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas to transfer the underlying actions to the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. The CAFC explained that the district court erred in failing to consider pre-litigation tactics by Ikorongo Technology LLC (Ikorongo Tech) and Ikorongo Texas LLC aimed at purposely manipulating venue in the case.

On June 11, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) affirmed the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California’s grant of a motion to dismiss for Apple and Samsung in a patent infringement action brought by Yanbin Yu and Zhongxuan Zhang (collectively, “Yu”). Yu alleged infringement of Claims 1, 2, and 4 of U.S. Patent No. 6,611,289 (the ‘289 patent), titled “Digital Cameras Using Multiple Sensors with Multiple Lenses,” and the court dismissed due to ineligibility under Section 101. Judge Pauline Newman dissented.

On April 9, the New York Intellectual Property Law Association (NYIPLA) filed an amicus brief in Ericsson Inc. v. Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., No. 2021-1565, urging a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to balance U.S. interests in adjudicating U.S. patent rights against the rule of comity, with respect to an order by a Chinese court restricting the litigation of certain U.S. patents in U.S. courts. Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC), Judge Paul Michel and former U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Director Andrei Iancu also filed an amicus brief in the case on the same day in support of Ericsson…. Although the NYIPLA did not take a position on the exact scope and content of Judge Gilstrap’s order, it filed an amicus brief to highlight our country’s “strong policy interest in allowing U.S. patent rights to be adjudicated in U.S. courts” and to point out that “[a]llowing China to exercise exclusive dominion over U.S. patent rights and royalty rates and to preclude enforcement of U.S. patent rights within the United States would cause a severe reduction in the value of U.S. patents and jeopardize the very underpinnings of the U.S. patent system.”

In the latest phase of an international dispute between Samsung Electronics and Ericsson, Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC), Judge Paul Michel and former U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Director Andrei Iancu have filed an amicus brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) supporting Ericsson and urging the CAFC to affirm the district court’s order granting an anti-interference injunction. That order enjoined Samsung from taking any action to interfere with Ericsson’s U.S. FRAND (“fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory” terms) lawsuit against Samsung in the Texas court.

An Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) at the International Trade Commission (ITC) recently determined that Samsung Phones violate key patents on magnetic emulator technology for contactless payment systems from Pittsburgh’s Dynamics, Inc. We have been collaborating for years in the academic and public sectors on issues raised in that case, and are consulting consult with Dynamics because we think these issues are vital to our innovation ecosystem, our national economy, and our commitments to international partners. It is especially illustrative of the serious risks facing these vital public interests that far too frequently when there has been a full and fair adjudication determining that there has been infringement of multiple patents and that those patents are neither invalid nor unenforceable, the headline more than suggests that the infringer has been cleared of responsibility.

On January 12, patent database provider IFI Claims published its Top 50 U.S. patent grant recipient list for 2020, as well as its Global 250 list of top owners of active patent assets worldwide. The Top 50 list includes many of the usual suspects among top patent filing organizations, including IBM, which takes the top spot among all firms receiving U.S. patents for the 28th year in a row. Perhaps the most surprising finding from the study is that patent application filing activity increased slightly during 2020 despite the massive disruptions to daily life caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

On January 5, the Honorable Paul R. Michel filed an amicus brief in support of Ericsson’s Emergency Application for an Anti-Interference Injunction related to Samsung’s lawsuit filed in the Wuhan Intermediate People’s Court of China (the Wuhan Action). In response to Ericsson’s motion filed on December 28, 2020, the United States Federal District Court for the Eastern District of Texas issued a temporary restraining order against Samsung in the FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory licensing rates) lawsuit. Michel’s brief addressed the “substantial notice and due process concerns associated with [an] anti-suit injunction issued by the Wuhan Court.”

Earlier today, Judge Rodney Gilstrap of the United States Federal District Court for the Eastern District of Texas issued a temporary restraining order against Samsung in a FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory licensing rates) lawsuit filed by Ericsson on December 11, 2020. The Order gives Samsung until January 1, 2021 to file any opposition to the continuation of the temporary restraining order, and gives Ericsson until January 5, 2021 to respond if, or more likely when, Samsung, files an objection. At first glance to the trained eye this seems shocking, but as is so often the case in the world of standard essential patents (SEPs) and FRAND, there is much more than meets the eye.

Last week, years of arguing and contention came to an end. The fight I’m referring to was not a political campaign, but that doesn’t make its impact on our country any less significant – it’s a victory that everyone can celebrate. Finally, the long-running patent litigation battle between TiVo and Comcast is over. Comcast had infringed TiVo’s patents and, to put it simply, was bullying the smaller company by weaponizing their larger legal team. Eventually, the International Trade Commission (ITC) stepped in and the two companies were able to reach a new, long-term licensing agreement. In doing this, a crucial precedent was potentially set – it will arguably harder for massive companies to take advantage of smaller ones.

Samsung Display and LG Display, the two South Korean technology behemoths, announced plans earlier this year to stop the production of LCDs by the end of 2020. The announcements first appeared in Reuters’ reports and aim to consolidate the two companies’ lead in organic light emitting diode (OLED) panels, while conceding to Chinese manufacturers who have aggressively expanded their LCD productions. LCD prices have slumped over the years, as Chinese manufacturers backed by state subsidies have aggressively expanded production capacities. The plunging LCD prices have widened the operating losses at both Samsung and LG Display and finally led to the decision to cut production by year’s end.

The Federal Circuit in a precedential decision issued earlier today affirmed the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s finding that Claim 11 of Prisua Engineering Corp.’s U.S. Patent No. 8,650,591 was unpatentable as obvious, and reversed and remanded for further consideration the Board’s finding that the other asserted claims were indefinite and could not be assessed for patentability under Sections 102 or 103. IPR2017-01188 was Samsung’s response to Prisua’s 2016 patent infringement lawsuit against the company, which alleged that Samsung’s “Best Face” feature infringed claims 1, 3, 4, and 8 of the ’591 patent. In that case, a jury in the Southern District of Florida ultimately found that Samsung had willfully infringed the asserted claims and awarded Prisua $4.3 million in damages, but that action was stayed pending the CAFC appeal.

Several weeks ago, the International Trade Commission (ITC) announced that Chief Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) Charles Bullock issued a Notice of Initial Final Determination recommending that certain memory modules manufactured and imported by SK Hynix, Inc. and its subsidiaries should be excluded from importation into the United States. As is common with these announcements, the ITC first released a one-page indication of the decision, which was followed by the redacted full decision once the parties had an opportunity to request redaction of trade secrets and confidential information. The full decision has now been released, and the ITC is asking for comments relating to public interest issues from the parties, interested persons, and other government agencies and departments.

The Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) recently issued its first-ever preliminary guidance on motions to amend claims filed by patent owner Sanofi and, although the substituted claims haven’t escaped an obviousness challenge from Mylan, patent owners might be able to use that guidance as a roadmap for their own motions to amend claims. In other PTAB decisions between October 1 and 16, USAA escaped covered business method (CBM) reviews based on the technological invention exclusion, NHK Spring factors led the PTAB to deny two inter partes reviews (IPRs) petitioned against TRUSTID patents, oral hearings were held in Apple’s IPRs against Qualcomm, despite the patent settlement agreement between the two firms, and NuCurrent failed to avoid Samsung IPRs after arguing issue preclusion based on district court litigation of a forum selection clause in a contract between the two companies.

The Federal Circuit recently vacated and remanded a decision by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB), finding that the PTAB applied the wrong legal standard for determining whether a reference was publicly accessible before the critical date of the challenged patent. The Court found that the asserted reference was publicly accessible because a person of ordinary skill in the art could, through the exercise of reasonable diligence, access the reference. The decision, authored by Judge O’Malley, held that a patent challenger does not have to establish that the asserted reference was actually accessed or received or available to a significant portion of those skilled in the art to show that the work was publicly accessible.