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In Apple’s patent infringement action against Motorola, Apple claimed that certain Motorola devices running the Android operating system infringe two of its network component patents. Motorola moved for summary judgment.

According to the district court, “Claim 1 of the ‘486 patent describes ‘replaceable…component’s]’ in a layered computing system. (The ‘852 patent incorporates the replaceable component system of ‘486 by reference at 13:22-44, and my interpretation of the terms applies equally to both patents’ claims.) The use of replaceable components promotes program flexibility and facilitates customization because replaceability enables the user to alter functionality customization because replaceability enables the user to alter functionality within a given program. The prior art was ‘application-based,’ which meant that users had to accept an application’s functionality as is or not use it at all.”
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Plaintiff Gerber Scientific International (“Gerber”) filed a patent infringement action against Roland DGA Corporation (“Roland”), asserting that Roland infringed Gerber’s patent covering a method and apparatus for computerized graphic production. Roland filed a motion for protective order with respect to the depositions of three of its Japanese employees and its president.

In its motion for protective order, Roland argued that the depositions of its three Japanese employees should take place in Japan and that the deposition of its president should not take place at all because he is a senior executive with no unique or specialized knowledge relevant to the case. With respect to the employees in Japan, Roland argued that witnesses should be deposed near their residence or their place of business and both parties could equally bear the costs, as such Gerber could not satisfy its burden of proving that circumstances exist that warrant taking the depositions in the United States.
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After the district court found that defendant’s electronic control device literally infringed certain claims of a patent owned by Taser and denied defendant’s summary judgment motion on defendant’s claims of invalidity and unenforceability, Taser filed a motion for contempt and an application for an order to show cause. In its motion, Taser asserted that Karbon Arms had purchased defendant’s assets as part of an insolvency proceeding and that Karbon Arms was producing the Karbon MPID which was essentially the same as the enjoined product sold by defendant.

The district court then noted that “[i]n order to enforce an injunction in a patent case, the party seeking to do so ‘must prove both that the newly accused product is not more than colorably different from the product found to infringe and that the newly accused product actually infringes.’ TiVo Inc. v. EchoStar, 646 F.3d 869, 882 (Fed. Cir. 2011) (en banc).” To apply the “more than colorable differences” test, the court must first compare the features that were found infringing to the corresponding feature of the newly accused products. If the court finds that only colorable differences exist, then the court must determine whether the newly accused product infringes the relevant claims.
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In the ongoing saga over Oracle’s lawsuit against Google, the district court has allowed Oracle’s damage expert another chance to fix its damage report. The district court had previously stricken Oracle’s damage expert report on two previous occasions but allowed Oracle’s damage expert a third chance.

Before addressing the damage expert report issue, the district court rejected Oracle’s suggestion of a piecemeal approach to the trial due to the court’s docket. “The docket simply does not permit that luxury. Counsel are unfortunate in having drawn a judge assigned to the massive MS-13 gang prosecution, which has resulted in four lengthy trials, including one underway now, without any relief from the remainder of his normal caseload. This has led to a backlog of trial-ready cases waiting their turn. . . . In the instant case, the damages methodology must be sorted out before the case will even be trial-ready. Until then, there is no point in setting a firm trial date. If matters go smoothly herein and if other trial settings fall away, the instant case could still possibly be tried starting mid-April and all counsel and witnesses should reserve for that possibility, failing which it will likely occur sometime during the last four months of the year. This order, however, gives no assurances as to when the case can be tried. If Oracle wishes to voluntarily dismiss any damages claim it will have to do so with prejudice; otherwise a dismissal is nothing more than an invitation to piecemeal litigation.”
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Plaintiff, Two Moms and a Toy, filed an emergency motion to stay the expert phase of their case pending the court’s ruling on claim construction. The plaintiff’s motion was based on the argument that “expert reports and expert discovery in a patent infringement case is extremely expensive and that a ruling on claim construction could end this case and at the very least will provide the parties with needed guidance and information for assessing the patent’s strength which will hopefully result in a settlement of the case.”

The court was not persuaded by the plaintiff’s argument. Indeed, it agreed with the defendant that it was “thinly veiled request for reconsideration of my two previous ruling denying motions to extend or otherwise modify the case schedule.” The court noted that these argument could have, and should have been, raised in connection with the earlier requests to amend the schedule that were denied by the court. “All of the arguments about expense and efficiency could have been made in connection with the parties’ previous Joint Motion to Amend Scheduling Order.”
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Microsoft and Google sued Geotag in the District of Delaware for a declaration that their customers did not infringe a Geotag patent, “Internet Organizer for Accessing Geographically and Topically Based Information,” and that the patent was invalid. Geotag had sued in excess of 450 companies in the Eastern District of Texas and many of these companies were customers of Microsoft and Google, who provide mapping services that allow interested persons to use the Internet to search for a convenient location of a business.

Geotag moved to transfer the declaratory judgment action pending in Delaware to the Eastern District of Texas. The district court in Delaware analyzed the private and public interest factors pursuant to Section 1404(a) and concluded that transfer was not appropriate.
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Defendants moved to dismiss a patent infringement complaint pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6) on the theory that the complaint failed to allege facts showing that a single party performed each and every limitation of the method claim.

The district court noted that “the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals has ‘instructed that ‘[d]irect infringement requires a party to perform or use each and every step or element of a claimed method or product.’ . . . Nevertheless, ‘[w]hen a defendant participates in or encourages infringement but does not directly infringe a patent, the normal recourse under the law is for the court to apply the standard for liability under indirect infringement. Indirect infringement requests, as a predicate, a finding that some party amongst the accused actors has committed the entire act of direct infringement.'” Thus, there is no finding of indirect infringement without a finding that there is a direct infringer.
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Oracle’s damage expert was directed to submit a substitute expert report after his original report was excluded on a motion by Google because it failed to apportion the value of the asserted claims and instead used a total value of Java and Android in calculating damages. The substitute damages report calculated damages to be approximately $2.5 billion. Of this number, $200 million was for past patent infringement and an additional $205 million for future patent damages through the end of 2012. Google moved again to strike the damages expert report.

In terms of the patent damages, Google challenged the starting point of $100 million for the hypothetical negotiation instead of $28 million, which was the number in a draft agreement proposed by Sun (Oracle’s predecessor) for a broad technology partnership between Sun and Google. The district court disagreed with Google, finding that Oracle’s expert had reviewed the entire licensing history between the parties and noted that the $100 million offer was on the table during real-world negotiations.
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Plaintiff Intertainer, Inc. brought an action for patent infringement against Defendant Hulu, LLC. Hulu moved to dismiss Intertainer’s first amended complaint pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). In the first amended complaint, Intertainer alleged infringement of a patent entitled, “Method for Interactive Video Contention Programming,” which according to the district court, “relates to a method of creating and streaming an interactive video stream permitting a user to view ancillary content, such as advertisements.”

Intertainer also alleged that the interactive video program includes an interface which when selected, displays ancillary material for the user and interrupts the running of the video and when the user returns to watching the video content, the video program resumes streaming from the point in time at which it was interrupted. Intertainer’s first amended complaint alleged that Hulu operated a website at www.hulu.com, which displays video content to users over the Internet and that the Hulu media player displays video content and video advertisements as well as advertising banners on its website.

Intertainer further alleged that users watching videos on the Hulu website can choose to view additional advertising content by clicking on the advertisement or the advertisement banner, which will then direct the user to another webpage displaying the advertisement content and will interrupt the streaming of the content from the web server. The video content can be resumed when the user returns to the Hulu website and clicks play. Intertainer contended that these steps directly infringed the patent-in-suit.
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Plaintiff Internet Machines LLC (“iMac”) filed a patent infringement action against several defendants including, among others, PLX Technology, Inc., ASUS Computer International and CDW Corp. alleging infringement of three patents that pertain to PCI Express switches. PLX manufactures the accused products while the remaining defendants distribute the products, incorporate the accused products into other devices or sell devices that incorporate the accused devices.

The defendants, other than PLX (the “Downstream Defendants”), moved to stay the litigation between themselves and iMac pending the resolution of iMac’s claims against PLX. The Downstream Defendants argued that PLX, as the product manufacturer, was the only true defendant in the case and that the resolution of iMac’s claims against PLX would moot any dispute between iMac and the Downstream Defendants. Based on a related case against PLX, iMac asserted that this was incorrect because PLX, in that other currently pending case, argued that it does not ship the accused products in an infringing state and that it is ignorant of any downstream configuration by its distributors or retailers. Based on this argument made by PLX, iMac asserted that a stay would therefore be inefficient and financially burdensome because it would require a second suit against the Downstream Defendants.
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