Plaintiffs tied to monetization firm Atlantic IP Services Limited have launched multiple litigation campaigns with cases most often filed in the Western District of Texas. A frequent defendant, Apple, has responded with repeated motions to transfer, for convenience, to the Northern District of California, with various results: several remain in limbo before District Judge Alan D. Albright after the Federal Circuit issued a writ of mandamus requiring that the transfer motions be adjudicated before the end of discovery; another was stricken in its entirety as a discovery sanction; and other such motions have been granted—with a bit of an asterisk, that is, over extensive criticism of a repeat venue declarant. Most recently, Judge Albright has outright denied an Apple motion to transfer in one Atlantic IP-tied suit, and, in an order newly made public, transferred another of those cases—but not to the Northern District of California, as Apple had requested.
