Everlight Electronics Company Limited has filed a Western District of Texas suit against Amazon (6:21-cv-00906), asserting a single LED device patent against the defendant’s alleged sale of a host of LED lighting products, including automotive headlight LED blubs, filament LED bulbs, and ultraviolet-C LED disinfecting wands provided by various third parties (e.g., GE). The patent-in-suit is not homegrown, Everlight acquiring it in a 2014 assignment.

With investors and analysts focused on the spread of coronavirus and its impact on global economic growth, expect the chatter around litigation finance as a “recession-proof asset class” to grow louder, and interest in the industry—which is reportedly already awash with capital—to mount. Meanwhile, early 2020 has seen a number of decisions notable in the ongoing debate over the disclosure of commercial litigation funding, as well as the emergence of yet more NPEs backed by private equity.

Bench Walk Lighting, LLC has followed up an October 2019 settlement in a case against OSRAM with four new Delaware suits, one each against Everlight Electronics (1:20-cv-00049), Lextar Electronics (1:20-cv-00047), LG Electronics (LG Innotek) (1:20-cv-00051), and Lite-On Technology (1:20-cv-00052). Overlapping subsets of the 14 patents asserted against OSRAM, generally related to LED modules and related components (e.g., flashes and displays), are at issue in the new complaints. The defendants are accused of infringement through the provision of LED modules, including some used as smartphone camera flashes.