The earlier-announced divestiture of patents from Innolux to a well-established monetization operation has taken shape in assignment records recently made public. Those records also reflect the continued divestiture of patents, along established pathways, into hands that suggest that monetization may at some point be in the works. Meanwhile, another batch of US patent assets has moved in the other direction, from monetization operation to operating company.

Two portfolios assigned to entities tied to patent monetization professionals are worth noting this week: one from the same source as that chip packaging portfolio highlighted a couple of weeks ago and one to a recipient with ties that suggest that litigation over the transacted assets is coming.

In August 2022, Daedalus Prime LLC, an entity associated with Daedalus Group LLC, launched its sole litigation campaign with a set of actions, one before the International Trade Commission (ITC) against MediaTek, NXP Semiconductors, certain automakers, and certain automaker suppliers; and three filed in the District of Delaware, one centered around each of MediaTek, NXP, and Qualcomm (but naming as defendants subsets of the proposed ITC respondents). Now, the plaintiff has sued MediaTek (2:24-cv-00235) alone, this time in the Eastern District of Texas. The asserted patents, described in the complaint as “relate[d] to groundbreaking improvements to microprocessor circuitry”, are broadly directed to various aspects of computer circuitry and semiconductor fabrication. The defendant is accused of infringement through the provision of devices containing microprocessors and systems-on-chip (SoCs), including certain Dimensity-series SoCs, that are based on the ARMv8.2 architecture and later.

A settlement between Daedalus Prime LLC and TSMC, noticed in mid-October in an action before the International Trade Commission (ITC), has ended the multiple district court cases between these two parties. Eastern District of Texas Chief Judge Rodney Gilstrap posted a heavily redacted order granting a joint motion to dismiss there, with a joint stipulation ending a Delaware declaratory judgment action that TSMC filed last December. TSMC’s departure from the campaign, following Samsung’s this past summer, leaves litigation to continue against Qualcomm, both before the ITC, where post-hearing briefing has gone in, and in district court, where a stay has stopped activity in favor of the ITC action.

Late last year, TSMC (1:22-cv-01647) filed a declaratory judgment action against Daedalus Prime LLC in the District of Delaware. The suit came in partial response to the complaints that Daedalus Prime had filed against TSMC, together with Samsung, both in September 2022, one before the Eastern District of Texas (now stayed) and another before the International Trade Commission (ITC) (now in claim construction). TSMC’s Delaware complaint was filed under seal, a redacted version of which, together with a responsive motion to dismiss from Daedalus Prime, reveals at least some of the contours of the license defense that TSMC is mounting, including what appears to be the linchpin: whether the assignment of the patents that Daedalus Prime has asserted against TSMC was effective in April 2021, before the date of a key agreement between Intel and TSMC, or thereafter, in June 2022.

A couple of weeks after filing a flurry of complaints in both district court and before the International Trade Commission (ITC), Daedalus Prime LLC has done it again, filing three district court complaints (2:22-cv-00352, 2:22-cv-00353, 2:22-cv-00354) and two ITC complaints (337-TA-3640, 337-TA-3641). Each names Samsung as a defendant/proposed respondent, with Qualcomm named as a proposed respondent in one of the ITC complaints and TSMC, in the other. TSMC is also a district court defendant, while Qualcomm is not, although Qualcomm products are mentioned throughout. The litigation centers around a portfolio that Daedalus Prime acquired from Intel in early June 2022.

Recent months have seen a number of patent divestments by operating companies made public, with a range of assignees including frequent filers, publicly traded patent assertion entities, third-party funded plaintiffs, and newly formed NPEs. Divestment size has also varied widely—from a single transacted patent to thousands.

In late 2019, NPE Daedalus Group LLC acquired roughly 600 former operating company patents, moving about 500 of those assets to Daedalus Blue LLC in January 2020. Daedalus Blue immediately filed its first litigation over patents from its received portfolio, suing SZ DJI Technology (a Chinese corporation) and DJI Europe (a “European” corporation) in the Western District of Texas over drones sold in the US under the DJI brand. At that point, it looked like direct assertion might be Daedalus Blue’s primary plan, but outbound assignments throughout 2020-2021 have presented an alternate approach, cutting the NPE’s holdings in half—and a remarkable order from District Judge Alan D. Albright, just unsealed in Daedalus Blue’s drone case, suggests why directly litigating can get . . . dicey.

Earlier this month, RPX reported the launch of new campaigns by apparent IP Edge LLC plaintiffs Noblewood IP LLC, Pixeltide Pathway LLC, and Wikeshire IP LLC—each asserting a former IBM patent. Assignment records made public this week suggest that more such litigation could be coming.

Daedalus Blue LLC has sued Oracle (6:20-cv-00428) over the provision of various products related to enterprise access management, storage and backup, and virtualization. The NPE has asserted five patents from among the over 500 US assets that associated entity Daedalus Group LLC acquired from IBM late last year and passed along to Daedalus Blue in late January. This campaign is the third to arise from those divested IBM assets, the second litigated by Daedalus Blue.