The Federal Circuit has issued a precedential decision that further clarifies the extent to which patent owners may appeal final written decisions (FWDs) from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB). On June 5, the court denied Dolby Laboratories Licensing’s appeal of a decision against Unified Patents in which the Board ruled in Dolby’s favor on validity but declined to address its argument that nine Unified member companies should have been named as real parties in interest (RPIs). The Federal Circuit held that Dolby lacked standing to appeal the PTAB’s RPI decision as the prevailing party in an IPR against a patent not asserted in litigation, determining in part that none of the statutory bases cited by Dolby overcame that standing defect.

Texas entity SiliconArts Technology US Inc. has initiated what appears to be its first litigation. In separate Western District of Texas complaints, the Intellectual Discovery Co., Ltd. (ID) subsidiary accuses BOXX Technologies (1:25-cv-00400) and NVIDIA (1:25-cv-00431) of infringing a single US patent generally related to a certain “ray tracing core” through the provision of specified graphics processing units (GPUs).

TS-Optics Corporation has filed a Central District of California complaint against Microsoft (8:24-cv-01974), targeting the provision of XBOX-series consoles that include certain disk drives, as well as the XBOX Cloud Gaming service, which supports the XBOX Touch Controls feature. The plaintiff received the two patents-in-suit, one generally related to an optical disk drive including a certain “optical pickup actuator” and the other, to virtual remote controls, from Intellectual Discovery Co., Ltd.

RPX recently noted the transfer of nine US patents from South Korean research institution Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI) to KAIFI LLC, a Texas plaintiff that has previously litigated a single patent originating with Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) but received from Intellectual Discovery Co., Ltd. That assignment is now sandwiched between a July 2023 transfer from PowerVoice to KAIFI (three patents) and an April 2024 transfer from Intellectual Discovery (one patent). This past week, KAIFI sued Amazon (2:24-cv-00542) over its received assets, in a new Eastern District of Texas complaint that targets the provision of a wide array of products, including the Alexa voice assistant and related products.

Patent transfers recently made public by the USPTO include multiple assignments between NPEs, several of which have litigated previously received assets, but others of which are new and have yet to file suit. They also include a grant to the US Treasury Department of four assets, one of which was “litigated” through this past July, when Western District of Texas Judge Alan D. Albright, on the court’s own motion, brought the campaign to an end.

Wireless Alliance, LLC, an Intellectual Discovery Co., Ltd. plaintiff, has filed its first litigation, suing AT&T (AT&T Mobility) (2:23-cv-00095), Deutsche Telekom (T-Mobile) (2:23-cv-00096), and Verizon (Verizon Wireless) (2:23-cv-00097) over the provision of their respective 4G and/or 5G cellular networking services. Three wireless communications patents are asserted in the Eastern District of Texas complaints. Wireless Alliance pleads that it owns one of those patents and is the exclusive licensee with respect to the other two, which it indicates are owned by the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI).

Recently released USPTO records reflect an early January assignment from Intellectual Discovery Co., Ltd. to an NPE formed in Texas late last year. Public records tie the assignee to a California law firm associated with multiple litigating NPEs over the years.

RPX ended its 2020 Patent Watch coverage with articles featuring the role that operating company patents play in fueling NPE litigation, the run of third-party litigation finance into the patent space, and the rise in the number of cases focused on companies doing business in the Automotive market sector. A review of assignments of US patents recently made public identifies multiple transactions falling into that first category—i.e., patent divestments by operating companies.

In April 2019, Kaifi, LLC, a Texas plaintiff associated with Intellectual Discovery Co., Ltd., launched its Wi-Fi calling campaign with a single case accusing AT&T of infringing a patent generally directed to maintaining connectivity when a user moves from an inside to outside, with the same backend infrastructure managing the handoffs. That case ended in early August 2020 after District Judge Rodney Gilstrap handed down an April 2020 order construing multiple terms from the patent’s claims and while the court was in receipt of a large number of motions for summary judgment and to strike contentions and related expert opinions, as well as an earlier motion to dismiss for lack of standing—the related papers for nearly all of which were filed under seal. Kaifi has now reupped its campaign, accusing Deutsche Telekom (IBSV, Layer3 TV, MetroPCS, Theory Mobile, T-Mobile) (2:20-cv-00281) and Verizon (Cellco Partnership d/b/a Verizon Wireless) (2:20-cv-00280) of infringing the same patent in separate complaints, also filed in the Eastern District of Texas.

Throop, LLC, a California entity, has filed its first lawsuits, accusing Alphabet (Google) (2:19-cv-10602), Microsoft (2:19-cv-10604), Seiko (Epson America) (2:19-cv-10597), Sony (2:19-cv-10605), and Vuzix (2:19-cv-10606) of infringing two patents, generally related to wearable devices that can communicate real-time video information. The accused products are the defendants’ augmented reality wearable devices, including the Google Glass, Microsoft HoloLens, Epson Moverio BT (used with Moverio Assist), Sony EyeGlass, and M100 Smart Glasses, respectively, targeting features that allow for video communications with other users.