Pearl IP Licensing LLC is one of four NPE plaintiffs associated with IP Edge LLC to litigate former Cypress Semiconductor patents that the Texas monetization firm acquired from Monterey Research, LLC, a subsidiary of IPValue Management (d/b/a IPValue). Early in 2020, Pearl IP accused AT&T, Deutsche Telekom (T-Mobile), and Verizon (Cellco Partnership d/b/a Verizon Wireless) of infringing a single such patent, broadly directed to a circuit that can recover from certain “overstress conditions”. With those three cases ending, this past December the IP Edge plaintiff sued HMD (1:20-cv-25220) in the Southern District of Florida and HTC (2:20-cv-01850) in the Western District of Washington over the same patent. Each complaint targets the provision of smartphones equipped with a Qualcomm processor featuring a Resource Power Management (RPM) circuit.

By the end of April, IP Edge LLC had initiated three litigation campaigns over patents from among the five that it acquired, through controlled entity Spindletop IP LLC, from Monterey Research, LLC, a subsidiary of IPValue Management (d/b/a IPValue). The original development work for the patents was conducted at Cypress Semiconductor (acquired by Infineon Technologies this April); with those assets, IP Edge plaintiffs Celebration IP LLC (targeting chipsets that control the discharge of lithium ion batteries); Forutome IP LLC (devices that feature a programmable tri-state buffer); and Pearl IP Licensing LLC (devices that feature processors with Resource Power Management (RPM) circuits) have each begun litigation. Last week, as Celebration IP and Forutome IP expanded each of their campaigns, IP Edge launched a new one from the former Cypress patents, through Heritage IP LLC.

In mid-February 2020, Texas monetization firm IP Edge LLC, through controlled entity Spindletop IP LLC, picked up five patents formerly held by Cypress Semiconductor (acquired by Infineon Technologies in April 2020) from Monterey Research, LLC, a subsidiary of IPValue Management (d/b/a IPValue). Three of those patents have subsequently been asserted in litigation through campaigns launched by IP Edge plaintiffs Celebration IP LLC, targeting chipsets that control the discharge of lithium ion batteries; Forutome IP LLC, devices that feature a programmable tri-state buffer; and Pearl IP Licensing LLC, devices that feature processors with Resource Power Management (RPM) circuits; each of which has seen defendants added over the past couple of weeks.

Late 2019/early 2020 saw prolific NPE IP Edge LLC—which has filed over 100 new patent cases since the start of this year—acquire patent portfolios from a variety of sources, including Huawei; a litigating subsidiary of IP Value Management (d/b/a IPValue); and a subsidiary of Allied Inventors Management, LLC. The transactions discussed in this article have placed in IP Edge’s hands assets originating with AMD, Cypress Semiconductor, Fujitsu, and Huawei, among others—some of which it has already begun litigating.

Pearl IP Licensing LLC, an entity apparently associated with Texas monetization firm IP Edge LLC, has sued Deutsche Telekom (T-Mobile) (6:20-cv-00260) over a single patent generally related to a circuit that can recover from certain “stress conditions”. T-Mobile is accused of infringement through the provision of certain “apparatus[es]”—identifying as an exemplary accused product the Motorola Z2 Force smartphone, targeted over its inclusion of Qualcomm processors with certain power and voltage management features. Pearl IP asserts current ownership of the former Cypress Semiconductor patent, which publicly available USPTO records indicate was received by IP Edge as part of a larger assignment from another NPE.