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Judge Gilstrap Grapples with Another Foreign Law Issue
Patent Litigation Feature
Earlier this year, Northern District of California Judge Jon S. Tigar rejected an unusual argument from plaintiff Lauri Valjakka urging the court to apply Finnish common law concerning the appropriation of abandoned shipwrecks and piles of discarded leather scraps to save his case. Then, Eastern District of Texas Judge Rodney Gilstrap held that French law, which follows “the privity rule”, applies to the contract giving rise to a FRAND obligation; and that Samsung provided insufficient evidence under French law that plaintiff G+ Communications LLC could be considered the alter ego of ZTE. For the latest brush with foreign law in domestic patent cases it is back to Judge Gilstrap, who just denied a motion to dismiss on a license defense that brushed up against a ruling under German law.
March 8, 2024
Quarterhill CEO Resigns
In Case You Missed It
Last week, Quarterhill Inc. (f/k/a Wi-LAN Inc.) announced that Bret Kidd stepped down as the company’s CEO, with Board Chair John Gilberry named interim CEO while a search for a more permanent replacement ramps up. The turnover comes less than a year after Michael Vladescu, the CEO of Quarterhill’s patent licensing arm WiLAN Inc. (WiLAN), died unexpectedly.
March 24, 2023
Quarterhill’s Newest Dispute, with Renesas, Sees Second Suit, as One of Its Oldest Rumbles Back to Life
New Patent Litigation
Xueshan Technologies Inc., a subsidiary of Quarterhill Inc. (f/k/a Wi-LAN Inc.), has filed a second complaint in the Eastern District of Texas against Renesas (2:23-cv-00091). Five patents received from MediaTek are asserted in this complaint, with infringement allegations targeting a wide array of computing products, including converters, memory protection units, microcontrollers, and processors. The fresh litigation from Xueshan Technologies drops as the ice around litigation in one of Quarterhill’s oldest campaigns, dating back to 2007, has thawed.
March 16, 2023
Quarterhill’s Polaris Innovations Sues Broadcom
New Patent Litigation
Polaris Innovations Limited has added an Eastern District of Texas suit against Broadcom (2:22-cv-00347) to its litigation over a portfolio of patents acquired from Infineon in July 2015. The plaintiff, a Quarterhill Inc. subsidiary, asserts five such patents in the new complaint, targeting the provision of various semiconductors, integrated circuits, processors, controllers, and systems-on-chip (SoCs). The case joins active Polaris Innovations litigation against AMD, filed in May 2021, and Xilinx (which AMD acquired in early 2022), filed this past February.
September 13, 2022
Quarterhill Subsidiary Starts Up New Campaign
New Patent Litigation
Xueshan Technologies Inc., a subsidiary of publicly traded Quarterhill Inc. (f/k/a Wi-LAN Inc.), has filed its first litigation, suing Renesas Electronics (2:22-cv-00157) over the provision of various integrated circuits, MCUs, MPUs, semiconductors, and SoCs. Asserted in the new Eastern District of Texas complaint are four patents, one generally related to a “user interface display apparatus” that uses texture mapping, another to a “wake-up circuit module” in an electronic device, and the other two, to a “3D graphics accelerator”. One of those last two patents-in-suit has seen prior litigation, although not filed by Quarterhill.
May 20, 2022
PTAB Improperly Resolved Prior Art Dispute in Google IPR Against Quarterhill, Rules Federal Circuit
Patent Litigation Feature
The Federal Circuit has resurrected a trio of Google inter partes reviews (IPRs) against two patents asserted against it by IPA Technologies Inc., a Quarterhill Inc. subsidiary. On May 19, the court issued a precedential decision that faulted the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) for failing to follow the correct standard in determining that a published article was not prior art—a dispute that hinged on the extent of one author’s inventive contributions under the pre-America Invents Act (AIA) first-to-invent system. The decision follows another setback against IPA Technologies last October, when Delaware judge ruled that Amazon did not infringe the same two patents just before a scheduled trial.
May 20, 2022
Xilinx Sued in Latest Complaint from Quarterhill’s Polaris Innovations
New Patent Litigation
Polaris Innovations Limited, a subsidiary of Wi-LAN Inc., itself controlled by publicly traded Quarterhill Inc., has filed suit in the District of Delaware against Xilinx (1:22-cv-00174) over the provision of field-programmable gate arrays (FGPAs). The plaintiff asserts four patents from the large portfolio that it received from Infineon in July 2015, two of them for the first time. Over the years, Quarterhill has announced settlements with all four of the prior defendants in this campaign, which began back in 2016.
February 18, 2022
WiLAN’s $85.2M Damages Verdict From Second Apple Trial Cannot Stand, Rules Federal Circuit
Patent Litigation Feature
The Federal Circuit has overturned an $85.2M damages award against Apple in its ongoing litigation with Quarterhill Inc. subsidiary Wi-LAN Inc. (WiLAN). On February 4, the appellate court issued a precedential opinion holding that WiLAN’s damages expert in a January 2020 damages retrial used a flawed methodology that was “untethered to the facts of this case”. This decision marks the second time that this same lawsuit has seen the reversal of a significant damages award, following a 2019 ruling from District Judge Dana M. Sabraw that threw out a prior $145.1M award for failure to improperly apportion the infringing features. The Federal Circuit also reversed a partial summary judgment of noninfringement from that first trial, among the other issues decided.
February 4, 2022
Quarterhill Announces a Portfolio Acquisition from a Somewhat Familiar Source
Patent Market, Patent Watch
Quarterhill Inc. (f/k/a Wi-Lan Inc.) has announced the acquisition of a portfolio of patents described as relating to “wired connectivity functionality, including USB-C technologies used in various applications such as desktop and laptop computers, tablets, mobile phones, gaming consoles, and smart TVs”. Assignment records recently made public indicate the likely source of the patents—per Quarterhill, a “publicly-traded leader in semiconductor technologies”—as well as the subsidiary recipients.
November 27, 2021
With Trial Looming, Delaware Judge Issues Noninfringement Ruling for Amazon in Quarterhill Case
Patent Litigation Feature
Delaware District Judge Richard G. Andrews has granted summary judgment of noninfringement for Amazon in a nearly five-year-old case brought by IPA Technologies Inc., a subsidiary of Quarterhill Inc. (f/k/a Wi-Lan Inc.). On October 28, the court ruled that the company did not infringe two patents generally related to speech-based control over electronic resources through its Alexa voice assistant, concluding that the product did not meet a key claim limitation. The court previously invalidated three other patents-in-suit under Alice, and it issued its noninfringement ruling as to the patents remaining in suit just two weeks before a scheduled trial.
October 29, 2021