Separate assignments of patent assets from five entities operating under the umbrella of Dublin-based patent monetization firm Atlantic IP Services Limited to a sixth such entity were recently recorded and made public by the USPTO. The transfers leave each of those divestors without any US patent holdings, at least according to currently available assignment records. Two Atlantic IP plaintiffs have notified the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) of the change in real party-in-interest in proceedings before it.

Plaintiffs tied to monetization firm Atlantic IP Services Limited have launched multiple litigation campaigns with cases most often filed in the Western District of Texas. A frequent defendant, Apple, has responded with repeated motions to transfer, for convenience, to the Northern District of California, with various results: several remain in limbo before District Judge Alan D. Albright after the Federal Circuit issued a writ of mandamus requiring that the transfer motions be adjudicated before the end of discovery; another was stricken in its entirety as a discovery sanction; and other such motions have been granted—with a bit of an asterisk, that is, over extensive criticism of a repeat venue declarant. Most recently, Judge Albright has outright denied an Apple motion to transfer in one Atlantic IP-tied suit, and, in an order newly made public, transferred another of those cases—but not to the Northern District of California, as Apple had requested.

On November 8, 2022, the Federal Circuit vacated scheduling orders in three cases filed against Apple in the Western District of Texas. The appellate court ruled that District Judge Alan D. Albright abused his discretion both by pushing forward on substantive matters in the litigation without deciding a trio of Apple motions to transfer for convenience—which would be left, according to the vacated scheduling orders, for resolution after the close of all fact discovery—and by denying Apple’s motions to stay the cases pending resolution of the mandamus petitions themselves. Now, Judge Albright has responded.

The Federal Circuit has issued another rebuke against Western District of Texas Judge Alan D. Albright over his approach to transfer timing. In the past few years, the appellate court has repeatedly ordered Judge Albright to consider transfer motions before turning to substantive issues like claim construction, leading him to modify his general case schedule to open venue discovery automatically upon the filing of a motion to transfer, with Markman hearings (typically scheduled early) often delayed. However, Judge Albright has argued that parties have since “beg[u]n abusing this process”, “strategically wait[ing]” to file their transfer motions—prompting him to impose a modified scheduling order in three cases against Apple that pushed the consideration of its convenience transfer motions to after the close of fact discovery. Now the Federal Circuit has overturned that scheduling order, ruling in three decisions—one precedential—that Judge Albright abused his discretion by pushing forward on substantive matters without deciding Apple’s transfer motions, and by denying its motions to stay pending appeal.

Last month, RPX flagged the movement of patents from L3Harris to multiple Irish NPEs associated with the monetization firm Atlantic IP Services Limited. Now, another divestiture from L3Harris to Atlantic IP has appeared among USPTO records, as well as a recent assignment from Siemens.

USPTO records made public over the past few weeks have revealed assignments to a wide spectrum of NPE assignees, including two newly formed Texas entities; several affiliates of a prolific patent plaintiff; two subsidiaries of a publicly traded patent assertion entity; and multiple Irish entities formed by a third-party backed monetization firm.

In early October, the September 28, 2021 assignment of a single patent from L3Harris to Scramoge Technology Limited, an NPE associated with Dublin-based monetization firm Atlantic IP Services Limited, was recorded with the USPTO. Scramoge promptly asserted the patent against five of the six defendants in its wireless charging campaign. Assignment records dated November 19 and recently made public by the USPTO reveal that at least seven additional patents left L3Harris on the same day, but this time bound for another Atlantic IP entity, one among seven such Irish entities that have not filed litigation—yet.

Since April, Atlantic IP’s Scramoge Technology Limited has been filing litigation, across two campaigns as a formal matter, over wireless transfer patents from a former LG Innotek portfolio that it acquired this past February. Before November, two defendants—Apple and Samsung—had been sued in each campaign, but now Scramoge has sued Alphabet (Google) (6:21-cv-01138) in its second campaign, ticking the number of overlap defendants up to three. Targeted in the new Western District of Texas complaint with two of those former LG Innotek patents is the Google Pixel Stand wireless charging device.

So far this month, Scramoge Technology Limited has added four cases to its wireless charging litigation, one campaign of which began with an April 2021 suit against Samsung and the other of which began with an August 2021 suit, again against Samsung. The new defendants are Anker (Fantasia Trading d/b/a AnkerDirect) (5:21-cv-01712), Evercel (Mophie) (8:21-cv-01673), and Hon Hai Precision Industry (Belkin) (2:21-cv-08035), with the Atlantic IP Services Limited plaintiff hitting Apple (6:21-cv-01071) for a second time this past week as well. The bulk of the asserted patents across the two campaigns originated with LG Innotek.

Scramoge Technology Limited, an NPE associated with Atlantic IP Services Limited, has sued Samsung (6:21-cv-00902) again, this time over the provision of a variety of wireless charging devices, including chargers, docks, portable batteries, stands, and trays. Three wireless power transfer patents, originating with LG Innotek, are asserted. While this suit comprises a new campaign as a technical matter, Scramoge Technology and Samsung—as well as Alphabet (Google) and Apple—are already litigating overlapping subsets of nine wireless charging patents acquired as part of the same portfolio pickup from LG Innotek.