01
Apr
By Eric Schweibenz
On March 21, 2013, ALJ David P. Shaw issued the public versions of Order Nos. 92, 93, and 99 in Certain Wireless Devices with 3G Capabilities and Components Thereof (Inv. No. 337-TA-800) denying Complainant and Respondent Nokia’s motions for summary determination.

By way of background, this investigation is based on a July 26, 2011 complaint filed on behalf of InterDigital Communications, LLC, InterDigital Technology Corporation, and IPR Licensing (collectively, “InterDigital”) alleging violation of Section 337 by Respondents Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd., FutureWei Technologies, Inc. d/b/a Huawei Technologies (USA),  ZTE Corp., ZTE (USA) Inc., and Nokia (collectively, the “Respondents”) in the importation into the U.S. and sale of certain wireless devices with 3G capabilities and components thereof that infringe one or more claims of U.S. Patent Nos. 7,349,540; 7,502,406; 7,536,013; 7,616,970 (the ‘970 patent); 7,706,332; 7,706,830; and 7,970,127.  See our August 29, 2011 post for more details on this investigation. 

Order No. 92

According to Order No. 92, InterDigital filed a motion for summary determination that the asserted claims of each patent are not invalid because Respondents failed to submit invalidity contentions during discovery and thus could not meet their burden of proving invalidity by clear and convincing evidence.  Respondents argued that InterDigital’s motion was premature in view of the fact that important discovery deadlines had not passed and in view of Respondents’ supplemental interrogatory responses.  Because “a significant amount of discovery was yet to be obtained by all parties, including discovery relevant to Respondents’ [invalidity] defenses,” and because the ALJ determined that Respondents had not been wholly deficient in meeting their discovery obligations to date, InterDigital’s motion was denied.

Order No. 93

According to Order No. 93, InterDigital filed a motion for summary determination that certain Nokia’s devices infringe claims 1 and 2 of U.S. Patent No. 8,009,636 (the ‘636 patent) by supporting the Wideband CDMA protocol utilized in 3G cellular communication systems.  In opposition, Nokia argued that InterDigital failed to set forth facts showing that compliance with the Wideband CDMA protocol necessarily infringes claims 1 and 2 of the ‘636 patent.  ALJ Shaw determined that genuine issues of material fact remain concerning compliance with the standard and thus denied InterDigital’s motion.

Order No. 99

According to Order No. 99, Respondent Nokia filed a motion for summary determination of invalidity of the ‘970 patent as obvious over two different combinations of cellular communication standards.  ALJ Shaw determined to Deny Nokia’s motion, finding that “genuine issues of material fact remain concerning … the level of skill in the art, how a person of ordinary skill in the art would understand the differences between the ‘970 claims and the identified prior art, and secondary considerations of nonobviousness.”



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