As we laid out in Friday's post, there was a hearing today in Rein Tech, Inc. v. Mueller Systems, LLC, C.A. No. 18-1683-MN (D. Del.) regarding another potential protective order violation. The defendant in Rein alleged that the inventor (who has seen AEO information) has continued to prosecute another patent application in the same field, despite the prosecution bar in the Court's protective order.
Update on Today's Hearing
The Court opened the hearing today by announcing that it intended to grant the defendant's SJ motion of non-infringement. Shortly thereafter, counsel for the patentee informed the Court that the patentee is now willing to …
Just a quick update: The potentially interesting Rein Tech hearing we flagged on Monday is now set to begin at 2pm today, rather than 4:30pm, and it will now be in Courtroom 4B.
Summary Judgment and Daubert briefs are often sprawling, slothful beasts. They shift from issue to issue lodging complaints both specific and general over the course of many pages and exhibits.
Accordingly, it can be hard parse which arguments are actually being pressed and require a response.
Today's case is a sobering reminder of the consequences of missing one.
The plaintiff's opening Daubert brief in Magnolia Med. Techs., Inc. v. Kurin, Inc., C.A. No. 24-1124-CFC, consisted of 18 pages complaining about how the defendant's invalidity report was "devoid of any analysis or detail and fails at baseline to even map the prior art to the claim elements or explain what combination or modification of the prior art …
[Update: The hearing below has moved to 2:00pm today in Courtroom 4B (not 4A)]
Fireworks, n., "a display of temper or intense conflict" (per Merriam-Webster.com)Moritz Mentges, Unsplash
Over the summer, we postedtwice about an interesting hearing in Rein Tech, Inc. v. Mueller Systems, LLC, C.A. No. 18-1683-MN (D. Del.).
In the first post, we discussed how the Court sanctioned a party for misusing information that was designated under a protective order. In the second, we talked about how the defendant cleverly used PDF metadata to help show that the protective order violation took place.
Since then, the case has continued moving forward towards trial. It is set for a pretrial conference on …
Last week, Judge Bryson ruled on a motion in limine where an accused infringer sought to strike the patentee's alleged "new theory" of validity just before trial or, in the alternative, for a permission to raise a new claim construction regarding that theory.
The Court ultimately denied the motion in limine because the accused infringer was on notice of the theory, but granted its alternative motion for permission to raise a new claim construction position regarding the theory, citing O2 Micro.
The Accused Infringer Was On Notice of the Issue
The Court easily denied the motion to strike, finding seven different ways that the accused infringer either was or should have been aware of the …
It can take quite a while to resolve summary judgment motions. In essentially every patent case they take up hundreds of pages of briefing accompanied by hundreds more pages of declarations, reports, and exhibits on the most arcane technical matters.
For this reason, all of our Article III judges' form scheduling orders (except Judge Andrews) explicitly instruct the parties to leave 3 or 4 months (3 for Judge Connolly, 4 for the remainder) between the close of briefing and the pretrial conference.
Because a modern patent trial tends to involve a great deal of back and forth on exhibit lists, designations, statements of facts, etc., the pretrial order is usually prepared -- or …
When you file a motion to dismiss in the District of Delaware, the case case go one of two ways, depending on the judge. Most of our current judges do not require discovery to move forward if a motion to dismiss is filed, at least absent action from the parties. Some District of Delaware judges, though, have required discovery to move forward pending a motion to dismiss. Former Chief Judge Stark made this explicit in his procedures, for example, and Judge Burke has also adopted this practice.
This seemingly minor difference in policy can make a huge difference in how a case proceeds. A complicated motion to dismiss can sometimes take a busy court anywhere from …
Judge Williams issued a noteworthy SJ opinion last week in Cisco Systems, Inc. v. Ramot at Tel Aviv University, Ltd., C.A. No. 21-1365-GBW (D. Del.).
Cisco involves a DJ action where the accused infringer is challenging the validity of a patent based on the pre-AIA § 102 on sale bar, alleging that a a third party sold a product that embodied the claimed method more than one year before the patent application.
The patentee seemingly agreed with the basic facts, but moved for summary judgment of no invalidity on the theory that the the sales were "secret."
What does "secret" mean here? At least for the purposes of this motion, the parties assume …
Ok, I'll admit, this post is getting a bit deep into the weeds of court procedure, even by our standards. But I thought it was interesting.
Last week we noted that the Court had canceled a trial to instead hold three additional days of hearings on summary judgment and other pending motions. I checked back in on the docket on that case, and the three hearings seem to have gone forward as planned.
Interestingly, the Court followed up after the final hearing and provided an update as to which of the summary judgment motions it is inclined to grant, and which it will deny:
ORAL ORDER: The Court, having now heard extensive oral argument on four of the pending summary judgment motions in this case, hereby advises the parties as follows, in order to assist them in planning ahead: (1) The Court’s current inclination is to GRANT Scale’s Motion for Summary Judgment of Non-Infringement of the Asserted Parse Claims, . . . to GRANT the remaining unresolved portion of Scale’s Motion for Summary Judgment of Invalidity of the Challenged Parse Claims, . . . and to DENY the remaining unresolved portion of Parse’s Motion for Summary Judgment #1: The Asserted Claims of the '442, '752, and '256 Patents are Invalid for Lack of Written Description and Enablement (i.e., as it relates to the asserted claims of the '442 and '256 patents) . . . . The Court is UNCERTAIN as to how it will resolve Parse’s Motion for Summary Judgment #2: The Asserted Claims are Invalid Under Section 112 for Failing to Claim Essential Features, . . . though it notes that it considered that motion, as briefed, to potentially have merit.; and (2) As discussed during the recent oral arguments, the Court will work to issue opinions regarding these motions in due course. It is of course possible that in finalizing its work on these opinions, the Court’s ultimate decision could turn out to be different from the inclinations expressed above.
Scale Biosciences, Inc. v. Parse Biosciences, Inc., C.A. No. 22-1597-CJB, D.I. 475 (D. Del. Oct. 14, 2025).
I've seen judges make similar comments in the past, and they tend to be accurate. Guidance like this can be really helpful in potentially resolving a case before the decisions issue.
It's not clear from the face of the order just how many claims remain, especially given that this case involves patent assertions in both directions. It will be interesting to see how the case proceeds from here, and whether the parties end up at trial.
As our AI overloads approach a dark singularity, I occasionally amuse myself by asking it increasingly obtuse questions just to see what it spits out. Today, for instance, I asked it for a cartoon depicting the abstract legal concept of collateral estoppel:
AI-Generated, displayed with permission
I'm not entirely sure the old fella hit the mark on this one, but I'm honestly not sure what I would come with that's any better. Another draw on the Turing test.
Anyway...
Judge Hall issued an interesting opinion on last week on collateral estoppel. The plaintiff in Ingenus Pharms., LLC v. Hetero USA, Inc., C.A. No. 24-1025-JLH (D. Del. Oct. 21, 2025), had several suits pending in different districts regarding …
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