How They Won It: Fish Gets Marvell Off Hook In IP Trial

Faced with a damages claim that nearly reached 10 figures in an East Texas courtroom often perceived as friendly to plaintiffs, a pair of Fish & Richardson PC partners simply stuck with the facts to prove that its client, Marvell Semiconductor Inc., did not steal patented technology in the sale of its hard drives.

The firm successfully convinced a Texas federal jury that the circuitry contained in Marvell’s drives was substantially different from the technology covered by patents asserted by Lake Cherokee Hard Drive Technologies LLC and secured a clean non-infringement verdict on Aug. 16.

The decision put nearly three years of litigation to rest. Lake Cherokee sued Marvell and seven other companies, including Hitachi Global Storage Technologies Inc. and LSI Corp., in 2010, accusing the firms of infringing a pair of patents the company had acquired. Lake Cherokee struck settlement deals with all the other defendants, leaving Marvell alone to slug it out in court.

Fish & Richardson partner Indranil Mukerji told Law360 that while they were fully confident that their client’s products did not infringe on the asserted patents, the forum of the case and the nature of the proceedings left little room for error.

U.S. District Judge Rodney Gilstrap provided Fish attorneys with only a week to prepare for their case.