This week I had an opportunity to watch the webcast of PLI’s 4^th Annual Patent Law Institute that took place in New York on March 1-2nd. As usual, the Institute delivered an enormous amount of insightful and practical information. The elite panel of experts covered everything you need to know about the practice impact of recent developments on all three sub-groups in the patent law community: patent prosecutors, patent litigators, and patent strategic & transactional lawyers.

During the final session of the Patent Law Institute, an esteemed panel of federal judges shared their perspective on critical patent litigation issues including trial presentation, discovery disputes (when and how to seek the court’s assistance), Markman procedures and dispositive motions (how to use these motions to maximum effect).

Honorable Elizabeth D. Laporte, Magistrate Judge, United States District Court, Northern District of California, San Francisco, mentioned a book titled Patent Case Management Judicial Guide, written by Peter S. Menell, University of California Berkeley-School of Law, et al.  Judge Laporte strongly recommended the book as a valuable resource for both Judges and attorneys. 

Abstract:

As the number, size, and complexity of patent cases have grown throughout the United States over the past several decades – paralleling expansion in the role of high technology enterprises in the U.S. economy – the need for a comprehensive, user-friendly, and practical judicial guide for managing patent cases has become increasingly apparent. Although similar in many respects to other forms of complex civil litigation, patent cases pose distinctive case management challenges. Patent cases feature complex and dynamic technological facts to a degree rarely encountered in most other areas of litigation. Furthermore, they employ unique procedures (such as claim construction hearings) that affect and interact with other aspects of the case (such as summary judgment motions and expert reports) in ways that create unusual scheduling and substantive complexity. In addition, patent cases often entail distinctive and difficult discovery issues, extensive use of experts, and particularly complex dispositive and pre-trial motion practice.

Because of the decentralized, general jurisdiction structure of federal courts in the United States, much of the experience relating to managing patent cases is silo-ed in particular judicial chambers. As one jurist aptly noted, best practices for patent case management have been transmitted largely through word of mouth. Given the crowded, diverse dockets of federal courts, the accessibility and reliability of such knowledge is far from ideal. Judges in some districts have partially codified recommended practices in the form of Patent Local Rules, standing orders, and patent jury instructions, but these documents do not address the full range of distinctive challenges posed by patent litigation. Furthermore, such judicial wisdom continues to evolve.

Recognizing these patterns, the authors undertook in 2006 to survey the range of approaches and perspectives on patent case management, foster discussion and analysis of patent case management techniques, and develop an authoritative guide for judges, law clerks, practitioners, and patent and civil procedure professors and scholars. Given the dynamism of the patent system and patent litigation, the authors plan to revise the Guide on a biennial basis.

Tags: best practices for patent case managment, Judge Elizabeth Laporte, judicial guide, Patent Case Management, Patent cases, Patent Law Institute, Patent Local Rules

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 25th, 2010 at 19:19 and is filed under Patent Case Management, Patent Litigation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.