A recent Law 360 story by Jeff Montgomery, “Some Defense Fees Are Shifted to Wi-LAN for Case Flaws” reports that Wi-LAN Inc. must pay a substantial share of the defense costs Vizio Inc. and Sharp Electronics Corp. incurred while fighting needlessly prolonged patent infringement claims that Wi-LAN knew were unsupportable, a Delaware federal judge has ruled.
In a decision, U.S. District Court Judge Leonard P. Stark found that the conduct of Canada-based intellectual property licensing venture Wi-LAN was "exceptional" in its unacknowledged weaknesses and unreasonable pursuit of litigation from at least April 2018 to the final judgment against Wi-LAN on Sept. 12, 2019.
"The Court's fee award reflects the unnecessary effort defendants had to expend to continue defending claims that Wi-LAN knew or should have known by no later than the date I identified, rested on unreliable, insufficient, and inadmissible evidence," Judge Stark said in an 11-page memorandum order.
At issue were U.S. Patent Nos. 6,359,654; 6,490,250; and 5,847,774, but Judge Stark found that only Wi-LAN's handling of the '654 patent pushed the company's conduct into the orbit of Title 35 of the U.S. Code, Section 285, which allows fee awards to prevailing parties in "exceptional" circumstances.
The ruling will oblige Wi-LAN to pay Sharp's and Vizo's reasonable attorney fees incurred in fighting the '654 patent infringement claims from the date of the last third party declarations, April 26, 2018, through the court's entry of final judgment on the patent, Judge Stark said.
Gianni Cutri of Kirkland & Ellis LLP, lead counsel for Sharp and the attorney who led briefing on the motion to declare the case exceptional, said the legal team was pleased with the victory. "We are also gratified that the court agreed with our view that it was unreasonable for Wi-LAN to continue to press its infringement claims and further ordered Wi-LAN to pay a substantial portion of Sharp Electronics Corporation's attorneys' fees because of this exceptional conduct," Cutri said.