Earlier today Judge Albright spoke at a Zoom-hosted “Fireside Chat” sponsored by the Austin Asian American Bar Association. Though if there was actually a fireplace nearby, it didn’t make it on camera. But we digress…  Principal Kat Li of McKool Smith facilitated an engaging and info-packed 45 minutes, which we’ll summarize below. Some of the nuggets should be familiar to longtime Albright-watchers, but there’s something new and useful here for everyone. As a framing device we’ll use the topics chosen by Ms. Li, subject to some light chronological reordering to group common themes. How the Court manages its workload & role of the Technical Advisor: As always, Judge Albright extended generous recognition to his “great team,” including both his “exceptional law clerks” and EE-PhD-credentialed Technical Advisor ...

UPDATED MAY 7 We thought readers of the blog might like to know that at 11:30AM Central next Thursday, May 13, Judge Albright will be delivering Zoom-based remarks on the topic of “his practices regarding trial, claim construction, discovery, and other hot topics” at a Fireside Chat event sponsored by the Austin Asian American Bar Association (AAABA). The chat will be hosted by McKool Smith Austin office Principal Kat Li (who is available for questions beforehand). You can register for the (free!) event here.

To make up for our recent brief layoff, we’ll try to bring you a slightly meatier-than-normal summary of recent happenings in and coverage of the Waco Division. Here’s what we’ve picked up over the last few weeks that’s not related to VLSI-Intel II: ESW-Roku: As we covered a couple weeks back, Judge Albright’s third patent trial resulted in a defense verdict of both non-infringement and invalidity: Scott Graham of Law.com interviews the victorious defense team: Jackson Walker Saves Roku From $10M—No, Make That $228M—Patent Hit (subscription required) Michelle Casady of Law360 also covers the verdict: Roku Cleared Of Infringement In $228M Interactive TV IP Trial (subscription required) VLSI-Intel I: Even though the second trial is now behind us, the first chapter of the VLSI-Intel saga remains a topic of great interest (and we haven’t even seen ...

It’s been a busy couple weeks of non-blog-related stuff around these parts, so we apologize for neglecting y’all. We’ll try to make it up to you with a few posts’ worth of comprehensive lookbacks and mini-summaries. In this post we’ll share our own thoughts about VSLI-Intel II. The next post will cover other media’s coverage of the trial. Soon to be followed with one more post covering “everything else” of recent interest in the Waco Division. Off we go…! As regular readers are now (we presume) aware, the VLSI-Intel II jury returned last Wednesday with a verdict of non-infringement. But the jury wasn’t just checking a uniform “defense verdict” box, as it also found that Intel had failed to invalidate VLSI’s patents. In any event, we’re now at ...

As promised, here’s a comprehensive listing of the other media coverage we were following during the VLSI-Intel II trial, in roughly reverse-chron order: Verdict & Post-Trial Analysis: Scott Graham of Law.com was on the case, as always: Intel Escapes Second VLSI Trial With Zero Damages (subscription required) Cara Salvatore of Law360 covered the verdict, as well: Intel Beats VLSI’s Bid For $3B In 2nd Chip Trial (subscription required) Scott Graham’s Skilled in the Art column took a look back afterwards: Intel Regains Some Mojo in Waco (subscription required) And it was no shock that Law.com named the Intel team as its Litigators of the Week: A Complete Non-Infringement Scorecard For Intel and Wilmer in Round 2 with VLSI Susan Decker, Matthew Bultman, and Laurel Brubaker Calkins of Bloomberg Law looked at the verdict: Intel Wins ...

For those who haven’t yet heard, Friday afternoon Roku notched its second trial win before Judge Albright. The jury handed down a verdict finding that Roku had not infringed any asserted claim of ESW’s two asserted patents, and further found that Roku had successfully proved that ESW’s ‘718 patent was invalid. (Roku did not put on an invalidity case at trial as to the second asserted patent.) Michelle Casady of Law360 has a good summary writeup: Roku Cleared Of Infringement In $228M Interactive TV IP Trial (subscription required) Judge Albright spoke briefly with counsel following the jury’s verdict and congratulated both sides on a well-tried case. He specifically stated that he had no inkling which way the jury was likely to rule before they handed him the ...

As much as we’d love to bring you wall-to-wall coverage of every trial in front of Judge Albright, this latest calendar is getting a bit jammed. So in this post we’re just going to try to hit the highlights of both this past week’s ESW-Roku trial, and next week’s (presumably) forthcoming VLSI-Intel II trial. ESW-Roku: This week’s ESW-Roku trial was conducted quickly and efficiently by both sides. Even after Tuesday’s “sick day,” ESW concluded its case on trial Day #2 (i.e., Wednesday), and Roku concluded its case by end of trial Day #3 (i.e., yesterday). This morning brought a very brief rebuttal case from ESW, limited solely to recalling ESW’s technical expert Dr. Shamos (we think—we missed the first few minutes). Judge Albright then charged the jury, and the parties concluded summations by ...

Quick FYI: For anyone wondering, there will be no trial proceedings today in ESW v. Roku, due to an illness in chambers. (Nothing serious, as far as we’re aware.) We’ll keep you posted. As for yesterday, for the time being we’ll direct you to coverage from Michelle Casady at Law360: Texas Jury Told Roku Infringed Interactive TV Patents (no subscription required, given COVID-related content). Beyond that good summary of openings, yesterday’s proceedings moved quickly: Two different ESW fact witnesses, deposition designations, and the first portion of the testimony of ESW’s infringement expert Dr. Shamos. Dr. Shamos, given unspecified travel restrictions, notably testified by Zoom. That’s the first time of which we’re aware that such a significant witness has testified remotely in Judge Albright’s trial courtroom—but we noticed no ...

The Court has updated the dial-in credentials to observe the ESW v. Roku trial, as follows: +1 669 254 5252  or +1 646 828 7666  or +1 551 285 1373  or +1 669 216 1590  Webinar ID: 160 619 0257 Passcode: 832689 Mobile-friendly:  +16692545252,,1606190257#,,,,*832689# 

Judge Albright is currently delivering preliminary instructions to the jury in ESW-Roku; you can dial-in to listen to proceedings as we detailed here last week. In the meantime, here’s our link roundup of last week’s doings in the Waco Division: We noted in our prior link roundup that the trial in the True Chemical v. Performance Chemical case, which had been scheduled to occur last week, was canceled at the last minute following the Court’s hearing on PCC’s sanctions motion. Michael A. Tomasulo and Kevin J. Boyle of Winston & Strawn’s WacoWatch blog have the story: Trial Cancelled. Sanctions Looming. And so does Dani Kass of Law360: Oil Co.’s Sanctions Bid Derails WDTX Patent Case On Trial Eve (subscription required) Mr. Tomasulo on the WacoWatch blog also follows up, along with Dr. Alan ...