Fee Awards

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Trend is patent litigation loser pays fees or costs - but not this time (courtesy Google Images)
Trend is patent litigation loser pays fees or costs – but not this time (courtesy Google Images)

The significant filing fees spent by an accused infringer on a successful American Invents Act (AIA) review are not taxable as costs in the underlying district court patent litigation, according to the January 5, 2016 decision [pdf] in Credit Acceptance Corp v. Westlake Services.

In Credit Acceptance, the district court refused to tax as costs the $73,200 in filing fees paid by the accused infringer and prevailing party Westlake to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in successfully challenging Credit Acceptance’s patent in an AIA review.  Although the ruling goes against the general shift of both the Courts and Congress to increasing the financial risks of bringing unsuccessful patent litigation (this in service of the underlying policy of reducing the number of frivolous patent litigations), it appears to have been correctly decided.

Credit Acceptance tracks what has become a fairly typical fact pattern.  The owner of a patent claiming a business method or a software innovation brings suit for patent infringement in federal court.  In response, the accused infringer seeks AIA review by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) of the validity or patentability of the claimed invention.  The court stays the litigation pending administrative review.  The PTAB sustains the challenge, compelling the party asserting patent infringement to voluntarily dismiss the lawsuit with prejudice.  As observed in Credit Acceptance, there is strong case precedent for finding that under these circumstances the accused infringer is the prevailing party.
Continue Reading Loser Does Not Pay for AIA Costs

A lodestar is a star used to guide a ship's navigation
A lodestar is a star used to guide a ship’s navigation

Now that it is easier for prevailing parties in a patent litigation to recover attorney fees [see our previous post], how likely is that that fees paid under some form of non-hourly arrangement – for example flat fees, contingency, success fees  or some other alternative fee arrangement (AFA) – can be recovered?  The answer is that the court’s end-of-case determination of a reasonable hourly rate and fee, called the “lodestar,” trumps the amount paid under any AFA.

AFAs that exceed the lodestar likely cannot be recovered.  In Kilopass v Sidense (ND Cal), Judge Illston found that Kilopass engaged in litigation misconduct and made exceptionally meritless infringement claims, and, therefore, awarded Sidense attorney fees totaling $5.3 million.  (Kilopass has appealed.)

While the fees awarded to Sidense are significant, they appear to be less than half of the fees that Sidense actually paid its counsel under a contingency bonus arrangement.  Sidense’s fee arrangement called for Sidense to pay 50% of its lawyer’s hourly billing on a monthly basis, with the remaining 50% held back until the end of the case.  The payment of the holdback was tied to a performance based multiplier.  Since the court granted summary judgment in Sidense’s favor and dismissed all claims, Sidense’s counsel was entitled to the maximum multiplier of 2.5x, effectively requiring Sidense to pay 175% of its lawyers’ standard rates.  While the public record does not disclose the full amount of the contingency bonus, what can be inferred from the decision is that the fees paid by Sidense under the contingency arrangement exceeded $11 million (based on inferred standard rate fees of $6.5 million).Continue Reading Patent Litigation Fee Awards: Hourly-Based Lodestar Trumps AFAs