Longitude Licensing Ltd. et al v. Apple Inc.

Filing 79

ORDER Regarding Joint Proposed Schedule by Magistrate Judge Elizabeth D. Laporte. (shyS, COURT STAFF) (Filed on 6/17/2015)

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

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NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

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LONGITUDE LICENSING LTD., et al.,

Case No. 14-cv-04275-EDL

Plaintiffs,
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v.

ORDER REGARDING JOINT
PROPOSED SCHEDULE

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APPLE INC.,
Defendant.

United States District Court
Northern District of California

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I.

Introduction

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This is a patent infringement case brought by Plaintiff Longitude Licensing Ltd. against

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Apple Inc. There are thirteen patents at issue in this case, all directed to flash memory systems

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and various aspects of operating and managing flash memory systems. FAC ¶¶ 16-30. There are

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six patents entitled “Partial Block Data Programming and Reading Operations in a Non-Volatile

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Memory.” FAC ¶¶ 16-21 (the ‘424 patent, the ‘987 patent, the ‘177 patent, the ‘421 patent, the

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’702 patent, and the ‘490 patent). There are three patents entitled “Flash Memory Data Correction

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and Scrub Technique.” FAC ¶¶ 22-24 (the ‘835 patent, the ‘607 patent, and the ‘095 patent). The

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‘488 patent is entitled “Method for Fast Wake-Up of a Flash Memory System.” FAC ¶ 25. The

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‘611 patent is entitled “Power Management Block for Use in a Non-Volatile Memory System.”

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FAC ¶ 26. The ‘865 patent is entitled “Maintaining Erase Counts in Non-Volatile Storage

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System.” FAC ¶ 27. The ‘729 patent is entitled “Automated Wear Leveling in Non-Volatile

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Storage Systems.” FAC ¶ 28. Plaintiff alleges direct and indirect/induced infringement of each

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patent.

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In light of the potential size and breadth of this case, during the case management
conference on March 10, 2015, the Court ordered that:



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Initially, discovery should focus primarily on ownership and standing, as well as discovery
directed to narrowing the asserted claims.

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

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Pursuant to the parties’ agreement, there is a limit of 200 hours of fact depositions per side.

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Each side may allocate those hours as it sees fit between party and non-party depositions,

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subject to the general limitations imposed by the federal rules such as proportionality.


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for each expert report submitted by the expert.

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

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Defendant shall serve its invalidity contentions in accordance with Patent Local Rule 3-3
no later than April 13, 2015. All subsequent deadlines in the Patent Local Rules are

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temporarily stayed.

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

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United States District Court
Northern District of California

Expert depositions shall be limited to one seven-hour deposition for each expert witness

Plaintiff shall serve a Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6) deposition notice regarding

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source code on Defendant. No later than two weeks after the deposition takes place, the

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parties shall meet and confer to agree on and provide to the Court a proposed schedule for

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this case at least through claim construction.

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Dkt. No. 46. The parties have filed a Joint Proposed Schedule, in which they identify agreed-upon

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dates as well as several disputes about narrowing the case and the case schedule.

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III.

Discussion

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A.

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The parties present a number of agreed-upon dates through claim construction, and the

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Agreed-Upon Dates

Court adopts those dates as modified below:

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

6/18/15: Longitude identifies no more 13 claims per patent and not more than a total of45
claims



7/2/15: Apple identifies no more than 15 prior art references against each patent and not more
than a total of 56 references

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

7/16/15: Exchange Lists of Proposed Terms for Construction [Patent Local Rule 4-1(a)]

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

8/6/15: Exchange of Proposed Constructions and Identification Intrinsic/Extrinsic Evidence
[Patent Local Rule 4-2(a)(b)]



9/3/15: Joint Claim Construction and Prehearing Statement [Patent Local Rule 4-3]

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10/5/15: Completion of Claim Construction Discovery [Patent Local Rule 4-4]

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10/19/15: Plaintiff’s Opening Claim Construction Brief [Patent Local Rule 4-5(a)]

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11/2/15: Defendant’s Responsive Claim Construction Brief [Patent Local Rule 4-5(b)]

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11/9/15: Plaintiff’s Reply Claim Construction Brief [Patent Local Rule 4-5(c)]

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

11/16/15 at 10:00 a.m.: Claim Construction Tutorial

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12/7/15 at 2:00 p.m.: Claim Construction Hearing [Patent Local Rule 4-6]

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United States District Court
Northern District of California

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B.

Additional Disputes

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Limiting Apple’s Invalidity Theories

In addition to the foregoing agreed-upon dates, Longitude asks the Court to require Apple

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to identify four “invalidity theories” for each asserted claim, each based on a single anticipatory

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reference or unique combination of obviousness references, by July 2, 2015, the same day that the

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parties agree that Apple will identify no more than 15 prior art references per patent and no more

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than 56 total. Longitude contends that Apple has proposed similar limitations in other cases, but it

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does not appear that any court has required a defendant to limit itself to certain theories, as

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opposed to limiting the number of prior art references as is suggested in the Model Order, and

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certainly not so early in the case. In Apple v. Samsung, the court required both sides to reduce

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invalidity references/systems/combinations to 45 per side three days before the fact discovery

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cutoff, but did not adopt a proposal to limit invalidity theories more generally. The Court will not

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require Apple to limit itself to a specified number of “invalidity theories” on July 2, 2015, but may

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revisit this issue at a later date if the circumstances warrant it.

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2.

Identifying Representative Products

Longitude asks the Court to require Apple to identify “representative products” by July 9,

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2015. In appropriate cases, courts use representative products to narrow cases where there are

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numerous related products creating identical or similar issues of infringement. See, e.g., Rambus

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v. Hynix, Case 05-cv-00334-RMW, D.I. 2803 (requesting letter briefs on the issue of identifying

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representative products); Apple v. Samsung, 12-cv-00630-LHK, D.I. 471 (“The Court strongly

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encourages the parties to reach a stipulation on [representative products].”). Longitude contends that

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the accused products here are similar because they utilize a limited number of operating systems and

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flash memory management appears to be similar among the products. Apple counters that this is not

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an appropriate case for identifying representative products because the accused functionalities operate

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differently depending on the hardware, operating system, and flash translation layer used in a given

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product. The Court is awaiting further briefing from Apple on this issue and will issue a separate

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order relating to representative products after June 18, 2015.

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3.

Identifying Non-Infringement Theories

In addition to a requirement that Apple identify representative products on July 9, 2015,
Longitude also wants Apple to provide it with discovery regarding its non-infringement contentions,

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United States District Court
Northern District of California

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and specifically how each of the representative products differs for purposes of infringement (i.e.,

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respond to Interrogatory No.1 requesting this information). Alternatively, if Apple argues that

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each of the accused products is unique, Longitude wants Apple to identify relevant distinctions.

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Apple agrees to produce this information, but argues that it should be required to respond to

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Interrogatory No. 1 much later in the case, and suggests 45 days after a claim construction order.

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The Court will not impose a deadline of July 9, 2015 for this discovery, but believes that it should

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be provided much sooner than Apple suggests. The parties are ordered to meet and confer and

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agree on a mutually agreeable date for this discovery.

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4.

Detailed Statement of Claim/Case Dispositive Nature of Claim
Construction

The parties agree that a joint claim construction and prehearing statement pursuant to

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Local Rule 4-3 shall be filed on September 3, 2015. Apple wants that statement to include “a

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detailed statement as [sic] why each of the selected terms for construction are either claim and/or

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case dispositive.” Longitude argues that this is unnecessary because Local Rule 4-3 already

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requires “identification of the terms whose construction will be most significant to the resolution

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of the case up to a maximum of 10” and requires the parties to “identify any term among the 10

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whose construction will be case or claim dispositive” on the same date, September 3, 2015. Given

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the number of patents and claim terms at issue in this case, the parties should proceed through the
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initial round of claim construction primarily if not exclusively with terms that are likely to be

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dispositive of patents or at least claim terms and therefore the Court agrees with Apple that

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additional detail should be required.

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On September 3, 2015, the parties shall file their Patent Local Rule 4-3 Joint Claim

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Construction and Pre-Hearing Statement that: (1) identifies the terms whose construction will be

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most significant to the resolution of the case up to a maximum of ten; (2) of those ten, identify

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those whose construction is claim or case dispositive; and (3) for all terms, provide as detailed a

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statement as feasible as to why each of the terms selected for construction is either claim or case

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dispositive, or a statement that a particular term is not claim or case dispositive and as detailed a

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statement as feasible as to why it is still significant to the resolution of the case.

United States District Court
Northern District of California

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E.

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The Court will not set dates beyond the claim construction hearing now, and will set a case

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Post Claim Construction Schedule

management conference to set remaining dates after the Court issues its claim construction order.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Dated: June 16, 2015

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________________________
ELIZABETH D. LAPORTE
United States Magistrate Judge

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