Krausz Industries Ltd. v. Smith-Blair, Inc., et al

Filing 106

STIPULATED PROTECTIVE ORDER - Signed by District Judge Louise Wood Flanagan on 08/31/2015. (Baker, C.)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF NORTH CAROLINA
Western Division
No. 5:12-CV-00570-FL

KRAUSZ INDUSTRIES LTD.
f/k/a Krausz Metal Industries Ltd.,
Plaintiff,
v.
SMITH-BLAIR, INC., SENSUS USA,
INC. and SENSUS MANUFACTURING
SHANGHAI LIMITED,
Defendants.

1.

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STIPULATED PROTECTIVE ORDER

PURPOSES AND LIMITATIONS

Disclosure and discovery activity in this action are likely to involve production of
confidential, proprietary, or private information for which special protection from public
disclosure and from use for any purpose other than prosecuting this litigation may be warranted.
The confidential, proprietary, or private information likely to be involved in disclosure and
discovery activity in this action includes, without limitation, confidential product design,
research, development, manufacturing, and other technical information; confidential marketing,
sales, distribution, information; confidential information regarding competitors, competition,
and competitive strategies; confidential information concerning internal policies and procedures;
and confidential information concerning revenues, costs, profits and other financial matters.
Accordingly, the parties hereby stipulate to and petition the court to enter this Stipulated
Protective Order (“Order”). The parties acknowledge that this Order does not confer blanket
protections on all disclosures or responses to discovery and that the protection it affords from
public disclosure and use extends only to the limited information or items that are entitled to
confidential treatment under the applicable legal principles.

2.

DEFINITIONS
2.1

Challenging Party: a Party or Non-Party that challenges the designation
of information or items under this Order.

2.2

CONFIDENTIAL Information or Items: information (regardless of
how it is generated, stored or maintained) or tangible things that qualify
for protection under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(c).

2.3

Designating Party: a Party or Non-Party that designates information or
items in which it has a confidentiality interest in disclosures or in
responses

to

discovery

as

CONFIDENTIAL

or

HIGHLY

CONFIDENTIAL—OUTSIDE ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY.
2.4

Disclosure or Discovery Material: all items or information, regardless of
the medium or manner in which any such item or information is generated,
stored, or maintained (including, among other things, testimony,
transcripts, and tangible things), that are produced or generated in
disclosures or responses to discovery in this matter.

2.5

Expert: a person who (1) has been retained by a Party or its counsel to
serve as an expert witness or as a non-testifying expert in this action, (2) is
not a current employee, officer, or retained advisor of a Party or of a
Party’s competitor, and (3) at the time of retention, is not anticipated to
become an employee, officer, or retained advisor of a Party or of a Party’s
competitor.

2.6

HIGHLY

CONFIDENTIAL—OUTSIDE

ATTORNEYS’

EYES

ONLY Information or Items: Confidential Information that the
Designating Party reasonably believes contains such highly sensitive
information that its disclosure to any officers, directors, employees or
retained advisors of the other Party or a Non-Party would present a
substantial risk of harm to the competitive position of the Designating
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Party. By way of non-limiting example, Disclosure or Discovery Material
in one or more of the following categories may qualify for the HIGHLY
CONFIDENTIAL—

OUTSIDE

ATTORNEYS’

EYES

ONLY

designation: (i) non-public technical information, including schematic
diagrams,

manufacturing

and

engineering

processes,

engineering

notebooks, specifications, research notes and materials, technical reference
materials, and other nonpublic technical descriptions and/or depictions of
the relevant technology; (ii) non-public damages-related information (e.g.,
the number of products sold, total dollar value of sales products, and profit
margins); (iii) non public financial information; (iv) customer lists; (v)
business and/or marketing plans; (vi) price lists and/or pricing
information; and (vii) information obtained from a non-party pursuant to a
current Non-Disclosure Agreement (“NDA”).
2.7

Non-Party: any natural person, partnership, corporation, association, or
other legal entity not named as a Party to this action.

2.8

Outside Counsel: (1) attorneys, including attorneys licensed to practice
law in a foreign jurisdiction, who are not officers, directors, or employees
of a Party but are retained to represent or advise a Party; and (2) staff
employed or retained by those attorneys, including, but not limited to,
contract review attorneys.

2.9

Party: any party to this action, including all of its officers, directors,
employees, and retained advisors.

2.10

Producing Party: a Party or Non-Party that produces Disclosure or
Discovery Material in this action.

2.11

Professional Vendors: persons or entities that provide litigation support
services (e.g., photocopying, videotaping, translating, preparing exhibits

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or demonstrations, and organizing, storing, or retrieving data in any form
or medium) and their employees and subcontractors.
2.12

Protected Material: any Disclosure or Discovery Material that is
designated as CONFIDENTIAL or as HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL—
OUTSIDE ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY.

2.13

Receiving Party: a Party that receives Disclosure or Discovery Material
from a Producing Party.

3.

SCOPE

The protections conferred by this Order cover not only Protected Material (as defined
above), but also (1) any information copied or extracted from Protected Material; (2) all copies,
excerpts, summaries, or compilations of Protected Material; and (3) any testimony,
conversations, or presentations by Parties or their Outside Counsel that might reveal Protected
Material. However, the protections conferred by this Order do not cover the following
information: (a) any information that is available to the public at the time of disclosure to a
Receiving Party or becomes part of the public domain after its disclosure to a Receiving Party as
a result of publication not involving a violation of this Order; and (b) any information known to
the Receiving Party prior to the disclosure or obtained by the Receiving Party after the disclosure
from a source who obtained the information lawfully and under no obligation of confidentiality
to the Designating Party. Any use of Protected Material at trial shall be governed by a separate
agreement or order.
4.

DURATION

Even after final disposition of this litigation, the confidentiality obligations imposed by
this Order shall remain in effect until a Designating Party agrees otherwise in writing or this
Court otherwise directs. Final disposition shall be deemed to be the later of (1) dismissal of all
claims and defenses in this action, with or without prejudice; and (2) final judgment herein after
the completion and exhaustion of all appeals, rehearings, remands, trials, or reviews of this
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action, including the time limits for filing any motions or applications for extension of time
pursuant to applicable law.
5.

DESIGNATING PROTECTED MATERIAL
5.1

Exercise of Restraint and Care in Designating Material for Protection.
Each Party or Non Party that designates information or items for
protection under this Order must take care to limit any such designation to
specific material that qualifies as CONFIDENTIAL Information or
HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL – OUTSIDE ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY
Information.

Mass, indiscriminate or routinized designations are

prohibited.
5.2

Designation Required for Protection. Except as otherwise provided in
this Order (see, e.g., second paragraph of Section 5.3(b) below), or as
otherwise stipulated or ordered, Disclosure or Discovery Material that
qualifies for protection under this Order must be clearly so designated
before the material is disclosed or produced. However, as noted in Section
5.4 below, inadvertent failure to designate Disclosure or Discovery
Material at the time of disclosure or production does not waive a Party’s
right to thereafter make such designation if otherwise appropriate.
Notwithstanding the foregoing, if the Disclosure or Discovery Material is
produced by a Party or Non-Party for whom the information is not
CONFIDENTIAL,

HIGHLY

CONFIDENTIAL—OUTSIDE

ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY, any other Party with such an interest may
so designate the Disclosure or Discovery Material.

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5.3

Manner and Timing of Designation. Designation in conformity with this
Order requires:
(a)

for information produced in documentary form (e.g., paper or
electronic documents, but excluding transcripts of depositions or
other pretrial or trial proceedings), that the Producing Party affix
the legend CONFIDENTIAL or HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL—
OUTSIDE ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY to each page that
contains protected material.

If only a portion or portions of the

material in a document qualifies for protection, the Producing
Party also must, if requested by the Receiving Party as to a specific
document or documents, clearly identify the protected portion(s)
(e.g., by making appropriate markings in the margins) and must
specify, for each portion, the level of protection being asserted.
(b)

for information made available for inspection, that a Party or NonParty that makes original documents or materials available for
inspection need not designate them for protection until after the
inspecting Party has indicated which material it would like copied
and produced. During the inspection and before the designation, all
of the material made available for inspection shall be deemed
HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL—OUTSIDE ATTORNEYS’ EYES
ONLY. After the inspecting Party has identified the documents it
wants copied and produced, the Producing Party must determine
which documents, or portions thereof, qualify for protection under
this Order. Then, before producing the specified documents, the
Producing

Party

must

affix

the

appropriate

legend

(CONFIDENTIAL or HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL— OUTSIDE
ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY) to each page that contains Protected
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Material. If only a portion or portions of the material on a page
qualifies for protection, the Producing Party also must, if requested
by the Receiving Party as to a specific document or documents,
clearly identify the protected portion(s) (e.g., by making
appropriate markings in the margins) and must specify, for each
portion, the level of protection being asserted.
(c)

for testimony given in deposition or in other pretrial or trial
proceedings, that the Designating Party may identify on the record,
before the close of the deposition, hearing, or other proceeding,
protected testimony and specify the level of protection being
asserted. The Designating Party also may, no later than 14 calendar
days after the transcript of the deposition is delivered to Outside
Counsel for the Designating Party, designate, in writing, specific
portions of the testimony as to which protection is sought and to
specify the level of protection being asserted. Only those portions
of the testimony that are appropriately designated for protection
within the 14 calendar days shall be covered by the provisions of
this Order. Alternatively, a Designating Party may specify, at the
deposition or up to 14 days after the transcript of the deposition is
delivered to Outside Counsel for the Designating Party if that
period is properly invoked, that the entire transcript shall be treated
as CONFIDENTIAL or HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL— OUTSIDE
ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY, subject to the other provisions of
this Order concerning the scope of designations.
(c)(2) Transcripts containing Protected Material shall have an
obvious legend on the title page that the transcript contains
Protected Material, and the title page shall be followed by a
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list of all pages (including line numbers as appropriate) that
have been designated as Protected Material and the level of
protection being asserted by the Designating Party. The
Designating Party shall inform the court reporter of these
requirements. Before the expiration of a 14-day period for
designation, a transcript shall be treated during that period
as if it had been designated HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL—
OUTSIDE ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY in its entirety
unless otherwise agreed. After the expiration of that period,
the transcript shall be treated only as actually designated.
(d)

for information produced in some form other than documentary
and for any other tangible items—including, but not limited to,
productions of documents in electronic form, that the Producing
Party affix in a prominent place on the exterior of the container or
containers in which the information or item is stored the legend
CONFIDENTIAL or HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL— OUTSIDE
ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY. If only a portion or portions of the
information or item warrant protection, the Producing Party, to the
extent practicable, shall, if requested by the Receiving Party as to
specific information, identify the protected portion(s) and specify
the level of protection being asserted. In the case of nativelyproduced electronically stored information, such designation may
be affixed to the storage medium (e.g., CD, DVD, etc.) on which
such information is produced.

5.4

Inadvertent Failures to Designate. If timely corrected, an inadvertent
failure to designate qualified information or items does not, standing
alone, waive the Designating Party’s right to secure protection under this
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Order for such material. Upon timely correction of a designation, the
Receiving Party must make reasonable efforts to assure that the material is
treated in accordance with the provisions of this Order.
6.

CHALLENGING CONFIDENTIALITY DESIGNATIONS
6.1

Timing of Challenges. Any Party may challenge a designation of
confidentiality at any time. Unless a prompt challenge to a Designating
Party’s confidentiality designation is necessary to avoid foreseeable,
substantial unfairness, unnecessary economic burdens, or a significant
disruption or delay in the litigation, a Party does not waive its right to
challenge a confidentiality designation by electing not to mount a
challenge promptly after the original designation is disclosed.

6.2

Meet and Confer. The Challenging Party shall initiate the dispute
resolution process by providing written notice (by letter or email) of each
designation it is challenging and describing the basis for each challenge.
The parties shall attempt to resolve each challenge in good faith and must
begin the process by conferring directly within 7 days of the date of
service of notice. In conferring, the Challenging Party must explain the
basis for its belief that the confidentiality designation was not proper and
must give the Designating Party an opportunity to review the designated
material, to reconsider the circumstances, and, if no change in designation
is offered, to explain the basis for the chosen designation.

6.3

Judicial Intervention. If the Parties cannot resolve a challenge without
court intervention, the Challenging Party may file a motion challenging a
confidentiality designation if there is good cause for doing so, including a
challenge to the designation of a deposition transcript or any portions
thereof, but only if it satisfies the meet and confer requirements set forth in

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the preceding paragraph or establishes that the Designating Party has
failed to participate in the meet and confer process in a timely manner.
Any such motion shall be filed within 14 days of the initial notice of
challenge or within 7 days of the parties agreeing that the meet and confer
process will not resolve their dispute, whichever is sooner. The burden of
persuasion in any such challenge proceeding shall be on the Designating
Party. All Parties shall continue to afford the material in question the level
of protection to which it is entitled under the Producing Party’s
designation until the court rules on the challenge.
7.

ACCESS TO AND USE OF PROTECTED MATERIAL
7.1

Basic Principles. A Receiving Party may use Protected Material that is
disclosed or produced by another Party or by a Non-Party in connection
with this case only for prosecuting, defending, or attempting to settle this
litigation. Such Protected Material may be disclosed only to the categories
of persons and under the conditions described in this Order. When the
litigation has been terminated, a Receiving Party must comply with the
provisions of Section 13 below (FINAL DISPOSITION). Protected
Material must be stored and maintained by a Receiving Party at a location
and in a secure manner that ensures that access is limited to the persons
authorized under this Order.

7.2

Disclosure of CONFIDENTIAL Information or Items. Unless
otherwise ordered by the court or permitted in writing by the Designating
Party, a Receiving Party may disclose any information or item designated
CONFIDENTIAL only to:
(a)

the Receiving Party’s Outside Counsel, as well as employees of
said Outside Counsel to whom it is reasonably necessary to

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disclose the information for this litigation; provided, however, that
any attorneys and their employees who are not affiliated with
counsel of record in this action shall sign the Acknowledgment
(Exhibit A) prior to any such disclosure; and provided further that
Aryeh Reif and Reuven Borokovsky, prior to any such disclosure
to them, also shall provide to defense counsel sworn declarations
similar to those submitted by them in Krausz Industries Ltd. v.
Romac Industries, Inc., et al., No. 2:10-CV-01201-RSL;
(b)

officers, directors, employees and retained advisors of the
Receiving Party to whom disclosure is reasonably necessary for
this litigation and who have signed the Acknowledgment (Exhibit
A);

(c)

Experts (as defined in this Order) of the Receiving Party to whom
disclosure is reasonably necessary for this litigation and who have
signed the Acknowledgment (Exhibit A);

(d)

the Court and its personnel;

(e)

court reporters and their staff, professional jury or trial consultants,
mock jurors, mediators selected by the Parties, and Professional
Vendors to whom disclosure is reasonably necessary for this
litigation and who have signed the Acknowledgment (Exhibit A);

(f)

during their depositions, witnesses in the action to whom
disclosure is reasonably necessary and who have signed the
Acknowledgment (Exhibit A), unless otherwise agreed by the
Designating Party or ordered by the court; and

(g)

the author or recipient of a document containing the information or
a custodian or other person who otherwise possessed or knew the
information.
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7.3

Disclosure

of

HIGHLY

CONFIDENTIAL—OUTSIDE

ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY Information or Items. Unless otherwise
ordered by the court or permitted in writing by the Designating Party, a
Receiving Party may disclose any information or item designated
HIGHLY CONFIDENTIAL— OUTSIDE ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY
only to:
(a)

the Receiving Party’s Outside Counsel and who are also an
attorney of record in this case, as well as employees of said
Outside Counsel to whom it is reasonably necessary to disclose the
information for this litigation; provided, however, that absent
written consent from the Designating Party, the foregoing shall not
include any individual engaged in the preparation or prosecution of
patent applications anywhere in the world related to pipe couplings
or any component thereof. Any such bar to preparation or
prosecution

shall

begin

when

access

to

HIGHLY

CONFIDENTIAL—OUTSIDE ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY
information is first received by the affected individual and shall
end two (2) years after final disposition of this action;
(b)

Experts of the Receiving Party (1) to whom disclosure is
reasonably necessary for this litigation, (2) who have signed the
Acknowledgment (Exhibit A), and (3) as to whom the procedures
set forth in Section 7.4(a), below, have been followed;

(c)

the court and its personnel;

(d)

court reporters and their staff, professional jury or trial consultants,
mock jurors, mediators selected by the Parties, and Professional
Vendors to whom disclosure is reasonably necessary for this
litigation and who have signed the Acknowledgment (Exhibit A);
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(e)

the author or recipient of a document containing the information or
a custodian or other person who otherwise possessed or knew the
information.

7.4

Procedures for Approving or Objecting to Disclosure of HIGHLY
CONFIDENTIAL—OUTSIDE

ATTORNEYS’

EYES

ONLY

Information or Items to Experts.
(a)

Unless otherwise ordered by the court or agreed to in writing by
the Designating Party, a Party that seeks to disclose to an Expert
(as defined in this Order) any information or item that has been
designated

HIGHLY

CONFIDENTIAL—OUTSIDE

ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY pursuant to Section 7.3(b) first must
make a written request to the Designating Party that sets forth (1)
the full name of the Expert and the city and state of his or her
primary residence, (2) attaches a copy of the Expert’s current
resume, (3) identifies the Expert’s current employer, (4) identifies
each person or entity from whom the Expert has received
significant compensation or funding for work in his or her areas of
expertise or to whom the expert has provided professional services,
including in connection with a litigation, at any time during the
preceding four years, and (5) identifies (by name and number of
the case and location of court) any litigation in connection with
which the Expert has offered expert testimony, including through a
declaration, report, or testimony at a deposition or trial, during the
preceding four years.
(b)

A Party that makes a request and provides the information
specified in the preceding respective Sections may not disclose the
subject Protected Material to the identified Expert for seven (7)
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calendar days after delivering the request. If the Party does not
receive a written objection from the Designating Party, setting
forth in detail the grounds on which that objection is based, before
these 7 days expire, the Party may disclose Protected Material to
the identified Expert.
(c)

A Party that receives a timely written objection must meet and
confer with the Designating Party to try to resolve the matter by
agreement within seven days of the written objection. If no
agreement is reached, the Party seeking to prevent the disclosure to
the Expert may file a motion seeking such relief from the court.
Any such motion shall be filed within 14 days of the initial written
objection or seven days of the Parties agreeing that the meet and
confer process will not resolve the objection, whichever is earlier.
In any such motion, the Party seeking to prevent disclosure to the
Expert shall specify the risk of harm that the disclosure would
entail and suggest any additional means that could be used to
reduce that risk. The Party opposing disclosure to the Expert shall
bear the burden of providing that the risk of harm that the
disclosure would entail (under any safeguards proposed) outweighs
the Receiving Party’s need to disclose the Protected Material to its
Expert. The Protected Material that is the subject of the motion
shall not be disclosed to the Expert until the court rules on the
motion.

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8.

NON-PARTY PROTECTED MATERIAL SOUGHT TO BE PRODUCED
IN THIS LITIGATION
8.1

Non-Parties Are Beneficiaries. A Non-Party in this action may designate
Discovery Material that it produces as CONFIDENTIAL or HIGHLY
CONFIDENTIAL—OUTSIDE ATTORNEYS’ EYES ONLY. Such
Protected Material produced by Non-Parties is subject to the limitations on
disclosure imposed by this Order, except for those in Section 7.4 above.

9.

UNAUTHORIZED DISCLOSURE OF PROTECTED MATERIAL

If a Receiving Party learns that, by inadvertence or otherwise, it has disclosed Protected
Material to any person or in any circumstance not authorized under this Order, the Receiving
Party must immediately (a) notify in writing the Designating Party of the unauthorized
disclosures, (b) use its best efforts to retrieve all unauthorized copies of the Protected Material,
and (c) inform the person or persons to whom unauthorized disclosures were made of all the
terms of this Order.
10.

INADVERTENT PRODUCTION OF PRIVILEGED OR OTHERWISE
PROTECTED MATERIAL
10.1

Duties on Receipt of Claim of Privilege in Inadvertently Produced
Information. When a Producing Party gives notice to a Receiving Party
that certain inadvertently produced material is subject to a claim of
privilege or other protection, the obligations of that Receiving Party are
those set forth in Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(b)(5)(B), except that
the Receiving Party may not use Disclosure or Discovery Material that the
Producing Party asserts is attorney-client privileged or work product
protected in any challenge to that assertion of privilege or protection,
including by submitting the information for in camera review by the
Court.
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10.2

Non-Waiver under Fed. R. Evid. 502(d). Pursuant to Federal Rule of
Evidence 502(d), the inadvertent production of any information to which a
claim of privilege or work product protection attaches is not a waiver in
this action or in any other federal or state proceeding.

10.3

Mere Fact of Production Does Not Constitute Waiver. The mere
production of Disclosure or Discovery Material in a litigation as part of a
production does not itself constitute a waiver for any purpose.

10.4

No Effect on Ethical Obligations. Nothing in this Order modifies any
person’s ethical duties regarding information to which a claim of attorneyclient privilege and/or work product protection may attach.

11.

MISCELLANEOUS
11.1

Right to Further Relief. Nothing in this Order abridges the right of any
person to seek its modification by the Court in the future.

11.2

Right to Assert Other Objections. By stipulating to the entry of this
Order no Party waives any right it otherwise would have to object to
disclosing or producing any information or item on any ground not
addressed in this Order. Similarly, no Party waives any right to object on
any ground to use in evidence of any of the material covered by this
Order.

11.3

Filing Under Seal: Any request to file under seal confidential documents,
things and/or information shall the procedures set forth in Stone v.
University of Maryland, 855 F.2d 178, 180-81 (4th Cir. 1988). Each time a
party seeks to file under seal any Protected Material, said party shall
accompany the request with a motion to seal and a supporting
memorandum of law specifying (a) the exact documents, things, and/or
information, or portions thereof, for which filing under seal is requested;

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(b) where it is necessary for the court to determine the source of the
public’s right to access before a request to seal may be evaluated, whether
any request to seal seeks to overcome the common law or First
Amendment presumption to access; (c) the specific qualities of the
material at issue which justify sealing such material, taking into account
the balance of competing interests in access; (d) the reasons why
alternatives to access are inadequate; and (e) whether there is consent to
the motion.

Finally, in addition to the motion and supporting

memorandum, said party must set out such findings in a proposed order to
seal for the court. When a party seeks to file confidential documents,
things and/or information, including confidential portions of any
transcript, a party shall submit such materials to the court in a sealed
envelope or other appropriately sealed container, which covering shall be
endorsed with the title of this action and a statement substantially in the
following form: “Filed Under Seal Pursuant to Protective Order.”
12.

FINAL DISPOSITION

Within ninety (90) days after the final disposition of this action, as defined in paragraph
4, each Receiving Party must return all Protected Material to the Producing Party or destroy
such material, including, for example, all copies, abstracts, compilations, summaries, and any
other format reproducing or capturing any of the Protected Material. Whether the Protected
Material is returned or destroyed, the Receiving Party must submit a written certification to the
Producing Party (and, if not the same person or entity, to the Designating Party) by the 90-day
deadline that affirms the Receiving Party has not retained any copies, abstracts, compilations,
summaries or any other format reproducing or capturing any of the Protected Material.
Notwithstanding this provision, Outside Counsel are entitled to retain an archival copy of all
pleadings, motion papers, trial, deposition, and hearing transcripts, legal memoranda,

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correspondence, deposition and trial exhibits, expert reports, attorney work product, testifying
and non-testifying expert work product, and copies of Protected Material created by the
operation of Outside Counsel’s backup and recovery tools. Any such archival copies that
contain or constitute Protected Material remain subject to this Order as set forth in Section 4
above.
13.

ADVICE TO CLIENTS

This Order shall not bar any attorney in the course of rendering advice to such
attorney’s client with respect to this litigation from conveying to any party client the attorney’s
evaluation in a general way of designated Disclosure or Discovery Material produced or
exchanged under the terms of this Order; provided, however, that in rendering such advice and
otherwise communicating with the client, the attorney shall not disclose the specific contents
of any Disclosure or Discovery Material produced by another party if such disclosure would be
contrary to the terms of this Protective Order.

31st
August
This the _____ day of _______________________, 2015.

LOUISE W. FLANAGAN
United States District Judge

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STIPULATED:

/s/ Lance A. Lawson
Lance A. Lawson
N.C. State Bar No. 23835
[e-mail]
MYERS BIGEL SIBLEY & SAJOVEC, P.A.
4140 Parklake Avenue
Suite 600
Raleigh, North Carolina 27612
Telephone: [phone]
Facsimile: [phone]
Attorneys for Krausz Industries Ltd.

/s/ Robert J. Morris
Robert J. Morris
N.C. State Bar No. 15981
[e-mail]
Francisco J. Benzoni
N.C. State Bar No. 38660
[e-mail]
SMITH, ANDERSON, BLOUNT, DORSETT, MITCHELL & JERNIGAN, LLP
2300 Wells Fargo Capitol Center
150 Fayetteville Street
Raleigh, North Carolina 27601
Telephone: [phone]
Facsimile: [phone]
Attorneys for Smith-Blair, Inc., Sensus USA, Inc.
and Sensus Manufacturing Shanghai Limited

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EXHIBIT A
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF NORTH CAROLINA
Western Division
No. 5:12-CV-00570-FL

KRAUSZ INDUSTRIES LTD.
f/k/a Krausz Metal Industries Ltd.,
Plaintiff,
v.
SMITH-BLAIR, INC., SENSUS USA,
INC. and SENSUS MANUFACTURING
SHANGHAI LIMITED,
Defendants.

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STIPULATED PROTECTIVE ORDER

ACKNOWLEDGMENT AND AGREEMENT TO BE BOUND
I, ____

_______________________ [print or type full name], of _
________________________________

_ [print or type full

address], declare under penalty of perjury that I have read in its entirety and understand the
Stipulated Protective Order entered by the United States District Court for the Eastern District of
North Carolina on _

_______________ [date] in the case of Krausz Industries Ltd. f/k/a

Krausz Metal Industries Ltd. v. Smith-Blair, Inc., Sensus USA, Inc. and Sensus Manufacturing
Shanghai Limited, No. 5:12-CV-00570-FL. I agree to comply with and to be bound by all the
terms of this Stipulated Protective Order, and I understand and acknowledge that failure to so
comply could expose me to sanctions and punishment in the nature of contempt. I solemnly
promise that I will not disclose in any manner any information or item that is subject to this
Stipulated Protective Order to any person or entity except in strict compliance with the
provisions of this Order.

I further agree to submit to the jurisdiction of the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of North Carolina for the purpose of enforcing the terms of this Stipulated Protective
Order, even if such enforcement proceedings occur after final disposition of this action.
Date:

City/State where sworn and signed:

Printed name:
Signature: __________________________________

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