GE Lighting Solutions, LLC v. Technical Consumer Products, Inc.

Filing 75

Order resolving the parties' pending discovery dispute. Please see order for specific conclusions, obligations, and deadlines. Judge John R. Adams on 7/18/14. (L,J)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
NORTHERN DISTRICT OF OHIO
EASTERN DIVISION

GE LIGHTING SOLUTIONS, LLC,

) CASE NO. 1:12-cv-3127
)
Plaintiff,
) JUDGE JOHN R. ADAMS
)
-vs)
) ORDER
TECHNICAL CONSUMER PRODUCTS, )
INC.,
)
)
Defendant.
)

This matter comes before this Court for resolution of a discovery dispute between the
plaintiff, GE Lighting Solutions, LLC (“GE”), and the defendant, Technical Consumer Products,
Inc. (“TCP”), in a patent infringement case. The Court requested position statements which were
received on July 2, 2014. Upon review of the position statements and their attachments, the
Court hereby ORDERS as follows:
1.

GE shall produce to TCP any and all settlement and any other agreements

concerning the patents-insuit with 14 days of this Order.
2.

With respect to GE’s initial infringement contentions, the Court directs GE to be

more specific as to why it believes that TCP’s products infringe its patents by indicating the
specific structure in the accused products that GE claims satisfies each limitation of the asserted
claims. Similar to Judge Polster’s order, GE shall accomplish this by “[u]sing pictures of the
accused product, GE shall identify the specific structure by highlighting it or using arrows. The
Court understands that this is difficult to do using a one-dimensional image of the product, but
GE shall make a good faith effort to identify the specific structure.” GE Lighting Solutions, LLC
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v. Lighting Science Group Corp., No. 2012-cv-3132, 12/03/2013 Docket Entry.

GE shall

comply with this Order within 7 days.
3.

The Court hereby DENIES GE’s request to seek discovery on an additional 436

TCP products not identified in the Complaint. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(b) requires
that discovery must relate to a matter, not privileged, that is relevant to a claim or defense.
Relevant information need not be admissible at trial but must be reasonably calculated to lead to
the discovery of admissible evidence. Id. The Court may limit discovery if the burden or expense
outweighs its likely benefit, taking certain factors into consideration.
The Court agrees that although at times it may be appropriate to permit discovery on
unaccused products, “a plaintiff is not entitled to accuse certain products of infringement, and
then ask for discovery on every other product on a mere suspicion that other products might
infringe as well.” 01 Communique Laboratory, Inc. v. Citrix Systems, Inc., Slip Copy, 2014 WL
2506250, at *4 n. 6 (N.D. Ohio, June 3, 2014) (citing Honeywell Intern. Inc. v. Audiovox
Communications Corp., 2005 WL 3988905, at *2 n. 2 (D.Del. Oct. 7, 2005)).
Although GE has identified and seeks information on 436 TCP products not identified in
the Complaint, the Court finds that the identification at this point consists of “mere suspicion” of
infringement. Without more than this mere suspicion, GE’s request is unduly burdensome on
TCP and the burden outweighs the likely benefits of allowing the discovery. Accordingly, at this
time the Court denies GE’s request to conduct discovery on an additional 436 TCP products not
identified in the Complaint
4.

GE seeks a Court order requiring TCP to provide following categories of

documents: (1) corporate organization, personnel, facilities, divisions, and similar documents,
other than one organization chart; (2) financial documents and business plans for the Accused

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Lamps; (3) documents concerning the patents-in-suit or this litigation; (4) complete design,
testing, and manufacturing documents on the Accused Products; and (5) agreements with third
parties, including patent licenses. GE claims these documents are relevant to GE’s claims and
TCP’s defenses. TCP does not dispute its responsibility to provide the requested documents,
should they exist, and proposed a “substantial completion date” of July 14, 2014 for producing
the outstanding documents.
TCP is ORDERED to fully respond to the outstanding discovery requests or indicate why
no document exists within 7 days of this Order.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: July 18, 2014

/s/ John R. Adams____
_______
UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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