EMG Technology, LLC v. Apple, Inc.

Filing 209

MOTION to Change Venue by Apple, Inc., American Airlines, Inc., Dell Inc., Hyatt Corporation, Marriott International, Inc., Barnes & Noble, Inc.. (Attachments: # 1 Declaration, # 2 Exhibit A, # 3 Exhibit B, # 4 Exhibit C, # 5 Exhibit D, # 6 Exhibit E, # 7 Exhibit F, # 8 Exhibit G, # 9 Exhibit H, # 10 Exhibit I, # 11 Exhibit J, # 12 Exhibit K - Part 1, # 13 Exhibit K - Part 2, # 14 Exhibit L, # 15 Exhibit M, # 16 Exhibit N, # 17 Exhibit O, # 18 Exhibit P, # 19 Exhibit Q, # 20 Exhibit R, # 21 Exhibit S, # 22 Exhibit T, # 23 Exhibit U, # 24 Exhibit V, # 25 Exhibit W, # 26 Text of Proposed Order)(Rambin, Daymon)

EMG Technology, LLC v. Apple, Inc.

Doc. 209 Att. 23

EXHIBIT U

Dockets.Justia.com

Grant Gottfurcht - 12/16/2009 Page 1

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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT EASTERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS TYLER DIVISION EMG TECHNOLOGY, LLC, Plaintiff, vs. APPLE, INC., AMERICAN AIRLINES, INC., DELL, INC., HYATT CORPORATION, MARRIOTT INTERNATIONAL, INC. & BARNES & NOBLE, INC., Defendants. ) ) ) ) )Case No. )6:08-cv-447(LED) ) )VOLUME I ) ) ) ) )

DEPOSITION OF: GRANT GOTTFURCHT WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 16, 2009 10:19 A.M.

Reported by:

SUSAN LYNN POBOR CSR No. 5132
Merrill Legal Solutions - Houston

1-888-513-9800

www.merrillcorp.com/law

Grant Gottfurcht - 12/16/2009
Page 86 Page 88

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Q. And you heard your lawyer, Mr. Becker, tell the judge that you and your father were unsophisticated with respect to technology. Right? A. I don't recall if those were his exact words. Q. Is that an accurate statement? A. I don't -- I don't recall. Q. I'm not asking whether those were the exact words. Is it an accurate statement that you and your father are unsophisticated with respect to technology? A. You'd have to define "unsophisticated." Q. As you would normally understand that word. MR. BECKER: Object. Form. THE WITNESS: I think there's different degrees of being unsophisticated. You would have to be specific. BY MR. STEPHENS: Q. Okay. So you disagree? You'd say that you are not unsophisticated with respect to technology. Is that right?
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A. I don't know. Maybe he had an understanding of what he was telling him. Q. So you didn't understand what Mr. Becker meant when he said to the judge that you and your father are unsophisticated with respect to technology. Is that right? A. No. Q. Okay. What -A. I just -- I didn't think about it at the time. Q. Okay. A. I didn't even know -- I don't even know if those were the exact words he used. I would have to -- you know, maybe if there's a transcript and I could read it back and then I could hypothetically -Q. Are you denying that he used those words? A. I don't recall, I really don't. Q. Okay. Do you think they're accurate or not? MR. BECKER: Object. Form. THE WITNESS: Again, I don't know. BY MR. STEPHENS: Q. Okay. Now, he also told the judge that
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A. I'm not a programmer, I'm not an engineer. If that's your definition of being sophisticated, then I'm unsophisticated in that aspect of technology. Q. I don't have a definition. I'm asking the way you interpreted what Mr. Becker told the judge. MR. BECKER: Object. Form. BY MR. STEPHENS: Q. Do you agree what he told the judge was true with respect to you and your father's level of sophistication regarding the technology? A. It's a broad statement, so I would not -- I would not be able to answer as to Mr. -- my attorney, what he was inferring. Q. So you don't know whether what he told the judge was true or not? MR. BECKER: Object. Form. THE WITNESS: I don't know what he was thinking when he used the word "unsophisticated." Q. Well, neither did the judge. Right? MR. BECKER: Object. Form. BY MR. STEPHENS: Q. Right?

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you're not experts in the field. Is that accurate? A. Could be. Q. "Yes" or "no"? Is it? A. If experts are defined as programmers and -- and, you know, people who are -- work daily in the field of engineering or programming or have degrees, then that would be accurate. Q. Is that what you understood Mr. Becker to mean when he told the judge you were not experts in the field? A. No. Q. What did you understand it to mean? A. I didn't even think about it. There was a conversation, there was a lot of people on the phone. There was, I think, ten people in conference, and things were going back and forth, and I didn't really understand it to mean anything -Q. Okay. A. -- at the time. Q. He also -- Mr. Becker also told the judge that you and your father had helped capturing the inventions you conceived. Do you remember that?

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Grant Gottfurcht - 12/16/2009
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And so it made sense for me to -- as a salesperson, to hang it under him; therefore, I would be able to get a full commission on -- on a real estate transaction. So as far as looking for clients to buy and sell real estate, that was something I was doing on my own. Q. Did your father back you in any of your real estate ventures? A. He might have loaned me some money on some of the spec homes I had done. Q. Is he an investor in your yoga activity? A. No, he's not. Q. Do you have any outside investors in that? A. No, I do not. Q. Have you discussed with your father what you will do with the proceeds from this lawsuit? A. The only thing discussed is giving a part of it to charity, 50 percent to charity. Q. What's your understanding of what will happen with the rest? A. That it would be put into, I guess, EMG. Q. Would it end up in the trusts? A. I don't know exactly.
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there. A. I have 497 and 196. My overall understanding of what he did was work on some of the graphical interfaces. Q. Anything else? A. I don't know. Q. Okay. A. I know he was part of the group at Online Labs. I don't know what input he had in some of these flow charts. He might have had some input, he might have not. I don't know. Q. When is the first time that you met with patent lawyers in connection with the invention? A. Probably the first week of July of 1999. Q. What do you remember about that meeting? A. I don't recall a lot about the meeting. Q. Do you remember where it was? A. It's been awhile. I don't recall if it was first by phone or if we went into his office, Tom Coester. The firm was Blakely Sokoloff, and his offices I believe were in West L.A. Q. Do you remember anything else about that meeting? A. Not specifically beyond what I've told
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Q. What's your expectation? A. I would assume that it would. Q. And that ultimately, you'd be the beneficiary of at least part of the money that comes into this lawsuit. Right? A. Yes. Q. I'm handing you E. Gottfurcht 12. Take a look at that and tell me if you've seen that before. A. I don't recall. Q. What's your understanding of the role of the other inventors in the patents in this lawsuit? A. They were hired to work on some of the technical specifications for the patent. Q. And what did they do? A. They put together some flow charts and diagrams. Q. Anything else? A. Not that I could recall. Q. What's your understanding of Mr. Long's contribution to the 845 patent? A. The 845? Do you have a copy of that? Q. It should be one of those you have

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you. Q. Who participated besides you and Mr. Coester? A. Elliot Gottfurcht. Q. Anybody else? A. No. Q. Now, can you tell me the difference between the 459 patent and the 845 or 196 patent? The disclosures are different, and I'd like for you to tell me your understanding of why they're different. A. Can you repeat which patents you're talking about? Q. Yeah. What -- you've got the -- tell me which ones you have. A. 196, 497. Q. Okay. Yeah, what's the difference between the disclosures in those two patents? A. There's different dates. Q. Yeah, one is later. Right? A. Yes. One was issued July 29, 2003; one was October 21st, 2008. Q. I'm wondering where the 845 patent went. Is it in that stack somewhere?

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Grant Gottfurcht - 12/16/2009
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A. Pressing the screen if the button's on the screen. Q. Yeah, okay. I -- I don't mean virtual buttons on the screen. I mean like a keyboard button. You didn't mean that. Right? A. No. Q. Okay. So as you understood it, "manipulating a region of the screen for scrolling and/or zooming" meant only touching something on the screen. Is that right? MR. BECKER: Object. Form. THE WITNESS: It was -- it was my -- yeah, that's what I envisioned. BY MR. STEPHENS: Q. Okay. Did someone else come up with the idea of pushing a physical button to cause scrolling and/or zooming? A. I don't know. I don't recall. Q. You're not aware of anybody coming up with that idea? A. I don't recall. MR. STEPHENS: Okay. I have no more questions.
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(Whereupon the deposition was concluded at 4:28 p.m.)

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I do want to say, though, that we did address the issue of the assertion of privilege today, but I don't think we addressed the issue of waiver of privilege, so we still may revisit that issue. But I don't have any more questions. MR. BECKER: Anything further? Is American asking questions? MR. GENET: No, not today. MR. BECKER: Okay. Thank you. No questions for me. THE VIDEOGRAPHER: This concludes Volume I in the deposition of Grant Gottfurcht. The number of tapes used was two. The original videotapes will be retained by Merrill Legal Solutions, Woodland Hills. Going off the record. The time is 4:26 p.m. COURT REPORTER: And I'll send you both your roughs. MR. STEPHENS: Thank you. MR. BECKER: Thank you. COURT REPORTER: And you just want the copy, no rough. Correct? MR. GENET: Yes, thank you.

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PENALTY OF PERJURY

I hereby declare I am the deponent in the within matter; that I have read the foregoing proceeding and know the contents thereof and I declare that the same is true of my knowledge except as to the matters which are therein stated upon my information or belief, and as to those matters I believe it to be true. I declare under penalty of perjury that the foregoing is true and correct. Executed on the ______ day of __________________, 2009, at ____________________, California.

_________________________________ GRANT GOTTFURCHT

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Grant Gottfurcht - 12/16/2009
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STATE OF CALIFORNIA ) ) ) ss. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES ) I, SUSAN LYNN POBOR, Certified Shorthand Reporter No. 5132 for the State of California, do hereby certify: That prior to being examined, the witness named in the foregoing deposition, was duly sworn to testify the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth; That said deposition was taken down by me in shorthand at the time and place therein named and thereafter reduced by me to typewritten form and that the same is a true, correct, and complete transcript of said proceedings. Before completion of the deposition, review of the transcript [X] was [ ] was not requested. If requested, any changes made by the deponent (and provided to the reporter) during the period allowed are appended hereto. I further certify that I am not interested in the outcome of the action. Witness my hand this _____ day of ______________, 2009. ______________________________ Susan Lynn Pobor, CSR No. 5132

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