Justia Daily Opinion Summaries

Intellectual Property
October 13, 2023

Table of Contents

Pauwels v. Deloitte LLP

Contracts, Intellectual Property, Labor & Employment Law, Trademark

US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit

Calsep v. Dabral

Civil Procedure, Contracts, Intellectual Property, Trademark

US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit

Schwendimann v. Neenah, Inc.

Intellectual Property, Patents

US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit

Sisvel International, S.A. v. Sierra Wireless, ULC

Intellectual Property, Patents

US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit

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Pauwels v. Deloitte LLP

Court: US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit

Docket: 22-21

Opinion Date: October 6, 2023

Judge: Robert David Sack

Areas of Law: Contracts, Intellectual Property, Labor & Employment Law, Trademark

Defendants Bank of New York Mellon Corporation, LLP and its subsidiary, The Bank of New York Mellon (collectively, “BNYM”), retained Plaintiff as an independent contractor to work on an investment valuation project. Plaintiff developed the so-called Pauwels Model. At various times between 2014 and the end of his working relationship with BNYM in 2018, Plaintiff shared spreadsheets derived from the Pauwels Model with various employees and executives at BNYM. In 2016, BNYM retained Defendants Deloitte LLP, Deloitte Tax LLP, and Deloitte USA LLP (collectively, “Deloitte”) to take over the work that Plaintiff had been performing for BNYM. Plaintiff alleged that Deloitte used the spreadsheets to reverse engineer the Pauwels Model and was using the model to conduct the services it provided to BNYM. Plaintiff brought suit against BNYM and Deloitte, alleging, among other claims, that the Pauwels Model embodied a trade secret that they misappropriated.
 
The Second Circuit reversed and remanded the district court’s judgment insofar as it dismissed Plaintiff’s unjust enrichment claim. The court affirmed the remainder of the judgment. The court explained that misappropriation is not an element of a claim for unjust enrichment under New York law. Therefore, a plaintiff’s claim for unjust enrichment does not necessarily rise or fall with a claim of trade secret misappropriation. The court explained that because Plaintiff’s theory of liability is distinct from those underpinning Plaintiff’s claim for trade secret misappropriation, his claim for unjust enrichment should not have been dismissed as duplicative of his claim for trade secret misappropriation.

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Calsep v. Dabral

Court: US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit

Docket: 22-20440

Opinion Date: October 11, 2023

Judge: Edith Brown Clement

Areas of Law: Civil Procedure, Contracts, Intellectual Property, Trademark

Seven years ago, A.D. was hired to create a PVT (“pressure volume temperature”) simulation software program. Sah was hired by A.D. to develop a PVT software program in exchange for a stake in one of A.D.’s companies, IPSS. Eight months later, a product called InPVT hit the market. Plaintiff Calsep started looking into InPVT. In Calsep’s assessment, A.D. didn’t have the technical skills or resources to develop a PVT product. Calsep filed another motion to compel, alleging that A.D. still hadn’t adequately disclosed his source code control system. Although A.D. had “produced [a] purported source code system” in April and July, Calsep claimed that these productions were “undoubtedly incomplete” and “had been manipulated.” Believing the deletions to be intentional, Calsep filed a motion for sanctions. Afterward, A.D. filed a motion for reconsideration based on newly discovered forensic images that “vindicated” him. The magistrate judge recommended denying the motion, and the district court agreed, denying the motion for reconsideration of the sanctions order. A.D. appealed.
 
The Fifth Circuit affirmed the district court’s decision on A.D.'s motion for reconsideration. The court explained that A.D. cannot offer any reason—other than mere forgetfulness—why he couldn’t acquire the images sooner. Further, A.D. hasn’t shown that he acted with diligence during the case to locate these images. Moreover, the court explained that although A.D. argues that the images change the game, Calsep’s expert insists that too much data is still missing from the source code control system, rendering a proper review impossible. The court noted that there was no reason to question the district court’s judgment crediting Calsep’s expert testimony.

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Schwendimann v. Neenah, Inc.

Court: US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit

Docket: 22-1333

Opinion Date: October 6, 2023

Judge: Raymond Charles Clevenger, III

Areas of Law: Intellectual Property, Patents

Schwendimann owns the challenged patents, which relate to transfer sheets and methods for transferring images onto dark-colored fabrics. Multi-layer image transfer sheets for transferring images onto fabrics were well known in the prior art but Schwendimann’s patents claimed a single-step solution whereby the white background was incorporated into the image transfer sheet, allowing the white background and dark image to be applied simultaneously onto the dark fabric.

On inter partes review, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board found all claims of three patents and multiple claims of the fourth patent unpatentable as obvious in view of prior art. The Federal Circuit affirmed. Substantial evidence supported the Board’s finding that a skilled artisan would be motivated to combine prior art.

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Sisvel International, S.A. v. Sierra Wireless, ULC

Court: US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit

Docket: 22-1493

Opinion Date: October 6, 2023

Judge: Raymond T. Chen

Areas of Law: Intellectual Property, Patents

Sisvel’s 561 patent relates to methods of channel coding when transmitting data in radio systems. Channel coding is a technique that adds redundant information to a data block, thereby creating a coded data block. To account for problems from noise and interference during data transmission, the redundant data allows a receiver to more accurately detect and correct errors in the transmitted data, but at the cost of requiring more bandwidth and network resource usage. The 561 patent uses techniques called “link adaptation” and “incremental redundancy,” which it asserts improves prior channel coding techniques.

On inter partes review, the Patent Trial and Appeal Board found four claims unpatentable but upheld five other claims. The Federal Circuit affirmed the findings of unpatentability. Prior art (Chen) does disclose a second puncturing pattern for transmission of selected code symbols and the Board provided a sufficiently detailed explanation to support its finding that Chen discloses the “combining” limitation. The Board acknowledged Sisvel’s argument that Chen includes a statement that “retransmitted packets are interleaved (not combined).” The court vacated in part, with respect to the claims that were upheld.

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