Haines & Associates Partners with Woodcock Washburn LLP in Multi-Million Dollar Patent Infringement Lawsuit Against National Semiconductor

The Legal Intelligencer
By Gina Passarella

May 22, 2008

Plaintiffs attorney Cliff Haines of Haines & Associates met Woodcock Washburn policy committee member Steve Rocci more than a decade ago when Rocci was referred to him regarding an injury he suffered.

Haines took on the case and the two proceeded to trial, picking a jury Sept. 11, 2001. Rocci wasn't ultimately the victor in the suit, but he said he always remembered how Haines connected with the jury. So it was Haines he thought of when a potentially large intellectual property suit crossed his desk.

Woodcock Washburn had represented the predecessor company to eTool Development Inc. and its subsidiary eTool Patent Holdings Corp., formerly known as Chemical Domain Inc. Its founder, Eric Norris, is the son of Woodcock Washburn counsel Norman Norris.

When eTool Development felt its only patent was being infringed, it turned to Woodcock Washburn and the firm investigated the claim. Rocci said he knew at the outset this would be a large case. His client was looking to bring a suit against National Semiconductor Corp. for infringing upon eTool Development's patent number 7,113,919, known as a "system and method for configuring products over a communications network."

The patent deals with a system for use by suppliers and distributors to catalog and research various uses for component parts in a number of industries — like the chemical and electronics industries — all done over a network such as the Internet.

Estimates put potential damages to eTool Development at $100 million per year, and the plaintiff is seeking to treble those damages under a finding of liability for willful infringement — directly and indirectly — through National Semiconductor's use of a similar system, WEBENCH, and its encouragement of others to use its system.

Rocci and Haines decided to try the case in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas — a jurisdiction known for streamlined local patent rules, a fast-moving docket and some large plaintiff verdicts in intellectual property suits. That trend was questioned in a recent article in The American Lawyer titled "Taming Texas," which examined an end to a long string of plaintiff wins out of Marshall, Texas.

But Haines said they felt comfortable with the venue because they "wouldn't get bogged down educating a judge that never saw a patent case before." It was also a jurisdiction, Rocci said, the team thought it could hold on to in case National Semiconductor challenges the venue. The company is based in Northern California but has facilities in Dallas, he said.

Rocci and Haines — who admittedly refer to their arrangement as a bit of an experiment — are covering all their bases. When searching for local counsel, the pair interviewed a few firms in late 2007 and went with Richard Sayles of Sayles Werbner in Dallas. He had worked with Woodcock Washburn on two previous bio-pharma cases and his firm has ties to the Marshall area.

Haines said they were also quick to bring in a jury consultant — also from Texas. While he might not do that for most cases until they are about ready to go to trial, Haines said it's never a bad idea to talk through the issues and learn what a local jury would be receptive to.

And that's really Haines' role in this case. Woodcock Washburn has litigators on board, but Rocci, who has tried cases himself, said this was a large matter that really required the experience of what he called a "jury trial boutique." Rocci said they are expecting a fight in this case, which they anticipate going to trial by late 2009 or early 2010.

Aside from teaming up with local counsel when the firm is working outside the Delaware or Pennsylvania region, Rocci said it's the exception and not the rule for Woodcock Washburn to bring in outside litigators to help try a case.

For Haines, this setup is a first. He has never tried an intellectual property case but has been thinking of expanding the services his firm offers and this was one way to do that.

While Haines said he has homework to do on some of the legal issues, he's not so worried about becoming an expert on patent law or technology issues in the next few months because he doesn't want the jury to have to focus on those details either.

But just in case, he decided to brush up on the practice. Haines audited Rocci's patent litigation course at Temple University's Beasley School of Law this past semester.

Haines joked that he was asked to take the final to improve the curve, but there was no word from his professor on the final grade.

When it comes time to put that training to good use, Haines said he would most likely present the damages issue to the jury, and Sayles would handle the liability side. All of the attorneys, however, will be making the trip down to Texas.

Woodcock Washburn has a team of attorneys handling the case, and Jim Wells and Pat Campbell of Haines & Associates will also work on the case. Haines said his firm would direct a considerable amount of resources toward the matter. There's a lot of work to be done by all three firms given the fast pace of patent trials in Eastern Texas, Rocci and Haines said.

National Semiconductor has not yet responded to the suit, which was filed May 9, and attorneys for the company were unknown at the time of publication.