Goldman Ismail Secures Federal Circuit Win In Uniloc Patent Litigation

A Goldman Ismail team led by partner Doug Winnard successfully represented Apple in an appeal before the Federal Circuit in connection with a litigation campaign brought by Uniloc, a prolific non-practicing entity. The appeal stems from an issue raised by Apple regarding Uniloc’s standing to assert numerous patents in its portfolio against defendants nationwide. As a result of Apple’s challenge to Uniloc’s standing, Uniloc has already dismissed dozens of cases. Uniloc also has attempted to seal large quantities of information about its potential lack of standing and its relationship with a funding entity called Fortress. Uniloc’s sealing request attracted the attention of public interest group Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), which intervened and opposed Uniloc’s sealing request. Judge William Alsup of the Northern District of California rejected Uniloc’s attempt to seal these documents as substantively and procedurally improper.

In a precedential opinion, the Federal Circuit adopted Apple’s proposed remedy, finding that—as Apple had argued—Uniloc’s flagrant violations of the district court’s local rules warranted denying Uniloc’s sealing requests and placing a substantial amount of its information regarding the underlying standing challenge in the public domain.  The Federal Circuit remanded for further consideration as to issues relating to third parties.  Apple is still actively litigating its underlying standing challenge.

Doug Winnard argued the case for Apple, assisted on the briefs by Alan Littmann, Michael Pieja, and Lauren Abendshien.