Alan J. Heinrich

Alan Heinrich is a partner in the Los Angeles office of Irell & Manella LLP, where he is a member of the firm’s litigation, intellectual property litigation and appellate groups. He currently serves on the firm's Executive Committee and as Chair of the Hiring Committee.

Mr. Heinrich’s practice focuses on complex business and intellectual property litigation at both the trial court and appellate court levels. Mr. Heinrich has been recognized by Chambers & Partners as "Up and Coming" in the area of intellectual property law in the 2008 Chambers USA Leading Lawyers for Business Guide and as a "rising star in intellectual property litigation" in the 2009 edition of the Legal 500 United States. From 2006-2011, Mr. Heinrich has been selected for inclusion in Los Angeles Magazine's Southern California "Rising Stars" in intellectual property litigation. In 2013, he has been selected for inclusion in Los Angeles Magazine's Southern California "Super Lawyers."

Mr. Heinrich earned his J.D., summa cum laude, from Loyola Law School in 2000, where he was valedictorian of his class and chief articles editor of the Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review. In 2000–2001, he served as law clerk to the Honorable Diarmuid F. O'Scannlain, Circuit Judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in Portland, Oregon. Mr. Heinrich received a B.A., magna cum laude, from Washington and Lee University and a Ph.D. in Classics from the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Mr. Heinrich is a member of UCLA's Adjunct Faculty, where he teaches an advanced patent law class. He has also taught Federal Courts at Loyola Law School.

Representative Matters

Nortel Networks Patent Acquisition
Represented Research In Motion on intellectual property issues in connection with its $777 million investment in a consortium that acquired a substantial majority of the former Nortel Networks patent portfolio for $4.5 billion.  The portfolio consisted of approximately 4,000 patent assets related to a broad array of networking, communications and internet technologies.  The deal was one of the largest public sales of intellectual property assets in history and was the recipient of the 2012 International Financial Law Review M&A Deal of the Year Award.    

St. Jude Medical v. Access Closure, Inc. (W.D. Ark.)
Represented St. Jude Medical in a patent case alleging infringement of St. Jude's patents relating to vascular closure devices.  In December 2010, the jury returned a verdict of willful patent infringement and awarded St. Jude $27.1 million in damages, reportedly the largest jury verdict in any area of law in the Western District of Arkansas.  Mr. Heinrich handled St. Jude's damages case at trial.

Immersion Corp. v. Sony Computer Entertainment (N.D. Cal.)
Represented Immersion Corporation, a leading developer of "haptic" technologies that allow people to interact with computers using their sense of touch, in a patent infringement lawsuit alleging that various PlayStation game products infringe two Immersion patents relating to computer-controlled vibrotactile technologies.  In September 2004, after a five-week trial, the jury returned a verdict in favor of Immersion, finding all asserted patent claims valid and infringed and awarding $82 million in damages.  In February 2007, after Immersion prevailed in a series of post-trial proceedings, Sony paid Immersion more than $150 million, which included Sony's satisfaction in full of the judgment, as well as payment of interest, compulsory license fees, and future royalties.  Mr. Heinrich also represented Immersion in patent litigation against Microsoft Corporation, which settled in July 2003.

Sony Computer Entertainment America v. Dudas (E.D. Va.)
Represented intervenor Immersion Corporation in a case of first impression involving the Patent and Trademark Office's discretion to suspend an inter partes reexamination under the American Inventors Protection Act of 1999.  Sony brought suit after the PTO granted Immersion's petitions to suspend reexamination proceedings that Sony initiated following Immersion's successful patent infringement action in federal district court.  The court upheld the PTO's suspension order, granting summary judgment in favor of Immersion and the PTO.  The PTO has cited the district court's decision as authoritative precedent in the latest editions of the Manual of Patent Examining Procedure.

Peer Communications v. eBay and Skype (E.D. Tex.)
Represented defendants eBay and Skype in a patent infringement suit related to internet communications, including what is known as VoIP (voice over internet protocol).  The plaintiff was a subsidiary of Acacia Research Corp.  After claim construction, the district court entered judgment for eBay and Skype based on patent invalidity and dismissed the case with prejudice.  The judgment was affirmed by the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

Net2Phone v. eBay and Skype (D.N.J.); eBay v. IDT and Net2Phone (W.D. Ark.)
Represented eBay and Skype in several patent infringement lawsuits related to internet communications, including VoIP (voice over internet protocol) and calling card technology.  Net2Phone first filed suit in New Jersey.  eBay subsequently filed suit in Arkansas against Net2Phone and its parent IDT.  Although filed two years later, eBay's case in Arkansas was scheduled for trial well before Net2Phone's case in New Jersey.  Both cases settled successfully shortly before trial.

Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation v. Intel Corp. (W.D. Wis.)
Represented the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation ("WARF"), the patent management and licensing entity for the University of Wisconsin, in litigation against Intel.  WARF alleged that Intel's flagship Core Microarchitecture infringed a patent that arose from research at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.  Three days before trial, Intel and WARF settled the case. 

Avago Technologies Ltd. v. PixArt Imaging, Inc. (N.D. Cal.)
Represented Avago Technologies in a patent infringement case involving optical navigation technology for optical computer mouse applications.  The accused products were PixArt's CMOS optical mouse sensors.  The case settled successfully for Avago, with PixArt agreeing to take a worldwide license to certain Avago intellectual property.

Forterra Systems v. IMVU (N.D. Cal.)
Represented IMVU, an online avatar-based chat service and recipient of the 2008 Virtual Worlds Innovation Award, in a patent infringement suit involving three-dimensional multi-user internet chat technology.  The case settled successfully for IMVU after the district court issued a claim construction order that substantially adopted all of IMVU's proposed claim constructions and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office rejected all of Forterra's asserted claims in an inter partes reexamination proceeding instituted by IMVU.

Interplay Inc. v. Citicorp Real Estate, Inc. (L.A. Sup. Ct.)
Represented Citicorp Real Estate on plaintiff's claims for misappropriation of trade secrets and other state law tort claims.  In 2002, the court granted CREI's motion for nonsuit at trial and entered judgment in favor of CREI.  Mr. Heinrich argued the appeal, in which the judgment for CREI was affirmed in full.

Bar & Court Admissions

• 2001, California
• 2001, U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit
• 2002, U.S. District Court, Central and Northern Districts of California
• 2005, U.S. Court of Appeals, Federal Circuit