Intellectual Property Litigation

For more than 40 years, our Intellectual Property Litigation practice has delivered exceptional results for plaintiffs and defendants in complex intellectual property disputes. Our experience includes patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, unfair competition and antitrust issues. We are also brought in to resolve significant commercial disputes involving technology.

Our team helps industry leaders, startups, leading academic institutions and multinational biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies solve their most challenging problems. Many of our clients are pushing the frontiers of technology, and we partner with them at the frontiers of the law to help them achieve their most important business goals.

As lead counsel, we have litigated patents from nearly every technology discipline, including software, semiconductors, computer peripherals, visual effects, biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, medical products, telecommunications, industrial machinery, video games and e-commerce. Our victories range from jury verdicts in the hundreds of millions of dollars—including the largest damage award ever affirmed in a published decision by a California appellate court to more than $1.7 billion paid to DVR market leader TiVo in patent infringement litigation. The breadth of our work is international in scope, and we have substantial experience coordinating global litigation strategies for clients spanning the U.S., Europe and Asia.

Key to our success is the incredible talent and relentless drive of our litigators, who are nationally known as leaders in the field and praised by clients and colleagues:

• "Highly creative—Irell never just uses the same old playbook." – Chambers USA
• "Irell's lawyers are some of the most thorough, diligent and detailed-oriented practitioners you could hope to have on your side. They turn out brilliant results as a matter of course." – Intellectual Asset Management's IAM Patent 1000
• "The lawyers here are some of the most intellectually rigorous around, so while cases are staffed leanly, clients are never left wanting for the finest legal insight." – World Trademark Review's WTR 1000

Our team brings extraordinary qualifications and a high level of creativity to every matter. Many of our litigators have advanced technical degrees and professional experience in private industry, and all of them boast extraordinary academic records. We work collectively to solve the kinds of problems other firms can’t solve, and we draw upon the minds of our entire group—including associates and partners—to come up with the most novel and successful approaches to legal strategy. We are often brought in to take over and turn around “unwinnable” cases after serious losses by other firms.

Our practice includes more than 20 registered patent attorneys who practice before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB), representing clients in all manner of post-issuance proceedings, including inter partes review (IPR), covered business method, post-grant review and ex parte reexamination. The group includes a former chief administrative patent judge of the PTAB who was instrumental in drafting the post-grant provisions of the America Invents Act. Frequently, our group handles patent cases before the PTAB along with co-pending infringement litigation in federal district courts. Our tight-knit team coordinates closely, thinking one step ahead on issues such as claim construction to provide a unified legal strategy for both paths of litigation.

In addition to patent litigation, we regularly represent clients in high-profile copyright and trademark litigation in state and federal courts and before administrative agencies. We represent clients before the USPTO Trademark Trial and Appeal Board and the Court of Appeals to bring and defend oppositions and petitions to cancel. We represent both plaintiffs and defendants in copyright and trademark litigation, seeking and defending temporary restraining orders, preliminary injunctions and trials on the merits. 

Irell Technical Analysis Laboratory

Irell is home to the Technical Analysis Laboratory, a unique facility housed in our Los Angeles office. The lab allows us to quickly and inexpensively conduct product teardowns, scientific analysis, and massive simulations, entirely in-house. In our intellectual property practice, the lab helps our lawyers and scientists investigate infringement and validity on real products and conduct quantitative damages experiments all while saving our clients the considerable time and expense required to shop for experts and wait for outside results. The lab is run by science advisor Thomas Barr and IP litigator Amy Proctor.

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Experience

• Juno Therapeutics, Inc. and Sloan Kettering Institute for Cancer Research v. Kite Pharma, Inc. In December 2019, convinced a jury in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California to award Sloan Kettering Institute for Cancer Research and Juno Therapeutics, Inc. $752 million in a patent infringement suit against Kite Pharma Inc. The jury also found that Kite willfully infringed the patent for cancer immunotherapy known as CAR T-cell therapy. In April 2020, a judge enhanced the award to $1.2 billion.
• Optis Wireless Technology LLC et al. v. Apple Inc. In August 2020, persuaded a federal jury to award PanOptis its full damages request of $506.2 million in past damages in a patent infringement suit against Apple involving 4G LTE technology. The jury in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas found Apple infringed claims of the five patents at issue and determined all asserted claims were valid. The panel also found Apple's infringement was willful. The case was the first patent jury trial in the nation since the pandemic began. The court finalized the award in February 2021. 
• Peter v. NantKwest. In December 2019, persuaded the U.S. Supreme Court to unanimously side with NantKwest, Inc. and reject the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s position that applicants who appeal to a district court must pay the agency’s legal bills, regardless of who wins. NantKwest is developing cancer treatments using natural killer cells. 
• United Services Automobile Association v. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. In separate cases on behalf of United Services Automobile Association, persuaded juries to award $102 million and $200 million and individual findings of willful infringement against Wells Fargo relating to patents for mobile remote deposit capture technology. 
• Finjan Inc. v. Juniper Networks, Inc. Successfully defended Juniper against a patent infringement lawsuit, convincing a jury in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California that Juniper did not infringe a malware detection patent held by Finjan Inc. Finjan asserted seven computer security patents against Juniper. The judge ordered each party to select the patent claim it felt was the strongest and move for early summary judgment on that claim in a proceeding the judge called a “Patent Showdown.” Juniper prevailed on summary judgment for the claim it selected, and defeated Finjan’s summary judgment motion – setting up the trial on what Finjan had selected as its strongest claim. During the trial, Irell persuaded the court that Finjan, which sought $60 million in damages, had not presented sufficient evidence to support a damages claim. The eight-member jury also delivered a unanimous finding of non-infringement for Juniper. After the trial, the judge ordered a second round of the “Patent Showdown.” Once again, Juniper obtained summary judgment on the claim it selected. Not only did Juniper defeat Finjan’s motion, but it also convinced the court to enter summary judgment in Juniper’s favor on that claim. Shortly after the ruling, Finjan voluntarily dismissed its remaining claims against Juniper. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued a summary affirmance on appeal.
• Zahourek Systems, Inc. v. Balanced Body University, LLC. Convinced the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit to reverse a district court’s summary judgment ruling against a client in a copyright infringement dispute over a sculpture of a human skeleton with muscles. The Tenth Circuit’s July 2020 published opinion revived client Jon Zahourek’s infringement suit against Balanced Body University, LLC involving the giant skeleton Zahourek created known as “the Maniken.” Before Zahourek hired Irell, the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado held that the sculpture was a “useful article” and not protectable by copyright. After the ruling, the client hired Irell to represent him on appeal, and the Tenth Circuit agreed with the firm’s argument that the court’s “useful article” analysis was flawed. The opinion remanded the case for further consideration.

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